434 



RECREA TION. 



will prove impossible. If a man claimed 

 to do 60 or 70 centuries in the year he 

 would be looked on as exceptional, but this 

 man expects to do this and 300 more such 

 rides, as well. He won't get through." 



The English writer is correct in char- 

 acterizing this effort as an abuse of cycling. 

 It is more than this. It is a piece of brutal 

 self-abuse, and should, like the 6 days' race, 

 be prohibited by law. 



The policeman looked after the man on 

 the bicycle and shook his head doubtfully. 

 He watched him wabble up the street and 

 then wabble back again, and was sorely 

 troubled. 



" Hi, there! " he' yelled at last. " Git off 

 that wheel wanst, till I see whether you're 

 drunk! " — Chicago Post. 



Nearly every city in the United States, 

 where cycling is popular, has an ordinance 

 requiring that every bicycle in use on the 

 public highways, after dark, be provided 

 with a lighted lamp. Not many such cities 

 have seen the wisdom of extending this law 

 to all other classes of vehicles, however. 

 Chicago and New York took the initiative 

 in this respect, last summer, and Phila- 

 delphia was the next to follow their ex- 

 ample, having enacted a " universal lights " 

 law this spring, to the everlasting chagrin 

 of a number of other municipalities which 

 pride themselves on their progressiveness. 



Chicago wheelmen labored sedulously for 

 a long time to accomplish a result that in 

 the end was realized almost by accident. 

 Through the local daily and cycling press 

 the need of lights on all vehicles, in use on 

 the boulevards and streets at night, wascon- 

 stantly agitated for months, it being pointed 

 out that certain of the highways were inade- 

 quately lighted; that many light buggies 

 and cabs were fitted with rubber tires and 

 could neither be seen nor heard until too 

 late, by cyclists and pedestrians alike; that 

 the drivers of such vehicles often turned in 

 abruptly on the boulevards from dark side 

 streets; that cabs and hansoms frequently 

 stood in waiting at the curb, hidden from 

 view by the shadows of the trees, and that 

 even when a horse and vehicle could be dis- 

 cerned and heard by a wheelman, on a dark 

 night, it was almost impossible to determine 

 whether it was coming toward him or go- 

 ing in the same direction. The press took 

 pains to call attention to the many terrible 

 accidents occasioned by collisions between 

 cyclists and unlighted vehicles, at night, re- 

 sulting sometimes in death, and sometimes 

 in broken arms or legs. The matter was 

 taken up and pushed by the Associated 

 Cycling Clubs, and 2 of the largest bi- 

 cycle papers in the country, published in 

 Chicago, issued thousands of little green 

 and blue ribbon badges, bearing the im- 



perative inscription, " All vehicles must 

 carry lights." 



No immediate effect was noticeable, but 

 in the middle of the summer of 1897 a bill 

 was introduced in the city council provid- 

 ing for the licensing of bicycles at $1 a year, 

 and other vehicles in proportion to the load 

 they carried, from $2 for a one horse buggy 

 or wagon, with a capacity of one ton or less, 

 to $8 or $12 for a dray carrying 4 or 6 tons 

 and hauled by an equal number of horses. 

 Numbered registration tags were to be is- 

 sued for attachment to said bicycles and 

 vehicles. Anticipating that . the cyclists 

 would raise a great protest, a clause requir- 

 ing all vehicles to show one or more lighted 

 lamps at night was incorporated in the 

 measure to conciliate them. Much as they 

 wanted the universal lights, the bill failed of 

 its object, and after it had passed the coun- 

 cil and received the mayor's signature an 

 injunction was issued to prevent its enforce- 

 ment. When the injunction came to hear- 

 ing, the plaintiff being an ex-judge and the 

 defendant the corporation counsel, the law 

 was declared unconstitutional — all of it with 

 the exception of the clause requiring lights 

 on all vehicles — and the wheelmen were tri- 

 umphant. 



And that is how Chicago came to have a 

 " universal lights " ordinance. 



In the City of Brotherly Love it was dif- 

 ferent. The wheelmen labored unceasingly, 

 for 3 months, through the Associated Cy- 

 cling Clubs and the Pennsylvania Division 

 of the L. A. W., to secure such a law, and 

 were finally successful last March, after the 

 bill they had had introduced in the common 

 council had been delayed by an amendment 

 providing that the measure should not go 

 into effect until 60 days after its passage. 

 The ordinance as it now stands requires 

 that all pleasure vehicles, and all other ve- 

 hicles proceeding at a pace faster than a 

 walk, shall, between the hours of sunset 

 and sunrise, carry a lighted lantern or lan- 

 terns, prominently displayed, under penal- 

 ty of a fine of $5 for infraction. 



In one respect the Philadelphia law is 

 not so uncompromising as the Chicago or- 

 dinance, since drivers of teams other than 

 pleasure vehicles, when belated, may pro- 

 ceed on their way at a walk. 



Every other metropolitan city in the land 

 needs a similar ordinance. 



" Jones is writing for the magazines 

 now." 



" That so? On what subject? " 

 " Asking for sample copies." 



ALWAYS GO SOMEWHERE. 



To get the full amount of pleasure and 

 profit out of the ownership of a bicycle one 

 must use it as a means of getting beyond 

 the confines of his immediate neighbor- 

 hood. It soon becomes recreation of the 



