Sones
OF THE
WHEELS
P

THE LIBRARY
OF THE
REGENTS
UNIVERSITY
JOMNIBUS AL ARTIR{US
OF
INNESOTA
CLASS
BOOK
810.1
P547
SONGS OF THE WHEEL.

SONGS OF THE WHEEL.
SELECTED AND ARRANGED
BY
WALTER P. PHILLIPS.
NEW YORK:
GEORGE MUNRO'S SONS, PUBLISHERS,
17 To 27 VANDEWATER STREET.
O
COPYRIGHT, 1897,
BY
WALTER P. PHILLIPS.
Walter
OCT 8 '48
810.1
P547
INDEX.
Aerial Navigation
Ah, Woful Change!
Alas!
Anti-Cyclone, An
A-Wheeling
•
Beautiful Scorcher, The
Before and After.
Beginner, The
Beneath the Wave
Benediction, A
Beware the Wheel
Bicycle Bells .
Bicycle Bend, The
Bicycle Goose Melodies
Bicycle Song, A.
Birth of the Bike, The
Bloomers
Blows.
Catechism, A
Century, A
Congressional Wheelmen
Copper Caught the Scorcher, The
1225017
PAGI
60
20
39
ryry
61
48
104
102
•
65
117
111
34
88
. 109
29
9
97
. 113
15
24
72
94
vi
INDEX.
PAGE
Crucial Test, The
84
Cycler's Face, The
52
Cyclometer Crank, The .
30
Doubtful Maid's Soliloquy, A
99
Dress
80
Enigma, An.
70
Fair Cycler, A
75
Female Scorcher, The
32
Few Wants, A
31
Fin de Siecle
17
•
Fin de Siecle Favorite, The
66
Flight of Romance, The
Florinda's Deal
39
109
Galileo and the Bicycle
62
Goddess of Girls, A
18
Grandmother of '76 and '96, The
105
Grass Widow, The
69
He Drew the Line
87
Held by the Enemy
14
Her Spinning Wheel
105
How a Woman Should Mount
19
•
How She Accepted Him
42
How She has Changed
115
How They Brought the Good News .
4.5
In the Moonlight.
97
Introspective Scorcher, The.
. 100
King Tommy's Rise and Fall
66
=
INDEX.
vii
Lady Clare
Lament from the Cradle.
Latest Puzzle.
PAGE
58
116
14
Lights and Shadows
13
Lochinvar up to Date
89
Lover's Reminiscence, A
91
Lover's Wail, A
107
Love's Transformation
35
Made it Chronic
25
Mary
20
Masculine Wish, The
53
Maud Muller
54
New Version of an Old Song
82
"1950"
51
No Vacation this Year
84
No Wheel for Him
57
Old Bike, The
81
Old Grumbler to New Girl
112
Q
On a Tandem
92
Outwitted
12
Pants
43
Passing of the Horse, The
85
Paul Revere, Jr.'s, Ride
36
Peter's Wife
Phillida on Her Wheel
63
47
Punctured
Saved .
Scorcher, The
114
41
23
viii
INDEX.
Scorcher, The
Scorchers.
Scorcher's Back, The
Scorcher's Farewell to his Steed, The
Seven Ages of Bicycling, The
She Waits for Me
Sight, A
Song of the Wheel, The .
Still Scorching
Strike of a Bike, The
Summer Girl, The
Taken from Life .
They are Seven
To a Cycler
To a Girl on a Wheel
PAGE
44
96
115
•
21
40
71
98
26
53
49
25
76
64
93
103
To My Cycle
779
Trade Mark, The
101
Two on a Tandem
16
With the Tandem at the Gate
108
Woman
114
Wrecked
68
Songs of the Wheel.
THE BIRTH OF THE BIKE.
From the St. James's Gazette.
In the beginning,
Ere the artificer
Built him the wood thing
Named the célérifère,
Baron von Draise-
Four years from Waterloo-
Vengefully pondering,
Impotent Gaul,
As he heard how the thunder
Of Wellington's soldiery,
England's artillery,
Wheeled through the world—
Grinning, he scrawled
In the dust with his walking-stick
A shape for a sign,
10
SONGS OF THE WHEEL.
Two circles: circumference
Perfectly flawless,
Joined and united them,
One, indissoluble,
(Wondrous intelligent!)
That was the birth of me:
I am the Bike.
High and round, rude and haughty,
Big-wheeled, little saddled,
I froze into steel;
And he knew me and named me,
Bone-shaker, Velocipede,
Father of Bicycles,
Winger of woman,
Banishing petticoats,
Bringing the female
(Long since irrational)
Rational dress.
Ho! then the polish
And pride of my ministry.
Ho! then, the gleam
Of my glittering nickel-plate.
Ho! then, the park,
And the pleasaunce of Battersea.
Ho! then, the hose
Of my deftly shod womankind.
I, the ubiquitous
SONGS OF THE WHEEL.
11
Angel of Exercise,
I am the Bike.
Mount, then, my children,
Follow, oh, follow me,
Forth through the daylight
Into the shadow-land
(Time to light up!)
Rush by the omnibus,
Halting not, tiring not,
Pedalling evenly
Over the stones.
On, till the turbulent
Traffic grows fainter,
All of you, each of you.
Clerk from the counting-house,
Peer from imperious
Portals of Westminster,
"Devils" from Fleet Street,
Maidens from Lockhart's,
Costers from Whitechapel.
Follow, oh, follow, then,
Follow the Bike.
I am the coin maker.
Hark, through the deathly
Depression of Stock Exchange,
Hark, how the companies
12
SONGS OF THE WHEEL.
Limitless, limited
Under the Act,
Spring into life
At the touch of my wheel.
See them capitalize
Million on million,
Gear Case and Handle-Bar,
Wallet and Tyre:
Everything patented,
Everything profiting.
Mark the advertisements-
Vast, multitudinous-
All the world conquered,
All things subservient,
I alone triumphing,
I, the Victorious,
I am the Bike.
OUTWITTED.
From the Cleveland Plain Dealer.
I thought her mine-my rival watched
Us ride away; then he
Went straight and bought a tandem, and
Of course that settled me!
SONGS OF THE WHEEL.
13
LIGHTS AND SHADOWS.
From the Buffalo Courier.
She passes on her wheel: I stand
And watch her onward gliding.
I note the dainty little hand
Her cycle deftly guiding.
Her rosy cheeks and wavy hair
Beneath her hat-brim shading;
I watch her figure, light as air,
Into the distance fading.
So she rides past me every day,
And each time comes the feeling,
Ah, me! she takes my heart away
Each time she goes a-wheeling.
But I must get me back to toil,
Nor stop, her form to scan,
Her papa's in the Standard Oil,
And I'm his hired man.
And so my heartache I must heal,
And bend to labor's load.
That's why, you see, she rode the wheel,
While I-I wheel the road!
JOE LINCOLN.
*
14
SONGS OF THE WHEEL.
HELD BY THE ENEMY.
From the Cleveland Plain Dealer.
Upon the bench he sat and sat,
While others came and went,
His face half hidden 'neath his hat
Showed doubt and terror blent;
His sweetheart passed, he didn't rise,
She knew not what he meant,
She little guessed the dreadful ties
That held him while she went;
For though with love his heart was filled
He moved to no extent-
Because he sat where some one spilled
A tube of bike cement!
LATEST PUZZLE.
From the Roseleaf.
A biker asked a farmer,
"Has a lady wheeled this way?"
And the farmer told the biker,
"It's mighty hard to say,
From the costumes they are wearing,
From the mountains to the sea,
If the biker is a she one,
Or a biker is a he!"
SONGS OF THE WHEEL.
15
A CATECHISM.
From the St. James's Gazette.
What bends men's figures to an S?
The Bicycle.
While ladies ride with gracefulness?
The Bicycle.
And what makes Daphne with alarm,
From sudden spill foreboding harm,
Yield her slim waist to a man's arm?
The Bicycle.
What makes Amanda save and scrape?
The Bicycle.
Till she can buy the latest shape?
The Bicycle.
What makes a joint last days on days,
Turned and returned in sundry ways
Of hash, rissoles and rechauffés?
The Bicycle.
What plays the deuce with Yankee trade?
The Bicycle.
What's now the only "notion " made?
The Bicycle.
What makes the carriage builder slack,
What cheapens cob and nag and hack,
While the financiers boom and crack?
The Bicycle.
16
SONGS OF THE WHEEL.
What turns the scholar to a dunce?
The Bicycle.
He rides (he used to study once)
The Bicycle.
Why are neurotic novels shut,
And minor poets all uncut,
And everything neglected, but
The Bicycle?
TWO ON A TANDEM.
From Truth.
When all the tiny wheeling stars
Their cycle lamps have lit,
And, bending o'er their handle-bars,
On roads celestial flit,
I trundle out my tandem fleet,
With Daisy at my side;
We mount, and then our flying feet
Propel us far and wide.
Along the smooth, secluded pike
We take our evening run,
Two souls with but a single bike,
Two hearts that scorch as one.
EARL H. EATON.
SONGS OF THE WHEEL.
17
FIN DE SIECLE.
I'm an end-of-the-century girl,
But really, between you and me,
I don't think the fun of the thing
Is quite what it's cracked up to be.
I've worked to emancipate Woman,
I've tried to scorn dances and teas,
I've discarded my petticoats, too,
And arrayed myself boldly in-these!
I've swung on the parallel bars,
Read Ibsen, Nordau, and George Moore;
I've toiled and I've spun on my wheel
Till all my anatomy's sore.
To-morrow I'll cremate these togs,
And lie in a hammock till night,
With the Duchess and fashions to left,
And a box of French bonbons to right.
Yes, I've smoked, too, and gone through
the slums,
And inspected a big penitentiary,
And-hurrah! the goal is in sight,
The end of my first and last "century."
DICK LAW.
18
SONGS OF THE WHEEL.
A GODDESS OF GIRLS.
From the New Bohemian.
Brief-skirted and slender,
She mounts for a ride;
Six gallants attend her—
Brief-skirted and slender,
She claims the surrender
Of all at her side.
Brief-skirted and slender,
She mounts for a ride.
Oh, radiant creature;
She wheels and she whirls,
Till no one can reach her
Oh, radiant creature,
In figure and feature
She's a goddess of girls-
Oh, radiant creature,
She wheels and she whirls.
There's no use denying
She's captured my heart;
There's no use denying
She did it by trying
The bicycle art.
There's no use denying
She's captured my heart.
SONGS OF THE WHEEL.
19
I'll ask her to marry
Without more ado;
No longer I'll tarry—
I'll ask her to marry
And try in a hurry
A wheel built for two-
I'll ask her to marry
Without more ado.
SUSIE M. BEST.
HOW A WOMAN SHOULD MOUNT.
From the Chicago Inter-Ocean.
To mount the wheel with perfect grace,
First see the pedals are in place,
The right the center half around,
The left the nearest to the ground.
Draw back the wheel a little-thus,
To give it proper impetus.
Your hands upon the handle-bar
Should be as dainty touches are.
Then press with right foot, till you see
The inside pedal rising right,
Describes the circle, sinks from sight;
But ere it meets your foot once more
You're mounted, and the lesson's o'er.
