The herald., 1896-12-15
THE YANKEE BIKE"

| often think that the differences be-
tween Americans and Englishmen are
always most fully eXemplified by their
bicycles. Just as we are a high-strung,
nervous, rapid people, so are they a
strong. big, slow but forceful race. And,
as it is with both, so it is with their
wheels. The American wheel is a
graceful, light. swift machine, enduring
enough-as we are-though going to
pieces all at once, If at all. The English
bike is like everything else that goes on
wheels in England-an ugly thing, with
no curves of beauty, except the rims, but
very strong, very heavy, and calculated
to last as long as a silk hat, which, with
the English, is forever. We strip our
wheels down to the skeleton, throwing
away the brakes, the mud guards, the
tool bags. the nettings-everything, in
short, that does not help us to have a
mere seat and locomotiOn. The English
not only keep on all these things, but
add whatever else they can find around
their houses to hang on to their mA-
chimes. They have mud guards fore and
aft, nets, brekes, reticules. parcel hold
ers-and parcels you may be sure.
Whenever an Englishman wants a
wheel, if he buys a home made one, it
must weigh from 30 to As pounds, and
then he will probably exhibit it to his
friends and say: It's heavy, but il s
good and strong" The fact that the
poor devil has to lead it up a hill, as If
it were a fatted calf, while Americans
speed by him up the heaviest grades In
England, does not affect his content
ment at ALL He is something strong
among men, and he's got - something
strong" for a toy
Every day one sees more and more
American wheels on the streets. We
who know the trade marks fastened to
the front posts of bicycles easily distin..
pIIjsh old hnnpa fQVnritaG q G h n ~
along among the multitude of bikes.
For six months the proprietors of pop
ular show have been turning their tick
cts to lottery uses and giving away two
American wheels a week. If we walk
along Holborn we see shop after shop
advertised as the agencies of Yankee BIZ
cycles. This has been patent to every
American in London, but it remained for
the Daily Mail to call public attention to
this remarkable invasion of foreign
product, and after doing so, in startling
though absolutely trustworthy terms it
sent its reporters to interview the MAX
ers of English wheels.
And now, curiously enough, comes an
other view of the difference between the
English and the Americans If l may say
so, without meaning any degree of Of
fense the English are the vainest peo-
PIE about themselves with whom l have
ever cast my lot. They are so cock-sure
tHdl tHey are the DeSt, anu tnat What-
ever they do is the best. that as in this
case, they will calmly sit down, see the
bread and butter and trade taken away
from them by competitors, and simply
exclaim: 1T cannot possibly be sou
This the Daily Mail has brought out
with humorous clearness. Thus tens
of thousands of American wheels have
been sold in England within the last
few months; though we see them every
where; though the Yankee agents come
to my Office and tell me of the marvellous
numbers of wheels they have sold, ana
yet the English manufacturers simply
say: 1T can't be so. The American
wheel is an inferior article Nothing is
good that isn't English We are not the
least alarmed. Julian Ralph in the
New York Journal