CHAPTER II.
THE CYCLE ART.
Posterity will always consider this the embryo generation of the cycling art; it might well be termed the “living wheel age.”
A number of valuable books have been written on the fundamental principles of locomotion by means of walking, riding upon animate beings, flying and creeping, and also upon all kinds of inanimate or mechanical motors, but little has been said about physical properties underlying the intervention of a wheel between the body of man and the surface to be travelled over, the motor being man himself.
The interesting art of man-motor carriages has already developed an industry of such great importance that the certainty as to its permanency is beyond cavil, and, believing that it will yet assume much greater proportions and become of more and more absorbing interest, there seems to be some excuse for an attempt to place even a limited amount of personal information before those connected with the industry and before the admirers of the art. There are few industries the product of which is dispersed among so varied a class of patrons, and scarcely none in which the patron takes so lively an interest in the respective articles produced.
In most industries, where a machine is the product, the consumer is expected to be an expert in the art to which the industry appertains, and is therefore supposed to be capable of individual judgment as to the merits of what he acquires; if a steam-engine is the object of the purchase, it is expected that an expert of some ability in the art will judge of and afterwardsrun and repair it; but how could this be expected with a bicycle?
There is probably no other machine used by mankind, with the possible exception of the watch, that does service to such a variety of individuals as the cycle. Now, it would be of little use to write a book for popular reading on the mechanical construction of a watch, because from its very nature none but an expert could appreciate the facts, if any were given; but greater hope might be entertained in regard to a larger machine, because the buyer can at least see what he is about. You never heard of a bicycle-rider blaming his repairer for stealing the wheels out of his machine and substituting others, because he can see, however inexperienced he may be, that this has not been done. Now, if we all could, by a little observation, learn one-half as much about our watches as we can about our bicycles, the poor watch-maker would never suffer the indignities so universally and unjustly heaped upon him. The primary knowledge above hinted at as possible, among the hoped-for patrons of this work, seems to be an auspicious circumstance in connection with an effort to teach them a little more.