20
SONGS OF THE WHEEL.
AH, WOFUL CHANGE!
From the Nebraska State Journal.
My love was much fairer than dream girls
The greatest of artists ere drew;
Each cheek like a rosebud reclining
On billows of pearl-tinted dew.
Her eyes, like twin stars in the azure,
Gleamed bright 'neath her rippling hair-
Ah, never was picture so dainty,
None ever so sweet and fair.
But alas! for those pearl-tinted cheeklets,
Alas! for those blue eyes, alack!
Alas! for that smile like an angel's,
Alas! for that hump on her back!
My love once as fair as the spring-time
Has vanished, and there in her place
66
Is a scorcher," decked out in loud bloomers,
And wearing a bicycle face.
GEO. V. HOBART.
MARY.
From the Somerville Journal.
Mary had a little lamb,
But both have long been dead;
If Mary were alive to-day,
She'd want a wheel instead.
•
4
SONGS OF THE WHEEL.
21
THE SCORCHER'S FAREWELL TO HIS
STEED.
From the San Francisco Examiner.
(With apologies to McGuffey's Third Reader.)
My beautiful, my beautiful! thou standest meekly
by,
With proudly arched and glossy frame, and
sprocket geared so high.
Fret not to roam within the park with all thy
winged speed;
I may not scorch on thee again-thouʼrt pinched,
my silent steed!
Fret not with that impatient tire, sound not the
warning gong;
They'll check you in a basement damp because I
scorched along.
The bike cop hath thy handle-bar-my tears will
not avail;
Fleet-wheeled and beautiful, farewell! for thou'rt
held for bail!
Farewell! those fat pneumatic wheels full many
a mile have spun,
To bask beside the Cliff House bar or do a century
run;
22
SONGS OF THE WHEEL.
Some other hand less skilled than mine must
pump thee up with air;
The patent lamp that won't stay lit must be an-
other's care.
Only in sleep shall I behold myself with bended
back-
Only in sleep shall thee and I avoid the trolley
track;
And when I churn the pedals down to check or
cheer thy speed,
Then must I starting wake to learn thou'rt
pinched, my silent steed!
Ah, rudely, then, unseen by me, some clumsy
chump bestride
May wabble into rough brick walls and dish a
wheel beside;
And compressed wind that's in thee 'scape in
shrill, indignant pain
Till cruel man that on thee rides will fill thee up
again!
With slow, dejected foot I roam, not knowing
where or when
I'll meet a good Samaritan who'll kindly loan me
ten.
•
SONGS OF THE WHEEL.
23
And sometimes to the park I go, drawn in my
hopeless quest;
"Twas here I struck a record clip-the copper did
the rest.
*
*
*
*
*
Who said that I had given thee up? Who said
that thou wert lost?
"Tis false, 'tis false, my silent steed! I fling them
fine and cost!
Thus-thus I leap upon thy back and hit the
asphalt trail!
Away! my bright and beautiful; I pawned my
watch for bail.
CHARLES Dryden.
THE SCORCHER.
From the Philadelphia North American.
The scorcher tore full furiously
Along the busy street,
Unmindful of the obstacles
That he perchance might meet.
He scorned to heed the warning cries,
That record-breaking chump!
And he ran plump on a coal cart--
Now his wheel is on the dump.
24
SONGS OF THE WHEEL.
A CENTURY.
From the Youth's Companion.
He tumbled from his weary wheel,
And set it by the door;
Then stood as though he joyed to feel
His feet on earth once more:
And as he mopped his rumpled head,
His face was wreathed in smiles;
"A very pretty run," he said;
"I did a hundred miles!"
"A hundred miles!" I cried.
"Ah, think!
What beauties you have seen!
The reedy streams where cattle drink,
The meadows rich and green.
Where did you wend your rapid way
Through lofty woodland aisles?"
He shook his head. "I can not say;
I did a hundred miles!"
"What hamlets saw your swift tires spin?
Ah, how I envy you!
To lose the city's dust and din,
Beneath the heaven's blue;
To get a breath of country air;
To lean o'er rustic stiles!"
He only said, "The roads were fair;
I did a hundred miles!"
SONGS OF THE WHEEL.
25
THE SUMMER GIRL.
To Newport the Summer Girl has gone,
Astride on a wheel you'll find her;
Her jaunty bloomers are buckled on,
And the Chappies follow behind her.
"Oh, Belle of the Town!" said the nearest Chap,
"Though all the world betray thee,
One lover at least for thy hand shall scrap,
One faithful man shall praise thee!"
The maiden fell! But a punctured tire
Could not bring her proud soul under.
She patched it up with her kit and wire,
While the Chaps looked on in wonder.
"Oh, no!" she said, "no man for me!
On this swift steed I would rather whirl,
And be admired, and gay, and free,
Than connt as an old-time Summer Girl!"
H. LINSLY JOHNSON.
MADE IT CHRONIC.
He was bent on having a wheel, they said,
And to purchase one was straightway led,
And now, as his daily feats have shown,
He's bent till the same has chronic grown.
26
SONGS OF THE WHEEL.
THE SONG OF THE WHEEL.
From the Chicago Daily Tribune.
Whizzing through the meadows,
Bouncing over ridges,
Dodging busy crossings,
Scooting under bridges,
Coasting down steep hillsides
Till the senses reel;
Bless me! this is pleasant,
Riding on a wheel!
Rolling over roadways
Swift as bird on wing
Early in the morning;
This is just the thing!
Hearing matin music
From each dewy spray;
Old Sol, in the meantime,
Ushers in the day.
Skimming o'er the pavement,
Shooting through the park,
Viewing pretty flowers-
Isn't it a lark?
Haven't any lantern,
Light begins to fail;
Copper will arrest and
Run us into jail.
SONGS OF THE WHEEL.
27
Speeding, swiftly speeding,
Go the racers gay,
Bending nearly double
As they dash away.
All the people shouting,
Wonder on each face,
Try to pick the winner
In the great road race.
Papa and his baby,
Darling little boy,
Whistle tuneful ditties-
Life is full of joy.
Papa works the pedals,
Baby rides before;
Papa soon is tired,
Baby cries for more.
Gentleman just learning
Seems a little rash;
Steers into a hydrant
With an ugly crash!
Pulls himself together,
Not inclined to talk;
While the rest are looking
Thinks he'd rather walk.
Gentleman in trousers
Cut décolleté,
28
SONGS OF THE WHEEL.
Sees a maid in bloomers
Just across the way.
Thinks that he will charm her
By his ease and grace;
Finds she's fully fifty
When he sees her face.
With immense exertion
Mr. Adipose,
Filling half the highway,
Sweating, puffing, goes.
Morning, noon, and evening
Finds him on the spin,
Happy in the thought that
He is getting thin.
Stream, and vale, and mountain
Fascinate the sight;
Nature's many beauties
Are the cyclist's right.
Splendor of the sunset
In the evening sky,
Form, and hue, and fragrance
Greet him passing by.
Whizzing through the meadows,
Bouncing over ridges,
Dodging busy crossings,
Scooting under bridges,
SONGS OF THE WHEEL.
29
Coasting down deep hillsides
Till the senses reel;
Bless me! this is pleasant,
Riding on a wheel!
A BICYCLE SONG.
From the St. Nicholas Magazine.
Light upon the pedal,
Firm upon the seat,
Fortune's wheel in fetters
Fast beneath our feet;
Leave the clouds behind us,
Split the wind we meet,
Swift, oh, swift and silent,
Rolling down the street!
When the dark comes, twinkling
Like fire-flies in the wheat,
Bells before us tinkling
Fairily and fleet,
By the gates of gardens,
Where the dusk is sweet,
Slide like apparitions
Through the startled street!
30
SONGS OF THE WHEEL.
Spearmen in the desert
Maybe fly as fleet,
Northern lights in heaven,
Sparkles on the sleet!
Swift, oh, swift and silent,
Just before we greet,
The outer edge of nothing,
Turn rolling up the street!
HARRIET PRESCOTT SPOFFORD.
THE CYCLOMETER CRANK.
From the Minneapolis Tribune.
Of all the cranks I've ever seen,
The cyclometer crank is the worst;
He watches it go from morn till night,
And pushes it round with all his might
Though his veins are like to burst.
There's music for him in the click of the cog,
And it cheers his weary way,
Whether riding home or riding to town,
Or pumping up hill, or coasting down,
He lives on its merry lay.
He can not stop on half a mile,
And though the time has come to dine,
SONGS OF THE WHEEL.
31
į
If the cycle stands at 399,
The dinner must wait awhile.
When death has claimed the cyclometer
crank,
And he's passed from this world of guile,
He'll ask Peter to wait at the open gate,
Though the saint is old and the hour is late,
While he runs off another mile.
WILLIE SEE.
A FEW WANTS.
From Life.
Wanted: A knee-pan smooth and hard,
Unseamed and a perfect fit;
Prepared from stuff uncommonly tough,
That is warranted not to split.
Wanted: A brand-new set of ribs,
Not made for vain display;
Not twisted, torn, or warped and worn,
But curved in the proper way.
Wanted: A pair of perfect ears-
No fluted edges for me;
An ear not ground, but round and sound
As a real good ear should be.
32
SONGS OF THE WHEEL.
Wanted: A face. I am not vain,
And a good plain face will do,
That is not a sight-with the color white-
For I'm tired of black and blue.
A man that's new I'll be once more
When these parts have been supplied;
And maybe, then, I will mount again
That wheel and learn to ride.
THE FEMALE SCORCHER.
From the Chicago Evening Post.
I'm a dashing modern woman
On a wheel.
You have seen the imitation;
I'm the real.
I can wear the knickerbockers,
Pressed in patent safety lockers,
Shirts and shoes and dashing cady
Made for gent and worn by lady
A good deal.
I can talk the sprocket lingo
Late and early;
Chew the gum and swear "By Jingo!"
Hair is curly.
SONGS OF THE WHEEL.
33
Eyes are blue and big and dreamy;
Hate the side of life called seamy,
Love ice-cream and matinées,
Love a man that bets-and plays-
When I'm surely.
Girls are good enough, I reckon,
In a pinch;
But the boys are better fellows-
That's a cinch.
I can ride a hundred miles,
Climb the fences, jump the stiles,
Mend my tires, file the cogs,
And I fly from barking dogs
Not an inch.
Mother runs a clothing business
Down town;
Father cooks and bakes the biscuits,
Bakes 'em brown.
Brother knows the fancy stitches,
Plays at tennis, sighs for riches;
But I mount my wheel and skurry
Through the gaslit parks and hurry—
Sans a gown.
Wish I had a beau to pace me
Now and then;
34
SONGS OF THE WHEEL.
But I'm getting too rapid
For the men.
They all nod and toss me kisses;
Swear I'm speediest of misses;
Marry girls with great, long skirts,
Go to church on Sunday morning,
Dizzy whirl of cycles scorning-
Now and then
Darn the men!
BICYCLE BELLS.
From the Philadelphia Times.
She glides like a dream from my vision
In the morning all dewy and gray;
A nymph from the gardens Elysian,
She dashes and flashes away!
