Barton County democrat. [volume] (Great Bend, Kan.) 1885-1915, 1892-11-10

kindled spirit of competitions efteu-
times stronger than the intellectual
spirit itself Then comes the COMPETE
tive effort A book is obtained and
kept, in which each days work is re-
corded from the beginning OF the year
to the end A man utterly unknown
out of his own little circle suddenly be-
comes man of mark to new and wide
circle. He has ridden, say, some thou
sands of miles in one year. or won a
race, or made great excursion: he Is a
man to know in the wide and ever
widening cycling world Here are the
inducements to hard cycling, new exer-
else of body, new exercise of mind, and
new competitive ambition
As contemporary said few weeks
ago apropos of these remarks: lone can
understand the insidious strength of
the temptation to indulge overmuch in
this fascinating form OF exercise. But
the greater the temptation the greater
the need of prudence and Self-restraint- >
We who look on as we'll as practice the
exercise see the necessity for this add
vice with increasing evidence each
month and year: it is day by day be-
coming more obvious, on the road, on
the track, in the streets of the metropo-
lis and other cities, that cycling is
breaking its own record in evidence be-
fore the coroner, before the physician
and surgeon before the magistrate, be-
fore the world at large, cycling circles
alone excepted Accidents daily in
crease, not from faults of the machines
ridden-for, thanks to the skill, care
and competency of the industry that
turns out cycles, there is the most add
nirable safety work in this direction
that ever was produced-but from the
fault of the riders themselves; chiefly
the fault OF competition against other
riders aud against all sorts and condi-
tions of Observation-Disclosures on horse
back, in carriages, by omnibus and on
foot Lookers-on say there is marvel
Gus precision in riding in the crowded
streets They may well marvel, but in
this regard success itself in meeting
and evading obstacles does not mean
| winning: 1t means wear and tear of the
constitution beyond anything that can
be accredited when it is carefully OBJ
served. We have ourselves ridden
under these trials, and we know the eff
fects During the feat the most active
of the senses are strained to the utmost;
the ear is strained to catch every voice
and sound; the eye is strained to meet
every danger, as well as to7avoid being
cause of danger to others: the sense
of touch is equally strained; the mind
and the body are at full strain and the
muscular sense at its highest mark So
long as the tissues are young and elias
| tic this feat is for time possible, but
it is doomed, even in the young, to early
failure, and it makes the young preIna-
turely old. To the middle-aged-nay,
to those who are but just matured-the
feat is dangerous though collision may
never take place. There is the internal
and the external strain; there is the
after lassitude from what DIR. Kolb has
| ably described as 1.-THE nervous INSULT
cheney" of fatigue; and there is the
| after waste of the nervous fever which
follows the effort. Under these strains
it is little wonder that riders die while
| riding without actual collision; little
wonder that the papers should report
that a well-known cyclist was found
dead by the roadside with his machine
beside him Framed in a manner not
calculated to bear these strains, though
| they be less severe than riding daily
through London thoroughfare. thi,
gentleman, from nervous insufficiency
failed and succumbed under an exercise
the too enthusiastic partis2ns of wAcl
say we have no right to criticise, albeit
1T is fatal to their best comradeA-Lon
don Lancet