The Stark County Democrat. [volume] (Canton, Ohio) 1833-1912, 1896-03-05

Z" "nUw nrt,oiI uu you wtnU Ior this ma
chine by the hour or the day." tried
afterward to get the magistrate to see
this, but he, not knowing Italian, shied
at the very beginning of the phrase.
The owner of the bicycle on oath de-
clares that he thought l asked how
much the bicycle had cost him. He says
that he answered he paid 500 francs for
that brute of a machine, made in
France, while understood him to agree
to let me have it for francs a day,
which was cheap. | was in hurry to
be off and was afraid he might repent
his offer, so said it was all right, and
/ would take it, whereupOn, without
further parley, l wheeled the bicycle
into the middle of the road, sprang on
its back and was off, leaving the aston
ished man standing by his door, too
thunderstruck, it seems, to make any
outcry until / had passed beyond his
sight at the first turning of the road.
pedaled serenely on, little realizing
what commotion l had left behind
me, and the one funny thing about this
most regrettable episode is that spent
an exceedingly quiet, peaceful and en-
joyable day, not knowing was pursued,
making no attempt to elude anybody
and yet eluding them in what appeared
afterward to be by subtle and crafty
lodges. The magistrate could not be
persuaded that my sitting on the We
randa Of restaurant in the main street
Of Interlaken, with the bicycle in plain
view of everybody, was not the brazen
act of hardened criminal, who knew
the police would be searching for him
in the back streets.
When the man standing against the
doorway had recovered partly from his
amazement at my sudden fight ON his
machine, he rushed to the police station
and told the authorities there 4 plausi-
BILE foreigner had engaged him in polite
Ollendortian conversation, and, while
his mind was distracted in trying to fol
low his remarks, had seized the oppor-
tunity and also the machine and was at
that moment making his way to the
north road toward lnterlaken.
Now, capture under these circum-
stances seemed to be deliciously easy
There were no branching off roads. The
mountains were on one side and the lake
on the other, on neither side of which
was bicycling practicable, Therefore all
the two policemen had to do, when they
mounted their machines, was to ride
faster than / did, and so overtake me-
AS had no idea that race was on, ]
plunged along in leisurely manner
and would undoubtedly have been taken
near mterlaken if it had not been for
the fact that some years ago company
built funicular railway from the mar,
gin Of the lake mile or so up to st.
Beatenburg. had lived in st. Beaten
burg once, and | remembered that the
road from there to Interlaken was q
good one, so l thought that perhaps il
would not be bad plan to go up on the
railway and coast down to Interlaken.
l knew man who had done it once.
han well believe now that no one ever
tries it the second time. The car goes
up to ST. Beatenburg three or four times
q day only, but when couple of miles
away from the landing saw steamer
coming in, and knew if l reached the
landing about the time she did would
get car,
am rot a racer, but thereupon put
in my best licks TO make connection
with the mountain railway. The road
at this point is as level as the lake itseh
and only a few feet above it, My
thoughts turned to the railway because
| knew that beyond the lower end of II
the carriage road rose high above the
lake, passed through several tunnels and
then went down to the Interlaken plain
By taking the up car would avoid al
this and have il down hill all the way
The policemen, II seems, caught sigh
of me as was making my squirt, anC
they at once put ON extra steam. bu
there is deep baV inst hafna .nn'