Past meadows and groves, where the singing
Of birds all melodious swells,
My heart hears the silvery ringing
Of the beautiful bicycle bells!
She's a bicycle, bicycle girl,
With hair of the loveliest curl;
She's fresher than clover,
My heart she rides over-
She's a bicycle, bicycle girl!
SONGS OF THE WHEEL.
35
Her cheeks with the crimson is glowing-
With all that the rose could impart;
The breeze-the mad wanton!-is blowing
A kiss and a curl to my heart!
Past meadows where wild birds are winging
Their way o'er velvety dells,
She glides with a ravishing ringing
Of the silvery bicycle bells!
LOVE'S TRANSFORMATION.
From the Atlanta Constitution.
No more unto the myths of old
Sweet Love delighted clings,
For Love rides on a bicycle,
And Love has lost his wings.
No more the romance of the past
A pleasing thrill imparts,
For Love upon a bicycle
Now chases human hearts!
Alas! the happy, happy days!
But-cool my burning brow;
For Love wheels down the dusty ways,
And Love's a scorcher now!
36
SONGS OF THE WHEEL.
PAUL REVERE, JR.'S, RIDE.
From the L. A. W. Bulletin.
Listen, my lovers, and you shall hear
Of the midnight ride of Paul Revere,
On May the thirtieth, ninety-six;
Hardly a youth that is "up to tricks"
But will always remember the day and year.
He said to his love, "If your father still
Refuses to grant our prayer, to-night
At the hour of twelve, on your window-sill
You will place a lamp as a signal light-
One, if you stay, and two if we flee;
And I in the lane below will be,
Ready to ride to the parson wise,
And to win forever the gracious prize
Whose love shall be my paradise.
""
Then he said "Good-night!" for a little while,
His face lit up with a hopeful smile;
He gave no heed to the "pit-a-pat "
Of his heart, nor little things like that.
He watched the moon rise over the bay
And the river that lazily went its way,
Bearing along a light canoe
In which there nestled a blissful two
So close you could scarce tell which was who.
SONGS OF THE WHEEL.
Bry
Meanwhile his friend, as a sweetheart should,
With a plea and a prayer and sigh and tear,
Was trying to win her father's ear.
But he would not listen to aught she said,
Though she strove by every means she could;
And she turned away, devoid of cheer,
To seek, as her father thought, her bed.
She climbed the stair to her moonlit room,
And hastily gathered the precious things-
Some half-forgotten engagement-rings
(There's many a bud not born to bloom,
So strangely woven is the woof of fate!)
Some pins to fasten her hat on straight,
A few curl-papers to crimp her hair,
And then she paused and waited there
From her shaded window looking down
On the roofs of the silent, sleeping town,
In the moonlight seeming doubly fair.
Meanwhile, impatient to know his fate,
Down in the lane by the garden gate,
Back and forth went Paul Revere.
He tried his tandem with all his weight,
And tested the wheels, both front and rear.
He whirled the pedals swiftly round,
He saw that the frame was strong and sound,
But mostly he watched with anxious eye
38
SONGS OF THE WHEEL.
That chamber window, dim and high,
Half hidden behind the swaying trees,
That softly rocked with every breeze.
And lo! as he looks on the window's height,
A glimmer, and then a gleam of light!
He clasps his saddle; again he turns,
And lingers and gazes, till full on his sight
A second lamp in the window burns.
A hurry of wheels in a village street,
Two shapes in the moonlight, a flash in the dark,
And beneath, from the pebbles, in passing, a
spark
Struck out, by a wheel flying fearless and fleet;
That was all! and yet through the gloom and the
· light,
The fate of two beings was riding that night.
And the spark struck out by that wheel, in its
flight,
Kindled them both into flame with its heat.
You know the rest. Of course you have read
How the father, finding his daughter fled,
Mounted a horse and offered them chase,
But found he couldn't keep their pace;
How they all made up and shared the joys,
And now the fathers all tell their boys,
SONGS OF THE WHEEL.
39
In the hour of darkness and peril and need,
The story a lover loves to hear,
Of the midnight flight of that tandem steed,
And Mr. and Mrs. Paul Revere.
NIXON WATERMAN.
THE FLIGHT OF ROMANCE.
I used to know a quiet lane
Where lovers oft would stray,
And whisper tender vows of love
When twilight closed the day.
No more this shady, cool retreat
Is sought by couples shy,
Since every novice in the town
Goes there his wheel to try.
N. F. MILBURN.
ALAS!
From the Boston Courier.
She's not out biking spruce and gay
To-day, and there are rumors
That from the clothes-line yesterday
The goat ate Mamie's bloomers.
40
SONGS OF THE WHEEL.
THE SEVEN AGES OF BICYCLING.
From the New Orleans Times-Democrat.
All the world's a-wheel,
And all the cyclers merely tired!
'They have their enmities as to a choice of bike,
And one man in his time has many falls-
His acts being seven ages. At first the pollywog
Wiggling and sprawling from his trainer's arms;
Then the whining and discouraged tyro, creeping
Tremulous and fearful unwilling from the ada-
mant floor
Back to the wheel; and then, all hopeful, talka-
tive of when
That blissful day shall come, and he with mistress
ride
A tandem to the happy courts of Love!
Then a bikist in full measure, seeking the bubble
Notoriety
As a trick cycler; colliding with an alderman
Of huge proportions, beer and capon lined,
With eyes severe, our cycler vanishes behind a
prisoner's dock;
The sixth age shifts, and into his lean and plaided
pantaloons,
With fearsome mien and real faint-heartedness,
His little hoard well sav'd for purposes
Known right well by his bike, which disarranged,
SONGS OF THE WHEEL.
41
And spokes uncombed awaits its master's bail!
And his big, manly voice, turning to a childish
treble, pipes
66
Ay, guilty, Honor!" winds whistling in his
sound:
Last scene of all, that ends a wheelman's Chess
and Checkered history,
Is cyclomania, oblivion to else
Save gear, save spoke, save tire, save-scorching!
SAVED.
From the Chicago Times-Herald.
A bloomer girl
Just left her wheel;
A lurking piece
Of orange peel.
A careless step,
A sudden slip,
A scream, a fall,
A fatal rip.
A man at hand
With mackintosh,
A garment just
The thing, begosh!
'
:
42
SONGS OF THE WHEEL.
The bloomer girl
Raised from the ground,
The garment wrapped
Her form around.
A store at hand:
The maid has gone:
All's over, and—
The band plays on.
HOW SHE ACCEPTED HIM.
From Life.
"I longed to kiss you," he softly said,
"As we passed the turnpike, dear."
"Oh, that was the place," and she tossed her
head,
"Where my saddle was out of gear.'
""
"How much I loved you I longed to tell,
When we stopped at the inn, you know."
"Oh, that was the place," and her glances fell,
"Where my front wheel wabbled so.
""
"And then, when we reached the clover farms,
Under the old oak-tree,
I wanted to clasp you, sweet, in my arms,
And ask you to marry me.
""
SONGS OF THE WHEEL.
43
And the maid, with her rapt gaze turned away,
Blushed deep at his words of fire,
"To think," she said, "that I rode that day
Ten miles on a punctured tire!
"And so with pleasure and real delight
I note what your words reveal;
For I've longed some time," and she clasped
him tight,
"To ride on a brand-new wheel."
PANTS.
TOM MASSON.
From Bearings.
I am willing to pay for a half page display
In heavy-faced letters, declaring
That I'll give a new dime for a word that will
rhyme
With the garments fair cyclists are wearing.
So, give me some space in a prominent place
And send a sight draft for the payment;
Though it takes my last cent, I'll remit with
content,
When supplied with a rhyme for such-rai-
ment.
Only poets can know the extent of my woe
When intent on some brilliant effusion-
}
44
SONGS OF THE WHEEL.
I am knocked out of time for the lack of a
rhyme
Conveying the needful allusion.
I might fill up my purse writing bicycle verse,
At the price it is usually rated,
But my troubles intrude when I strive to allude
To the cycle girl's garb bifurcated.
I could reel off dead loads of good sonnets and
odes;
I am sure they'd be regular gol-sousers;
But a mention of breeches would forfeit my
riches
And how can I use the word "trousers?"
So, please give my ad. the best place to be had,
And, meanwhile, I'll go down in my lockers
And fish out a dime for a word that will rhyme
With those togs that are not knickerbockers.
THE SCORCHER.
From the Cleveland Press.
The scorcher scorched-
The scorcher scorched with all his might,
His head o'er the handle-bars was bent;
The brewery wagon hove in sight-
Go ask the winds where the scorcher went.
SONGS OF THE WHEEL.
45
HOW THEY BROUGHT THE GOOD NEWS.
(BY A TWENTIETH CENTURY BROWNING.)
From the Pall Mall Gazette.
I sprang to the seat with a dexterous bound,
And I put down my foot as the pedal came
round.
"Good-bye," cried our hostess; "Good-bye,
cried the wits,
""
"We will follow to-morrow to pick up the bits.”
The door closed behind us; the lights sank to
rest,
And into the midnight we wabbled abreast.
Then we raced down the road at the fiercest of
rates,
And the cows came to peer at us over the
gates;
Up hill and down dale; on the slope, on the
flat,
My brave little bicycle flew like a bat,
And I would have stroked and caressed it, you
know,
Like the man in the poem, but I dare not
let go.
The gleam of our lamps danced about on the
way,
46
SONGS OF THE WHEEL.
And their fragrance uprose with the scent of
the hay;
And the rustic historian with trembling tells
How he listened that night to the ting of our
bells,
While the moon hanging over the poplar trees
shone
With a critical gaze at us wabbling on.
But a dismal adventure remains to be said,
For I rashly attempted to turn round my head;
And my bicycle, wroth at such empty pretense,
Bore me in an instant full tilt at the fence.
They gathered us up; I was sound and entire,
But my gallant pneumatic had punctured a
tire.
Then the people to whom the good news had
been brought,
When we came to the place gathered round as
they ought;
And they fetched a solution of rubber beside,
With a patent hand-pump, which they vigor-
ously plied.
For the burgesses said they could scarcely re-
fuse
To pump up the machine that had brought
the good news.
SONGS OF THE WHEEL.
47
•
PHILLIDA ON HER WHEEL.
From Truth.
When I was but a lad,
Long ago,
This simple lore I had,
Don't you know,
That every maiden fair
Was an angel unaware,
And I wondered when and where
The wings would grow.
But wiser now am I,
A good deal,
Though I've sometimes seen them fly,
Yet I feel
They are something just between
Man and angel in their mien
Since my Phillida I've seen
On her wheel.
She does not show a sign
Of a wing,
But her figure is divine,
And the fling
Of her abbreviated gown,
As she flickers through the town,
Might buy the throne and crown
Of a king!
48
SONGS OF THE WHEEL.
:
No halo of a saint
Does she wear,
Such as Lippo loved to paint,
But her hair
As when all heaven streams
Through the landscape of my dreams-
In such glory floats and gleams
On the air!
But not all for heaven she
Not too good!
Yet she's good enough for me
In any mood.
And if her dashing wheel
Took her even to the de'il,
Thither, too, I'd gently steal-
Yes, I would!
