The Kenilworth Advertiser. — 1891-07-18 (Kenilworth, Warwickshire, England)

BICYCLE V. TRAIN.  The bicycle (says the Birmingham Gazette) is besting the train—so the railway officials fear. For years the passenger traffic, and especially the excursion returns, has fallen short of the increase proportionate to the annual increment in population; this year there has been and still is a most noticeable decline in the number of people hooked to holiday and health resorts. It was commented upon at Easter, was emphasised at Whitsuntide, and every week since the first in June the comparison of excursionists as between this year and last has been the subject for anxious inquiry. Trade last year was fair, and this year is flourishing, so workpeople, clerks, artisans, and shopkeepers,who form the bulk of the trippers,cannot be prevented from visiting the seaside by want of pence ; the price of tickets, it is true, has been ' raised slightly, but the railway companies do not believe that an extra shilling or two on a long excursion will deter many, and on all the lines the fear is entertained that the turn of the cycle has come, and that with the best class of customer— the young man with a sweetheart—the train is not as popular, as it used to be. As to the cycles in use, they mast be counted shortly not by thousands but by tens of thousands. special trains leave Coventry nearly every day for Crewe, freighted wholly with bicycles and tricycles, and Birmingham gets its due proportion in spite of the many manufactories in the city, turning out thousands every week. On these cycles, so the railway people say, battalions of young men, who have hitherto gone with their sweethearts or wives for a week or two at the seaside now take their holidays on wheels and leave ;heir sweethearts at home.  One effect of the growth of cohorts of cyclists is that many of the old-world hamlets are fast becoming busy hives, and that there is scarcely a ruin or a church within 30 miles of Birmingham which is not "shot" by an amateur photographer every Saturday, and made the centre of a cyclists' picnic. The train left much of Shakespeare's country and Jack Catesby's and George Etiot's untouched the bicyclist goes everywhere, and, to forestall his wishes and consult the comfort of the enormous class known as "week-enders," taverns and tea gardens are springing up in the least likely places—and every one is crowded. Indeed, the cry is that the country cannot accommodate the week-enders. Several hostelries on Saturday were absolutely eaten out.  According to a report just issued, the total number of persons killed on railways during the first three months of the present year was 322, and 3101 were injured in the same period; of thine 22 were suicides. "Your father refuses his consent to our hnion ?" "Re does, Percy." "Nothing then seems to be left for us except elopement. Do you think, Nellie, that you could leave this luxurious home, forfeit all the enjoyments of wealth, and go sway with a poor young man to enter a home of lifelong poverty ? ' "I think I could, dear Percy." "Then you are not the practical girl I have always taken you to be." And, with deep dejection, he me up wearily and reached for his hat. Traditions have gathered round the Lobby buffet. One of the best remembered is connected with the late Mr. Tom Collins, the member for Boston. The hon. member used to come out of the House to an old woman's stall, buy a pennyworth of apples The Club train from Calais collided on Sunday put them in his trousers pocket, and go back to his night with an express porn Lille as both were place in the