The Stourbridge Observer, Cradley Heath, Halesowen & District Chronicle.
Stourbridge, West Midlands, England, 1880-06-19 00:00:00

CANOEING versus BICYCLING.

The „Neet? Rifle Times, after a careful and prolonged
investigation of the matter, has discovered that no
Englishman ever adopts a sport unless it is largely
attended by danger and discomfort. All really
favourite English sports., from fox-hunting downwards,
tend to further this behef ; and the journal seta itself
to consider the claims, to popularity enjoyed by two
recent importations into America—bicycling and
canoeing. At first sight it seFms that the bicycle should
be by far the greater favourite—according to English
notions of genuine amusement. Canoeing does
not break bones, and "while the bicyclist can
point with pride and a crippled finger to his broken
nose, to his crutches, or to the sling in which
he carries his broken arm, the canoeist can only
display a few blisters." The journal professes to
have compiled statistics on these subjects, and from
them it appears that while the canoeist only at distant
intervals scrapes his leg or sprains something by the
upsetting of his canoe, the well-known vicious pro-
pensities of the bicycle, which throw its rider on
frequent and totally unsuspected occasions, result in
many fractures- and here the bicyclist has an im-
mense advantage over the canoeist. But this is only
a superficial view, and on going more deeply into
the subject it becomes evident that in comparing
the misery of bicycling with the misery of canoeing
the advantage is all in favour of the latter. The
bicyclist does not know what real discomfort is,
and the man who spends a few days' holiday
in a canoe can thoroughly inform him. "While
the canoeist cooks his own wretched meals and
burns his unhappy fingers, the bicyclist stops at a
comfortable hotel and eats what Western statesmen
call a 'square meal.' During the day the canoeist
is constantly getting wet, and subsequently baking
himself in the sun, while the bicyclist is dry. At
night, while the bicyclist is revelling in the loathsome
luxury of a bed at the hotel, the canoeist is trying to
sleep in his canoe, with a hard board for his bed, and
the mosquitoes singing his lullaby. The average
canoeist is rarely able to move his cramped legs on
awaking in the morning, and has to drag himself out
of his canoe with groans and execrations, but the
bicyclist is called from a spring mattress rested
and ready for a comfortable breakfast. There
is probably no athletic sport in the world which
can for a moment be compared with canoe-
ing in the wide variety and bitter torture of the
physical miseries which it entails, and all fair-minded
bicyclists must however reluctantly, admit that this is
true." The foxhunter may, and frequently does, get
wet through, but the mere exercise of riding keeps
his blood in circulation. He has not to sit still and
suffer as the canoeist must do, and the prospects of
rheumatism give additional superiority to canoeing,
for on American rivers, with sparsely-populated banks,
shelter often cannot be obtained even if the voyager
could land. Altogether, therefore, the journal decides
in favour of canoeing., as more truly satisfactory from
the eccentric Englishman's point of view.—Evening
Standard.