CHARLES G. D. ROBERTS.
THE BEAUTIFUL SCORCHER.
From the Boston Courier.
She rode along the road
In costume à la mode,
And threw a gleam of sunshine on the pike,
As she gripped the handle-bar,
And she beat the trolley car,
And her golden hair was hanging down her bike.

حمر
INSTRUCTI
"It luffed to left and it tacked to right,
But I grasped the handles with all my might.
>>
THE STOUT MAN'S CONQUEST.
SONGS OF THE WHEEL.
49
THE STRIKE OF A BIKE.
Jim Sherman hails from Utica,
And Utica's a town
Which Sherman has, to some extent,
Endowed with great renown;
For Sherman is a Congressman,
And when a town has that,
It may remark with pride to Fame:
"You know where I am at."
Since Jim has been in Washington
The great affairs of state
Have worked him so confounded hard
His health is delicate;
So, to improve his general tone
And brace him up a bit,
He bought himself a brand-new bike
And went to riding it.
By practice braver grown, this week,
He sought to show his mates
(All Congressmen) what he could do
At speedy, scorcher rates.
So, with a wild, tremendous spurt,
He started round the ring,
And soon succeeded, by his skill,
In passing everything.
50
SONGS OF THE WHEEL.
In passing everything? Well, no;
A hard, unfeeling wall
Got in his way, somehow, and that
He could not pass at all.
He saw it square in front of him-
Gadzooks! he should have shied;
But Sherman's tires were full of wind,
And he was full of pride.
Fast, fast upon the wall he drew;
The wall was fast; alack,
He hit it with a sickening thud
That made his tires slack;
And also at the same time knocked
The wind all out of Jim,
So that he felt that biking had
Lost interest to him.
*
*
*
*
They got him out-a total wreck,
His wheel was worse than he,
And Sherman wore a barrel home,
So people could not see
How scattered were his clothes; although,
He was so blacked and blued,
Had people seen him, they'd have thought
That he had been tattooed.
SONGS OF THE WHEEL.
51
Now Sherman takes a daily bath
In arnica and oils,
And once again devotes himself
To statesmen's arduous toils;
And Utica may know that Jim
Gives her his energies;
He feels that if he's got to die,
He'll do it by degrees.
W. J. L.
66
'1950."
From the Troy Daily Press.
It stands a thing of joy still
Behind the barn door where
The spiders spin their webs at will
And build a lair.
They say grandpapa rode with grace
Upon the strange old thing,
Propelling it from place to place
With rhythmic swing.
'Tis said young people courted then
Upon their whirling wheels;
What silly chaps those sons of men
To love's appeals.
52
SONGS OF THE WHEEL.
So strange a fancy people had
In days of long ago;
They were demented, clearly mad,
To travel so.
Ah! now we fly about in space
Above the earth below;
Wings beat the wheel for ease and grace
It's plain to show.
THE CYCLER'S FACE.
From the Boston Courier.
I've heard and read of the cycler's face,
That is now quite known to fame,
I have seen and noted the anxious trace
On the features of the same.
I have marveled much at the tales they tell
Of each lineamental case,
Of the set, fixed, hardened lines that well
Determine the cycler's face.
But my greatest example of the like
Is that of the cycling churl
Who had the face to borrow my bike
To elope with my best girl!
:
SONGS OF THE WHEEL.
53
THE MASCULINE WISH.
From the New Orleans Times-Democrat.
Oh, for some other land than this, in any sort of
zone,
Where females still are females, where new
women are unknown!
Where the eternal fitness of all things there's
naught to jar!
Where women wear no clothes of men, their
forms divine to mar!
Where clinging robes are still the style, as in the
long ago,
"Till bicycles brought pantaloons and plunged us
into woe!
May some new Moses lead us soon to that thrice-
blessed shore,
Where the bloomers cease from blooming and
the panties pant no more!
CHARLES J. COLTON.
STILL SCORCHING.
From the Chicago Dispatch.
The "scorcher" went tearing down the road,
Setting a pace to cause regret;
He met a farmer's heavy load,
Died, and may be scorching yet.
54
SONGS OF THE WHEEL.
MAUD MULLER.
From the Buffalo Commercial.
Maud Muller, on a summer's day,
Mounted her wheel and rode away.
Beneath her blue cap glowed a wealth
Of large red freckles and first-rate health.
Singing, she rode, and her merry glee
Frightened the sparrow from his tree.
But when she was several miles from town,
Upon the hill-slope, coasting down,
The sweet song died, and a vague unrest
And sort of terror filled her breast-
A fear that she hardly dared to own,
For what if her wheel should strike a stone!
The Judge scorched swiftly down the road-
Just then she heard his tire explode!
He carried his wheel into the shade
Of the apple-trees, to await the maid.
And he asked her if she would kindly loan.
Her pump to him, as he'd lost his own.
She left her wheel with a sprightly jump,
And in less than a jiffy produced her pump.
SONGS OF THE WHEEL.
55
And she blushed as she gave it, looking down.
At her feet, once hid by a trailing gown.
Then said the Judge, as he pumped away,
""Tis very fine weather we're having to-day."
He spoke of the grass and flowers and trees;
Of twenty-mile runs and centuries;
And Maud forgot that no trailing gown
Was over her bloomers hanging down.
But the tire was fixed, alackaday!
The Judge remounted and rode away.
Maud Muller looked and sighed, “Ah, me!
That I the Judge's bride might be!
"My father should have a brand-new wheel
Of the costliest make and the finest steel.
"And I'd give one to ma of the same design,
So that she'd cease to borrow mine.'
The Judge looked back as he climbed the hill,
And saw Maud Muller standing still.
"A prettier face and a form more fair
I've seldom gazed at, I declare!
"Would she were mine, and I to-day
Could make her put those bloomers away!"
56
SONGS OF THE WHEEL.
But he thought of his sisters, proud and cold,
And shuddered to think how they would scold
If he should, one of these afternoons,
Come home with a bride in pantaloons!
He married a wife of richest dower,
Who had never succumbed to the bloomers'
power;
Yet, oft while watching the smoke wreaths curl,
He thought of that freckled bloomer girl;
Of the way she stood there, pigeon-toed,
While he was pumping beside the road.
She married a man who clerked in a store,
And many children played round her door.
And then her bloomers brought her joy!
She cut them down for her oldest boy.
But still of the Judge she often thought,
And sighed o'er the loss that her bloomers
wrought,
Or wondered if wearing them was a sin,
And then confessed: "It might have been.'
Alas for the Judge! Alas for the maid!
Dreams were their only stock in trade.
وو
SONGS OF THE WHEEL.
57
For of all wise words of tongue or pen,
The wisest are these: "Leave pants for men!"
Ah, well! For us all hope still remains-
For the bloomer girl and the man of brains,
And, in the hereafter, bloomers may
Be not allowed to block the way!
NO WHEEL FOR HIM.
From the Buffalo Courier.
Give me a pair of sturdy legs,
And fair outfit of feet,
And I'll forego the bicycle,
However light and fleet.
For where's the wheelman knows the wood,
Or views the cloud-flecked sky?
Or leaps the fence to meet a lass,
A-comin' through the rye?
To every glimpse of loveliness
His set, grim eyes are blind;
He only sees the skimming road,
And counts the miles behind.
And should he meet a maid awheel,
He can't think ay or no
58
SONGS OF THE WHEEL.
Ere he or she have whisked apart
A dozen leagues or so.
Then give me my convenient legs,
That go where'er I bid;
Heaven keep them always tireless
As when I was a kid!
LADY CLARE.
From the Cleveland Leader.
It was the time when lilies blow,
And clouds are highest up in air;
Lord Ronald had plenty of rocks, and so
He bought a bike for Lady Clare.
I trow she didn't gaze with scorn
Upon the present he had brought;
"I'll mount it early to-morrow morn,
Out behind the house," she thought.
"It's the nicest-looking bike on earth,
And it is stout as well as fair;
Wonder how much the thing is worth?"
Thus ruminated Lady Clare.
In there came old Alice, the nurse,
Said: "Who was this that went from thee?"
SONGS OF THE WHEEL.
59
""Twas only Ronny," said Lady Clare,
"And see what he has bought for me.
""
"Oh, what a beaut!" said Alice, the nurse,
"And a high-grade wheel, too, I declare!
Now, you'll be right in line, I guess,
As sure as your name is Lady Clare.
""
*
*
*
*
*
She clad herself in a russet gown,
She looked not much like Lady Clare!
She got on once, but she soon was down,
With burdocks mixed up in her hair.
The high-grade bike Lord Ronald had bought
Leaped like a Texas steer,
It skinned the shins of Lady Clare
And stood her on her ear.
Down stepped Lord Ronald from his bike;
"Oh, Lady Clare, you shame your worth,
Your waist is all ripped up the back,
While you are rooting in the earth.”
"I'm going to ride this thing," she said,
As she felt around for her back hair;
"I'm going to ride the critter, or
My name will not be Lady Clare."
60
SONGS OF THE WHEEL.
He laughed a laugh of merry scorn,
And turned and kissed her where she stood;
He pinned her dress where it was torn,
And from her nose wiped off the blood.
"If you must ride to-day, get on,
And I," said he, "will hold you there
Till you can ride the thing alone,
So you shall still be Lady Clare."
AERIAL NAVIGATION.
An autumn day,
A sunny sky,
A hill that's steep and dusty;
A bloomer girl,
A shining wheel,
A wind both strong and gusty.
A sudden breeze,
A bloomer filled,
A rise, with naught to guide her;
A soaring maid,
A lonely road,
A wheel without a rider.
JEANETTE ELIZABETH FOWLER.
:
SONGS OF THE WHEEL.
61
1
A-WHEELING.
From the London Sketch.
Have you never felt the fever of the twirling,
whirling wheel,
Of the guiding and resisting of the shining cranks
of steel?
Never felt your senses reel
In the glamour and the gladness of the misty
morning sky,
As the white road rushes toward you, as the dew-
bathed banks slip by,
And the larks are soaring high?
}
Never known the boundless buoyance of the
billowy, breezy hills,
Of the pine scents all around you, and the run-
ning, rippling rills,
Chasing memory of life's ills;
Dashing, flashing through the sunshine, by the
windy wold and plain,
The distant blue heights luring, onward, upward,
to the strain
Of the whirling wheels' refrain?
Fled from prison, like a prisoner, sped the turn-
ing, spurning wheel,
Changed the city's stir and struggling, jar and
vexing, none can heal,
62
SONGS OF THE WHEEL.
For the peace the fields reveal,
And with spirits separate, straining above the
town's low reach,
Found a tender satisfaction, which the steadfast
summits teach?
In their silence-fullest speech.
Never known the wistful, wand'ring back, in
pleasurable pain?
Met the kine from milking sauntering to pastures
sweet again,
Straggling up the wide-marged lane?
You have never felt the gladness nor the glory
of the dream
That exalts, as tired eyes linger still on sunset,
mead and stream?
Haste, then! Taste that bliss supreme.
GALILEO AND THE BICYCLE.
From the Boston Courier.
Galileo from his retreat
Of silence came on noiseless feet
One day to earth and turned his eyes,
With keenest glances of surprise,
To countless thousands of mankind
Speeding along as speeds the wind;
SONGS OF THE WHEEL.
63
:
To maids and matrons, sires and sons,
And immaturest little ones,
All whirling on revolving things
That bore them swift as swiftest wings:
Through every busy thoroughfare,
In rural highways, coursing where
The prairies reached o'er endless space,
Where rivers ran, where'er the face
Of earth revealed an open way,
A wheeling, whirling fleet array
Of human forms in ceaseless flight
Was shown unto his wondering sight;
And standing there as one aghast,
His hands before his eyes he passed,
Then, proudly lifting up his head,
In self-applauding tone he said:
"I knew, by Jupiter! it moved,
As my researches grandly proved;
But, by my great-grandfather's hat!
I never thought 'twould move like that."-
PETER'S WIFE.
From the Chicago Record.
Peter, Peter, pumpkin eater,
Had a wife and couldn't keep her.
He hid her bloomers, bike, and bell,
And then he kept her very well.
64
SONGS OF THE WHEEL.
THEY ARE SEVEN.
I met a dainty summer girl,
She was not old, she said.
Her hair was thick with many a curl
That clustered round her head.
She had no rustic woodland air,
And she was smartly clad.
She wore upon her face so fair
A look that made me sad.
"Tell me what ails you, pretty maid,
That you so wan may be?”
"Alas! they're seven in all," she said,
And looked dejectedly.
6
"But what are they'? I prithee tell."
She answered: "Seven there be;
Two bruises on my ankle dwell,
And two upon my knee.
"Two of them on my arm do lie,
(They came when with Fan's brother),
The seventh gave me this black eye,
You see how blue's the other."
"You go about, my winsome maid,
Your limbs they are yet whole!”
SONGS OF THE WHEEL.
65
"Oh, yes." A fleeting smile betrayed
The sadness of her soul.
"Why do you ride the wheel, my dear,
If this is the result?"
She said: "I'd ride it without fear
Though 'twas a catapult!
"No matter if they're seventy!
Unto my wheel is given
My heart for evermore. Yet still
Of headers I have had my fill,
My bruises they are seven.
MARY F. Nixon.
BENEATH THE WAVE.
From the Chicago Record.
Only a little mermaid,
Who perched on a cold, damp rock,
And wept as if her system
Had incurred a dreadful shock.
"Alas! Ah, woe!" she blubbered,
"I'm the victim of a cheat;
I can not ride a bicycle,
For I haven't any feet."
66
SONGS OF THE WHEEL.
THE FIN DE SIECLE FAVORITE.
She brings my heart to my mouth, I ween,
And all my attention wins,
The sweet and beautiful bicyclene
As along the road she spins.
As she takes the lead of the trolley car,
With a spurt that shows her sand;
How I wish that I were the handle-bar
That she grasps with her lily hand!
KING TOMMY'S RISE AND FALL.
Tommy was ruled by his father and mother,
Tommy was bossed by his older brother.
Tommy was tyrannized over each hour
By a very small maid with the face of a flower.
But one day Tommy was given a wheel,
And he felt like a king on a throne of steel.
Now a sudden rise from a serf to a king
Has always proven a dangerous thing.
The people who come into power too quick
Go
up like a rocket and down like a stick.
King Tom, before the first day was done,
Was Emperor, Sultan, and Czar in one.
SONGS OF THE WHEEL.
67
He owned the pavement, he owned the street,
He ran the officers off their beat.
He frightened the coachmen out of their wits
As he scorched right under their horses' bits.
Pedestrians fled when they saw him approach,
He caused disaster to carriage and coach;
For he never turned out, and his pace never
slowed:
His bell was a signal to clear the road;
And I would not repeat, indeed, not I,
What the truckmen said when his bike went by.
King Tom only winked in their eyes with a grin,
Proud of his power to make them sin.
And bolder and bolder each day he grew,
And faster and faster his bicycle flew;
And he was certain he owned the earth,
And all that was on it from girth to girth;
And he always got off without hurt or scratch,
Till all of a sudden he met his match.
Reigning one time in his usual splendor,
He came face to face with a Cable's fender.
68
SONGS OF THE WHEEL.
He rang his bell for the right of way,
But a biker may ring till his hair turns gray,
And a Cable Car, or its Cousin Trolley,
Will pay no heed to that sort of folly.
All that King Tom recalls of that day
Was riding into the Milky Way,
Where he saw all the stars in the heavens. Well,
There isn't much more of his reign to tell.
He gave his wheel to his brother Bill,
And walks on two crutches, and always will.
And he says as he looks at his wooden leg,
"I went up like a rocket and down like a peg."
ELLA WHEELER WILCOX,
WRECKED.
From the Springfield Monitor.
A girl, a wheel,
A shock, a squeal.
A header, a thump,
A girl in a lump,
A bloomer all torn,
A maiden forlorn.
SONGS OF THE WHEEL.
69
THE GRASS WIDOW.
From the London World.
We met upon a P. & 0.
At Malta, and at Plymouth Hoe
We took to terra firma ;
She was so winsome and so weak,
Had come to England health to seek,
And left (for tears she scarce could speak)
Her better half in Burmah.
At Paddington she did entreat;
Might she to choose a modest gîte,
From my experience borrow?
I indicated an hotel
Where she sans peur might safely dwell;
We parted, and I promised—well,
To call upon the morrow.
And many a morrow after that
My feet compelled me to her mat;
We seemed to suit each other.
Lest Bob, in Burmah, should be vexed,
An ancient cousine she annexed,
Who heard her, with an air perplexed,
Call me her "little brother."
We spent our evenings at the play,
And whirled on wheels thro' half the day
70
SONGS OF THE WHEEL.
Around the wonted Stadia;
And into picture-shows we dropped,
And now and then we "Monday Popped,"
And thro' long noons together shopped
In Burlington Arcadia.
But now I'm broke, my leave is up,
No more to sing, no more to sup,
I softly kiss her fingers;
"Good-bye," a smile a sigh conceals,
She keenly her position feels,
And yet, in spite of all appeals,
Bob still in Burmah lingers.
COTSFORD DICK.
AN ENIGMA.
And the man stood before me talking:
"Verily, verily," were his words,
"I have been by the smooth road,
The great road
Where the wheels are whirling hither and yon;
Where the flowers bloom not,
Yet there are many bloomers;
Where there are no trees,
Yet limbs are everywhere;
Where no cattle come,
SONGS OF THE WHEEL.
11
}
Yet calves are many;
Lean calves and fat,
Pretty calves and homely,
Old calves and young;
And stranger than the other strange things
Was this:
That no calf of all those calves
Had more than one leg!"
Then the man ceased speaking,
And I communed with myself, saying:
.
Verily, the wheels this man thought he saw
Are in his own head."
And I plumed myself upon my superior wisdom.
W. J. L.
SHE WAITS FOR ME.
From the Cleveland Plain Dealer.
When, worn and tired with toil and care,
I homeward wheel my way,
A thought dispels my dark despair
And lights the homeward way;
A vision fair far up the street
With straining eyes I see.
I hurry then my love to meet,
I know she waits for me.
1772
SONGS OF THE WHEEL.
She waits for me, my love, my own,
She greets me with a smile,
I hear again her tender tone,
It shortens every mile.
She waits for me, because, you see,
Like lightning she can go;
At every turn she waits for me—
I ride so awful slow!
CONGRESSIONAL WHEELMEN.
By an unnamed but sure-enough Member of the House of Repre-
sentatives. We hope he's a statesman.
"Twas with awe that the people heard, a few
short months ago,
That Tom Reed had dropped his dignity and to
riding the bike fell to.
But this condition of alarm was destined soon to
die,
For many Congressional associates concluded the
wheel to try.
First there came Illinois' well-known son,
name Joe Cannon,
he by
A truer or more devoted pedaller can not be
found to count on.
SONGS OF THE WHEEL.
73
After many sore and trying efforts he managed
his wheel to stride,
And he now declares with confidence "he can
spit on either side.”
The Empire State was not to be without its bicy-
cle statesman,
For into the breach there quickly sprang its Odell,
Hooker, and Sherman.
They hied themselves to a bicycle school to mas-
ter the art of wheeling,
And the falls and sudden ground-stops experi-
enced by them scarce express their feeling.
Oh, how the ground rose and fell, toward each
rider reaching,
And oh, how steadily each Congressman damned
the faulty teaching!
Despite pains and obstacles each man declared it
sport and to his liking,
Notwithstanding the fact that each succeeding
fall seemed to be more striking.
A lesson or two seemed quite enough to make
these men feel confident;
No longer would they allow menial to presunie
to teach men so eminent.
Then, alas and alack, a climax came, and these
statesmen, so full of trust,
74
SONGS OF THE WHEEL.
!
Were thrown from their lordly pedestals and
forced to bite the dust.
That is to say, this sorry plight fell to the tall
and stately Chautauquan,
For he of Orange was also prone, but 'twas mud
that he was caught in.
But to Utica's pent-up representative was re-
served the greatest hit,
For his fall revealed his love for the wheel, for
he was completely wrapped up in it.
Now, it may be said that the picture is too
strongly drawn, and thus too far it reaches,
But 'tis exactly true, for the gearing had caught
and used up Sherman's breeches;
Odell's linen did not spotless remain, nor was
Hooker's clothing perfection;
But Sherman's attire was sadly torn and not fit
for public inspection.
In royal style did Sherman ride to his hotel in a
hack,
His minus pants would not permit him to walk
back.
With carriage hire and clothing new his finances
suffered quite a wreck,
But no such slight obstacles could his wheeling
fervor check.
SONGS OF THE WHEEL.
75
Let every aspiring citizen now take due and
timely warning,
And not look upon bicycling as necessary to his
calling.
Fame must come in another way, not on wheels,
but by brain and tact;
Adhere to the advice, and you'll surely find that
this is an absolute fact.
A FAIR CYCLER.
See her spin down the street,
Natty from head to feet,
Saucy, bewitching, sweet,
Gay as a linnet!
By all the gods! but I'd
Mightily like to ride,
By that fair cycler's side,
Just for a minute!
Ah! what nymphean grace!
What a poise! what a pace!
Surely, were she to race,
She could win medals!
Gown trim, yet flowing free,
Hat what a hat should be,
Boots pressing prettily
Down on the pedals.
i.
76
SONGS OF THE WHEEL.
Presto! the vision's gone,
Passed like the blush of dawn;
Seem from the scene withdrawn
Love, light, and laughter.
Bless me! how glum I feel!
By Jove! I'll get my wheel,
Mount in a trice, and steal
Speedily after!
IRVING GILMORE.
TAKEN FROM LIFE.
From the Cleveland Plain Dealer.
There was a man who bought a wheel,
He bought it for his wife,
And through the streets this man would reel
A-risking of his life.
Just so his wife could learn to ride,
With swift and agile bounds,
He galloped onward by her side—
She weighed two hundred pounds.
Of course he couldn't keep the pace,
And soon he traveled hence;
His love a tandem now doth grace-
Her second hub has sense!
SONGS OF THE WHEEL.
куку
AN ANTI-CYCLONE.
From Vanity Fair.
Hark to the voice of one who wails in grief and
consternation,
Singing the dirge, alack the day! of rational con-
versation;
Dead, gone, and quite forgotten, till one wonders
in amaze
What people found to talk about in precyclotic
days.
With talk of wheels and nothing else from soup
to macaroni,
A modern dinner means a cyclo-conversazione;
With quips and cranks in good old time our talk
was wont to glitter;
The quips are gone, the cranks survive to prove
themselves the fitter.
The cyclo-chatter penetrates all sorts and kinds
of places;
Queen's Counsel talk of "handle-bars" and doc-
tors of "gear cases;"
The scientific man inquires, " Are Swifts or Ban-
tams fleeter?"
And "cyclo" is the prefix to the poet's "dainty
metre."
.
78
SONGS OF THE WHEEL.
;
I'm sighing for the good old times, 'tis sad to
think upon them!
When maids sat at the spinning-wheels instead of
sitting on them;
For, though unfrequent were their words, and
very mild their jokes,
They tired you not with talk of tires, nor did
they speak of spokes.
But nowadays, in drawing-rooms and shops and
ladies' clubs,
Young wives complacently discuss the "new self-
oiling hubs;"
In strange, mysterious phrase I hear them tell as
in a dream,
How this one rides a "Buffalo" and that one a
"Sunbeam!"
And oh! how hard his lot who, in the cyclo-craze
not sharing,
Will find the talk of "ball-bearings" is almost
past his bearing!
They'll say "a screw's loose in his nut," to scorn
the modern faddle,
And sad'll be his fate who takes no interest in a
"saddle."
The ball of conversation to keep rolling nowa-
days
SONGS OF THE WHEEL.
779
i
You needs must talk the cyclo-shop, and feign to
share the craze.
The one consideration that consoles me at this
juncture
Is that the ball's pneumatic: so I hope it soon
may puncture.
A. TYRE O.
TO MY CYCLE.
From the Spectator.
Dear other self, so silent, swift, and sure,
My dumb companion of delightful days,
Might fairy fingers from thy orbit rays
Of steel strike music, as the gods of yore
From reed or shell; what melodies would pour
On my glad ears; what songs of woodland ways,
Of summer's wealth of corn, or the sweet lays
Of April's budding green; while evermore
We twain, one living thing, flash like the light
Down the long tracks that stretch from sky
to sky.
Thou hast thy music too; what time the noon
Beats sultry on broad roads, when, gathering
night,
We drink the keen-edged air; or, darkling, fly
"Twixt hedge-rows blackened by a mystic moon.
ADRIEL VERE.
80
SONGS OF THE WHEEL.
1
DRESS.
When Mary rides a bicycle,
She wears a natty suit,
With leggins trim, and saucy cap,
And, oh, she is a "beaut!"
She doesn't wabble on her wheel,
But sits up straight and fair;
And, seeing her, the men all stop
To watch her everywhere.
When Harry rides a bicycle,'
He straps his trousers tight
Around his ankles in a bunch,
And, oh, they are a sight!
He humps his back like an old cat,
In most ungraceful crooks,
And every one who sees him says:
"How bad that fellow looks!"
The moral of this bit of verse
Is plain enough, I guess;
It is that bicyclists should be
Most careful how they dress.
A wheel makes one conspicuous,
And one brought in the sight
Of thousands of his fellow-men
Should try to dress just right.
SONGS OF THE WHEEL.
81
THE OLD BIKE.
From the Cleveland Leader.
I love it, I love it, and who shall dare
To chide me for loving that old bike there?
I've treasured it long as a sainted prize,
And its battered old frame brings the tears to
my eyes;
"Tis bound with a thousand bands to my heart,
Though the sprocket's bent and the links are
apart.
Would you know the spell? My grandma sat
there,
Upon that old saddle, and zipped through the
air.
In childhood's hour I lingered near
That old machine, with listening ear,
For grandma's shrieks through the house would
ring
If I even happened to touch the thing.
She told me to wait until she died,
Then I could take it and learn to ride.
And once I caused her to tear her hair,
When I cut the tire of that old wheel there.
"Tis old, 'tis wrecked, but I gaze on it now
With quivering breath and with throbbing brow.
"Twas there she sat-ah, how she could ride,
With grandpa humping along at her side!
82
SONGS OF THE WHEEL.
Say it is folly, call it a joke,
But the scrap-man can't have even a spoke,
For I love it, I love it, and can not bear
To part with my grandma's old bike there!
NEW VERSION OF AN OLD SONG.
From the Irish Cyclist.
Show me a sight
Bates for delight
A bicycle bright wid a young Irish girl on it;
Oh, no!
Nothin' you'll show
Aiquals her sittin' and takin' a twirl on it;
Look at her there,
Night in her hair—
The blue eye of day from her eye laughin' out
on us;
Faix, an' a fut,
Perfect of cut,
Peepin' to put an end to all doubt in us.
That there's a sight
Bates for delight
A bicycle bright wid a young Irish girl on it;
SONGS OF THE WHEEL.
83
Oh, no!
Nothing you'll show
Aiquals her sittin' and takin' a twirl on it.
See! how the steel
Brightens to feel
The touch of them beautiful weeshy soft hands
of her!
Down goes her heel,
Round runs her wheel,
Purrin' wid
her.
pleasure to take the commands of
Talk of Three Fates
Sated on sates,
Spinnin' an' shearin' away till they've done for
me.
You may want three
For your massacree—
But one fate for me, boys, and only the one for
me.
An' isn't that fate
Pictured complate,
A bicycle bright wid a young Irish girl on it?
Oh, no!
Nothin' you'll show
Aiquals her sittin' and takin' a twirl on it.
84
SONGS OF THE WHEEL.
THE CRUCIAL TEST.
From the Richmond Dispatch.
"I always feel so brave," she said,
"When I the 'cycle pedals tread;
Like some world-conquering cavalier,
I ride unconscious of all fear!"
A field mouse crossed our winding way-
A grasp, a scream, a swerve, a sway!
And road-side gully did reveal
A pot-pourri of maid and wheel.
NO VACATION THIS YEAR.
From the Boston Courier.
Oh, for a day at the ocean's shore,
Or a day at the mountains high,
Away from the heat of the city street
In the fierce month of July!
So the maiden said; but-alackaday!
For the many things we like!
It takes every cent that she earns to pay
The installments on her bike.
SONGS OF THE WHEEL.
85
THE PASSING OF THE HORSE.
Only a horse,
From the Chicago Tribune.
A backwoods horse; and yet
An animal of noble lineage,
With right to boast of bluest English blood
That ever flowed through equine veins and knew
An eventful life he led
It not.
Upon the woodland farm.
A stolid man
His owner was, in whose lack-luster eyes
A horse was but a horse, and nothing more;
Who neither knew nor cared to know the worth
Of pedigree in horseflesh, and who worked
The noblest beast from year to year, in dull
Routine of service at the plough, or drove
His fiery, yet tamed Bucephalus
With grist of corn to mill, beyond the ridge,
Or in the ancient buggy hitched him up
And drove on Sundays to the meeting-house
In Thompson's Grove, a dozen miles away.
And so the years rolled on, and poor old Prince,
No longer in his prime, was sold one day
For forty dollars, to a keen-eyed man,
And driven to the nearest market-town,
And crowded in an ill-smelling car,
With ten or fifteen others, and sent East.
86
SONGS OF THE WHEEL.
One cold, gray morning, from his narrow stall
In the big barn where he now found himself,
Old Prince was taken forth. A street-car stood
Upon an iron track. They hustled him
In front of it. He heard the clank of chains,
And presently, a corporation's slave,
He moved off down the street, the noisy car
Rattling behind him. Patiently old Prince
Ambled along. It was all one to him.
The heyday of his youth had passed, and life
Held nothing that a self-respecting horse
Need worry over.
Merciful powers!
What is that? A boy, or what seems a boy,
Rides upon a strange and fearful-looking
Thing with two wheels, one before the other.
His back is humped. His face is set and stern.
His feet fly madly up and down as if
Some fearful agony possessed him. Lo!
What is it? Quivering in every limb,
With nostrils distended and a snort
Of rage and terror, old Prince stood straight up,
The blood of his long and noble line
Of English sires rose in righteous wrath
And sense of burning outrage. With a bound
His youth and strength came back. He set his
jaws,
Threw back his ears, and tore along the track
SONGS OF THE WHEEL.
87
At racing speed-a strange, unheard-of sight-
A car-horse running away and dragging
The car after him! Calmly the driver
Applied the brake. The harness held. Old
Prince
Slackened by degrees his speed. In his eyes
The fire died out. The deadly brake had done
Its work as a discourager and broke
The spirit of another horse.
The other day
They took him out to Western Avenue,
And left him. Glue factory.
Two dollars.
HE DREW THE LINE.
From the Cleveland World.
Her face won his devotion,
And her figure's queenly motion
Filled his being with a notion
All have felt.
She rode her wheel so sweetly
That she conquered him completely,
And she had him tucked up neatly
'Neath her belt.
Her dot was more than ample,
For a thou. was but a sample,
88
1
SONGS OF THE WHEEL.
And she never tried to trample
On his vows.
So this youth, in luck emphatic,
Had a future more ecstatic
Had he not been too erratic
To espouse.
For although her face and wheeling
And her fortune raised a feeling
That his peace of mind was stealing
And his ease,
He had courage never flagging,
And preferred forever stagging
When he saw her bloomers bagging
At the knees.
FREDERIC S. HARTZELL.
THE BICYCLE BEND.
From the Atlanta Constitution.
There once was a bend they called "Grecian,"
But may fate or kind fortune defend
True lovers and all,
On this bicycle ball,
From the maid with the bicycle bend.
SONGS OF THE WHEEL.
89
LOCHINVAR UP TO DATE.
From the Post-Dispatch.
A Young Lochinvar is come out of the West,
Of all the good makes his wheel was the best;
And save for his air-pump equipments he'd none;
He rode without tools, but he rode not alone.
So faithful in love, so matchless in speed,
He outscorched the scorchers-in that all agreed.
He stayed not for tack, he stopped not for dog,
He rode o'er the river upon a round log;
But ere he leaped off at his fiancée's gate,
His Nell had consented, and Locky was late.
For a
"dead one" at speed (he'd ne'er won a
race)
Was to wed Locky's Nell, to take Locky's place!
"I'll enter," said Locky, "whatever befall,
And if need arise I'll punch bridesman and all."
Then spoke the bride's father, with fire in his
eye
(The singular is right-the other was shy):
"Come you for trouble or to share in our joy?
You're in either case welcome, Locky, me boy."
"I long wooed your daughter, my suit was de-
nied.
Love swells like a tire, but it ebbs like the tide;
90
SONGS OF THE WHEEL.
1
And now I am come, with this lost love of mine,
To eat of the bride-cake, to drink of the wine.
There are maidens in this burg far fairer who'll
try
To win out old Locky-you know that's no lie.”
The bride pledged a "schooner," and Lock took
her up,
Went her four better and threw down the cup.
The cut of her bloomers, the light of her eye
Made young Locky mutter: "I'll win her or
die."
He took her soft hand, ere her ma could prevent
And 'round the whole room in a polka they went.
A touch of her hand, a word in her ear,
He gave her a sign that the tandem was near.
From the door to the seat the bloomer girl
sprung;
To light in the saddle behind her he swung.
"We're off!" Locky shouted, "we'll give 'em a
run;
They're scorchers, indeed, who'll be in on this
fun.'
وو
There was mounting of wheels 'mong all Nellie's
clan,
From the young country cousin e'en to the old
man;
SONGS OF THE WHEEL.
91
But they never saw more fair bride or groom
true-
Who scorched to the altar on a wheel built for
two.
E. G. K.
A LOVER'S REMINISCENCE.
From the Albany Morning Express.
The lover said:
"Modest was she when first we wed-
So shy, indeed, I can't forget
Her blushes red!
And when she mounted her pony true,
For a canter down Fifth Avenue,
She wore a long skirt of sober blue,
Hiding her feet, and side-saddle, too."
Again he said:
"Now she's a bold and airy maid,
A biking miss, of naught afraid,
All coyness fled!
She wears a jaunty bloomer faddle,
And, when mounting her cycle saddle,
She nimbly leaps and lands a-straddle,
Then pedestrians just skedaddle.'
""
CECIL LESLIE.
شم
1
92
SONGS OF THE WHEEL.
ON A TANDEM.
"Twas the time of meadow lilies,
And of bobolinks in tune,
When I went to ride with Phyllis
On a breezy afternoon.
How her jaunty gown became her,
With her maiden cheeks aglow!
Had I then been asked to name her
I'd have called her "apple-blow."
As she spoke with blush and dimple
Of her girlish hopes and fears,
As I watched the sunny rimple
Of the curls about her ears,
A great wave I could not master
Through my veins began to steal,
And my heart went whirling faster
Than the whirring of the wheel.
All too soon the moments fleeted,
All too swiftly sank the sun;
Fate the love-web had completed
When at last the goal was won.
Tender were the words between us
As we stood there side by side,
For the wily son of Venus
Had been with us on our ride.
IRVING GILMORE.
SONGS OF THE WHEEL.
93
TO A CYCLER.
High rolling cycler! pilgrim of the land,
Thou dost despise the earth where cares
abound,
And lov'st thy wheel, whose well-filled rubber
band
With sudden puncture, casts thee to the
ground,
That cold, hard ground, where safeties drop at
will
The fool who tries to coast on them down hill.
To thy pneumatic saddle, not beyond,
Mount, daring rider! Thy most ardent strain
In praise of safeties, a ne'er-failing bond,
Is still 'twixt thee and that long list of slain,
Who, though they sprinkle all the earth with
gore,
The praises of the wheel sing evermore.
Leave to the nightingale the shady woods,
A blaze of glorious open road is thine.
And if thou hast a score of bruises, floods
Of misery, and curses not divine,
Thou art a type of those most wise, who roam
Far from the kindred points of heaven and home!
*
*.
*
*
*
1
94
SONGS OF THE WHEEL.
My heart leaps up when I behold
A bicycle pass by.
So was it not when I began,
So is it not with every man
Who oft-times in the dust has rolled
Without a cry.
I ride my wheel where'er I can,
And I could wish my days to be
Bound each to each by wheeling merrily.
MARY F. Nixon.
THE COPPER CAUGHT THE SCORCHER.
From the Washington Times.
He was a mounted copper,
Upon an iron steed,
And was laying for the scorcher,
Who rode at lawless speed;
When a whizzing round the corner,
At a break-neck, lightning pace,
Appeared a reckless rider,
Whereupon the cop gave chase.
"I say, there!" cried the bluecoat,
As he humped himself about,
"You're arrested for fast riding."
When the scorcher heard the shout
SONGS OF THE WHEEL.
95
He looked o'er his shoulder,
And he didn't do a thing
But pedal all the harder
And make the welkin ring.
"I like that," said the "finest,"
As through the thoroughfare
He started for his victim;
And the crowd that gathered there
Cheered the racer, jeered the copper,
And wagered 10 to 1
On the scorcher as he sped along
On that exciting run.
In and out among the horses
And wagons on the street
They dodged about most artfully,
With many a dangerous feat;
But the bluecoat was outdistanced,
He set too slow a pace,
And his anger gave expression
In the wrath upon his face.
At last, grown weak and weary,
The copper swore he'd shoot,
And reached back for his pistol,
But the crowd cried, "Don't, you
brute!"
96
SONGS OF THE WHEEL.
But he aimed it at the scorcher,
If he didn't, I'm a liar;
"Bang!" and the scorcher tumbled,
For the cop had pierced his tire.
SCORCHERS.
From the Rochester Democrat and Chronicle.
Three scorchers went hustling down the street,
Along the street, as the sun went down;
As if they were trying a record to beat,
And the "coppers" were chasing them out of
town.
For fools must scorch, and fools must hump,
And the less of a rider, the more of a chump,
And they leave their victims groaning.
Three corpses lay out on the pavement there,
In the tracks of the wheels that the scorchers
rode,
And the ambulance came with a dash and a
swear,
And jounced away with its ghastly load;
But the fools still ride, and the fools still hump,
Who ought to be run out of town on the jump,
And the people will cease their groaning.
KARL H. WISEWELL.
SONGS OF THE WHEEL.
97
IN THE MOONLIGHT.
From the Cleveland Plain Dealer.
She smiled at me, as she swiftly passed,
Over the handle-bar;
That sunny smile was the maiden's last,
Over the handle-bar.
She carromed hard on a cobble-stone,
She took a header she couldn't postpone;
Her twinkling heels in the moonlight shone
Over the handle-bar.
BLOOMERS.
From the Toledo Bee.
Some observing man discovered
(How I've never thought to ask)
That Kentucky maidens' bloomers
Have a pocket for a flask;
That the cycling girl of Texas
As she rides is not afraid
She provides a pistol-pocket
When she has her bloomers made;
That the bloomer-girl of Boston,
Always cool and wisely frowning,
Has a pocket in her bloomers,
Where she carries Robert Browning;
98
SONGS OF THE WHEEL.
That the Daisy Bell of Kansas,
Who has donned the cycling breeches,
Has a pocket in her bloomers
Full of woman suffrage speeches;
That Chicago's wheeling woman,
When her cycle makes rotations,
Has a special bloomer pocket
Where she carries pork quotations;
That Milwaukee's cycling beauties,
As they pedal day by day,
Have a tiny secret pocket
Where a corkscrew's stowed away;
That the Gotham bloomer damsel,
Whom Manhattan dudes admire,
Has a tutti-frutti pocket
Full of gum to mend her tire.
A SIGHT.
From the Buffalo Courier.
I saw a girl
Amid the whirl;
She'd golden hair,
Her face was fair,
Her garments fine,
Her form divine,
With eyes like stars.
SONGS OF THE WHEEL.
99
She rode a bike
And such a sight!
She drove her steed
At scorchers' speed.
Her back was humped,
Her head near bumped
The handle-bars.
A DOUBTFUL MAID'S SOLILOQUY.
To ride, or not to ride: that is the question,
Whether 'twere better to cast aside all pride
And don the bloomers, appearing thus with man
In public thoroughfare, his equal now,
And boldly self-assertive, challenge all who pass
To criticise the mannish sport, the loss of girlish
grace,
Or to cling to petticoats, and stay at home.
For of a surety there are joyous parties formed
To go a-pleasuring, in which I bear no part.
But then, to ride, to fall, perchance
To break one's wheel! Ay, there's the rub,
Or to encounter wicked brewery carts
Bent on the destruction of the highway's plague.
I fear! I tremble! 'tis grewsome but to think
on it.
100
SONGS OF THE WHEEL.
Still, what is there left to do since all girls ride?
I'll do it. I'll be brave; 'twas but yester e'en I
saw,
Glancing from my window, who but Tom
Riding with that Smithers girl, forgetting me.
Hush! softly now! I'll steal away and take a
lesson.
If all goes well, another week will see me by his
side.
Farewell to ancient prejudices, we need them
not,
And thus I say, farewell!
THE INTROSPECTIVE SCORCHER.
From the Cleveland Leader.
I am the scorcher!
Please observe
The curve
That appertains unto my spine!
With head ducked low,
I go
O'er man and beast, and woe
Unto the thing
That fails to scamper when I ting-a-ling!
Let people jaw
And go to law
SONGS OF THE WHEEL.
101
To try to check my gait,
If that's their game!
I hate
To kill folks, but I'll do it just the same,
I guess,
Unless
They clear the track for me;
Because, you see,
I am the scorcher, full of zeal,
And just the thing I look like on the wheel!
THE TRADE MARK.
From the Detroit Free Press.
"Tis not the costume that he wears
Betrays the wheelman bold;
"Tis not the haggard look that bears
The proof he's of that mould;
'Tis not his cap, 'tis not his shoe,
"Tis not his curving spine;
Yet something tells us that it's true
He's in the cycling line.
"Tis not the awkward way he walks,
"Tis not the way he stands;
"Tis not the way he laughs or talks
That marks him in all lands.
102
SONGS OF THE WHEEL.
S
And yet we know that he aims to be
scorcher" and 66 crack"
A
We're sure of it, because we see
The mud-streak down his back.
THE BEGINNER.
From the Washington Evening Star.
Oft has the lyre been tuned to tell
About the wondrous grace
Of one, saluted as the belle
Of every earthly place.
Mankind admires her dainty pose,
From foot to curly head,
Of course, provided that she goes
Serenely, straight ahead.
But while we wish that youthful charms
Forever might endure,
There comes a host of strange alarms
With riders immature.
And e'en the most polite of men
Is filled with rage profound,
More bitter in its silence, when
W
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0
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SONGS OF THE WHEEL.
103
TO A GIRL ON A WHEEL.
From the Sun.
One day as I was riding on my wheel in Central
Park
I heard a silvery ripple, gay as trilling of a
lark;
I turned my head a moment, then my head
was turned for good,
For there beside a bicycle a girl in bloomers
stood.
My heart was lost forever to that maiden with
the wheel,
A thing of grace and beauty from her head
unto her heel.
Her face, it was the sweetest, her costume the
completest,
And her ankles were the neatest ever seen
upon a wheel.
She smiled, and mounting lightly, sped away
at rapid pace:
"You may kiss me if you catch me," she cried,
as I gave chase;
But from that day unto this day I have never
seen her face,
For I was left behind bewildered, fairly dis-
tanced in the race.
104
SONGS OF THE WHEEL.
Last night I took a scorching spin along the
Boulevard
And caught up with the charmer-almost-
within a yard.
She backward glanced, then darted off like the
swiftest-flying bird:
"You may kiss me if you ca-atch me, ha, ha!"
once more I heard.
My heart is lost forever to that maiden on a
wheel,
A thing of grace and beauty from her head
unto her heel.
Her face, it is the sweetest, her ankles are the
neatest,
And, confound it, she's the fleetest girl that
ever rode a wheel!
BEFORE AND AFTER.
From the Oakland Times.
Mary had but little nerve
With mice, until she got
Her bloomers safely fastened on:
And then she had a lot.
SONGS OF THE WHEEL.
105
HER SPINNING WHEEL.
Scorching down the Boulevard,
Chewing gum, and pedalling hard,
Ting-ling! Almost knock me flat,
Dizzie tie, Fedora hat,
Scarlet bloomers! "Tis a picture
Makes my very senses reel.
What was that? I ask. Oh, merely
Dot astride her spinning wheel.
ERNEST NEAL Lyon.
THE GRANDMOTHER OF "76 AND '96.
From the Hartford Courant.
In the good old times, said an ancient man,
Our grandmothers used a wheel;
And they crooned a lullaby soft and low,
As their fingers plied the reel.
They carded the wool and spun the yarn,
From the sheep around their door.
It was homespun cloth that our grandmothers
used
In the good old days of yore.
In these modern times, sighed the ancient man,
"Tis a different cloth they wear;
106
SONGS OF THE WHEEL.
"Tis crépon and satin, and novelty goods,
Imported from everywhere.
Alas for the good old times long fled,
And farewell to the spinning-wheel!
Tied up with a ribbon, or decked with flags,
It is silent along with the reel.
"Tis a different kind of a wheel, he said,
That these modern grandmothers use;
Columbias, Waverleys, Diamonds, Stearns,
Whichever make they may choose.
'Tis a different way that they use the wheel,
Alas that it thus should be!
These modern grandmothers ride on a wheel,
As they flock to the bicycle tea.
With shortened skirts, and a jaunty hat,
And their leggings laced up high,
There is never a day but you will see
These grandmothers riding by.
Grandmothers! Yes, and grandfathers, too!
And with them their daughters and sons,
All pumping along, through the dust and heat,
On their way to the bicycle runs.
Oh, shade of George Washington! what would
you say?
It would make all your senses reel.
SONGS OF THE WHEEL.
107
To look from the Capitol window to-day
And see Martha ride by on a wheel.
They may talk to me for a year and a day
Of modern bicycle tricks,
But give me the old-fashioned grandmother
dear
And the wheel of seventy-six.
J. K.
A LOVER'S WAIL.
Lucinda has the cycle fad,
And weekly worse it grows;
She wants a wheel, and wants it bad,
And likewise bloomer clothes.
I'd like to please her, but I feel
Opposed to cycling quite;
To me a woman on a wheel
Is not a pretty sight.
The thought of it my temper stirs;
I know I would not like
To see that stately form of hers
Bent over on a bike.
I do not fancy biking humps,
And feel my grief 'twould crown
108
SONGS OF THE WHEEL.
To see those beauteous legs, like pumps,
Go working up and down.
No, wheels are not for such as she,
Though they are speedy things.
Far more appropriate 'twould be
Were she equipped with wings.
WITH THE TANDEM AT THE GATE.
From the Chicago Times-Herald.
When evening comes with cooling air,
With tandem I seek Nellie fair,
To stand disconsolate at her gate
And count the minutes that I wait
Until she comes to meet me there.
The smooth roads call us everywhere;
The parks would hold no happier pair
If she would only not be late
But hurry to me at the gate,
That we might start together there.
The Midway bright with lanterns' glare,
Throbs under countless wheels that bear
Their riders swiftly on in state.
Make haste, my dear, it is your mate
Who calls for you his bliss to share!
SONGS OF THE WHEEL.
109
FLORINDA'S DEAL.
From the Chicago Record.
Florinda has the cycle craze, and likewise so
have I;
But, gracious! neither purse displays the cash
wherewith to buy.
Yet rare Florinda's up to things; she said-dear,
gifted girl-
"Let's blow in our engagement-rings, and get
some wheels and whirl."
BICYCLE GOOSE MELODIES.
New Orleans Times-Democrat.
Tom, Tom, the piper's son,
He stole a wheel and away he run;
But a copper fleet
Young Tom could beat,
And they locked him up in Mulberry Street.
Jack Spratt's
Trousers would flap;
His wife, she made hers tight,
And so between the two, you see
They kept the average right.
Peter, Peter, pumpkin eater,
Had a wife, and couldn't keep her,
110
SONGS OF THE WHEEL.
Took an ax and smashed her bike,
So she had to stay at home at night.
Hey-diddle-diddle,
The bicycle riddle,
The strangest part of the deal;
Just keep your accounts
And add the amounts;
The "sundries" cost more than the wheel.
Little Tommy Titmouse
Worked for a cycling house,
Went to his meals
On other men's wheels.
There was a man in our town
As wise as were our sires;
He ran across a piece of glass
And punctured both his tires;
And when he saw the air was out,
With all his might and main,
He took his little nickle-pump
And pushed it in again.
Ding-dong bell,
There's the man who fell.
Who knocked him down?
The meanest man in town.
SONGS OF THE WHEEL.
111
Who called the "cop?"
A man who saw him drop.
What a wicked man was that,
To try to kill the cyclist fat,
Who never did him any wrong,
But kept a-pedalling right along.
BEWARE THE WHEEL.
From the San Francisco Examiner.
The wheels go round without a sound,
The maidens hold high revel;
In sinful mood, insanely gay,
True spinsters spinning down the way
From goodness to the devil.
They laugh, they sing, and ting-a-ling
Their bells go all the morning;
And lanterns bright bestar the night,
The caterpillars warning.
With lifted hands Miss Charlotte stands,
Good-Lording and O-mying,
Her rheumatism forgotten quite,
Her fat with anger frying;
She blocks the path that leads to wrath,
Jack Satan's power defying.
112
SONGS OF THE WHEEL.
The wheels go round without a sound,
.
The stars are red and blue and green.
What's this that lies upon the ground?
Miss Charlotte Smith's a smithereen!
OLD GRUMBLER TO NEW GIRL.
Bike! Bike!
From Punch.
Bike!
O'er the hard street stones. Oh, she!
And I would that my tongue could utter
The thoughts that arise in me!
Oh, well for the newspaper boy
That he scoots on his cycle away!
Oh, well for the butcher lad
That he pedals-perchance it may pay!
But when stately girls get on
All a-couch, and with prospect of spill,
It is, oh, for the touch of a wee soft hand,
And the sound of a voice that could thrill!
Bike! Bike!
Bike!
With thy foot on the pedal. Oh, she!
SONGS OF THE WHEEL.
113
But the girlish grace that the wheel struck
dead
Will never come back to thee!
BLOWS.
From the Yonkers Statesman.
The giant powder in the blast
Is blowing up the boulders;
The maiden with pneumatic sleeves
Is blowing up her shoulders.
The baker to the kitchen maid
Is blowing up his crumpets;
The milkman in the lower hall
Is blowing up the trumpets.
The gentle zephyr from the South
Is blowing the narcissus;
The cook who thinks she knows it all
Is blowing up the "missus."
The father, down upon his knees,
Is blowing up the fires;
The daughter in her bloomer suit,
Is blowing up her tires.
114
SONGS OF THE WHEEL.
PUNCTURED.
From the Wilkes-Barre News-Dealer.
The preacher spoke of little things,
Their influence and power,
And how the little pitted speck
Made all the apple sour.
He told how great big, sturdy oaks
From little acorns grew,
And how the tiny little stone
The burly giant slew.
But the cyclist sat there unimpressed
By all the speaker's fire,
Until he went outside and found
A pin had pierced his tire.
WOMAN.
She's emancipated, we must confess;
Her rights she has won-'tis so:
No more she depends on a bathing-dress
The curves of her form to show.
It doesn't much matter what dress she wears,
Her beauties she must reveal:
Her upper charms at the dance she bares
And the lower ones on her wheel.
SONGS OF THE WHEEL.
115
HOW SHE HAS CHANGED.
From the Yonkers Statesman.
It seems a few short days ago
The girl for whom you'd died
Would walk a block and then exclaim:
"Oh, dear, my shoe's untied!”
But times have changed and so have girls,
Of this all are aware;
She simply now reminds you that
My tires need more air."
THE SCORCHER'S BACK.
The chimpanzee lately deceased,
Much lamented in New York's great Zoo,
Established one fashion at least,
Much followed in Kalamazoo.
His vertebral column which bent,
In tropical jungles to climb,
Its shape curvilinear lent
To model the bicycle spine.
And now in articulate curves
Its skeleton sits on its haunch,
In the posture the scorcher observes.
When his starter is giving the launch.
116
SONGS OF THE WHEEL.
Whate'er the original plan,
Confusion results from the shape,
"Twixt the ape that is almost a man,
And the man who looks so like an ape.
BIKE LORIDE.
LAMENT FROM THE CRADLE.
From the Washington Evening Star.
Up from the cradle came a wail,
At first a pensive coo:
Into a weird, vociferous wail
Of mournfulness it grew.
His sorrow, in a vein prolix,
He struggled to reveal,
"My father's talking politics,
66
And mother rides a wheel.
They say I'm cross. I'm simply sad
At being slighted so.
I wish the baby-carriage fad
Could somehow get a show.
How can you blame one in my fix
For setting up a squeal?
My father's talking politics,
And mother rides a wheel."
SONGS OF THE WHEEL.
117
A BENEDICTION.
From the Boston Courier.
God bless the wheel! the whirling wheel!
That wakens the world's unmeasured zeal,
And makes a man of my torture feel
Like praising the same alway,
For it's taken the maid next door, who sought
To daily pound the piano-forte,
To another brand of athletic sport
That bears her miles away.
THE END.
THE STOUT MAN'S CONQUEST.
THE STOUT MAN'S CONQUEST.
Copyright 1897, by Walter P. Phillips.
Words and Music by Walter P. PHILLIPS.


When I first sat my handsome wheel, I kept it not on an ev en keel; It
2, But now I've conquer'd the blooming bike, And I tear along the old turnpike, And the

FO
luffed to left, and it tack'd to right, But I grasp'd the handles with all my might, While
graceless boys who laugh'd at me Cry, "Pipe the scorcher-
hul- ly gee!" The

all the boys they laugh'd at me;
ladies bland- ly smile on
me;
Tru -
ly, I
I'm a cheerful
was
a sight to see!
sight to see !
The Stout Man's Conquest. Concluded.
CHORUS.

Tinkle, tink
•
-
le, went my bell, In
Tink le, tinkle, goes my bell, Its
ac-cents weak, its
sil - v'ry tones
tale to tell;
a
tale to tell;
p
Л

Tinkle, tink - le,
Tinkle, tink - le.
tinkle ding,
tinkle ding,
I thought the wheel a
Indeed the wheel's a
fearful thing.
joyful thing.
DANCE.

Tinkle, tinkle, rang the bell, And a wicked boy began to yell;
Tinkle, tink - le, sounds my bell,
In
sweet- est strains, its tale to tell;

Tinkle, tinkle, tinkle - dum,
Tinkle, tinkle, tinkle-dee,
bell were dumb.
I sometimes wished that
I love my wheel and my wheel loves me.

GIMBELS
:.
!

wils
810.1 P547
UNIVERSITY OF MINNESOTA
Phillips, Walter Polk, 1846-1920 comp.
Songs of the wheel.
3 1951 001 625 653 H
ones
THE
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