Vol 2, No 11
Articles in this issue
- Captain M. D. Rucker, jun. urges a strong muster for the general meet with the Cambridge University Bicycle Club at Welwyn, giving the N.W., N.E. and W. starting points, the Broad Street and Ludgate Hill trains to High Barnet that skip the macadam, Mr. Powell's offer to house machines at Cedar Lawn, Hampstead, and the room and bed capacity of the 'Wellington' and 'White Hart.'
- E. C. Koch again asks members who have not settled for concert tickets sold by them to do so at once, by Post Office order payable at the Lombard Street office.
- Divisional meets for the Welwyn general meet and the three following Saturdays, Lea Bridge Road, Jack Straw's Castle, Golder's Green or Harlesden Green for Welwyn, then Harefield, Denham Moor via Ruislip, St. Albans, Crawley, Chigwell Row and Ripley.
- District captains report: Francis Godlee's four N.E. men by Higham Hill and Chingford to the 'New Inn,' Waltham; Palmer Dalton's thirteen N.W. men to the 'Plough,' Northolt; W. A. Smith on a Western fiasco where a juvenile's rumour drew thirty spectators to Acton Church to watch a single rider set off for Iver; a near-blank S.W. meet salvaged at the 'Hautbois,' Ockham; and John C. Oswald's S.E. run to Westerham past a bolting horse and chaise at Sanderstead.
- A rule-by-rule digest of the revised club rules for members with no patience for the full text, the uniform defined precisely, colours now wearable on Sunday but the badge forbidden even at the Bath gathering, written notice of proposals to the Secretary, districts formalised, the Editor added to Committee, power to expel a member on a quorum of 50, and the amended regulations for meets, road medals, races and attendance prizes.
- Report from Kennington Oval before some six thousand spectators: eleven heats of the One Mile (one of them nearly wrecked by straying sheep), Hamilton beating Colman in the final, F. T. East winning the Five Miles Club Handicap from scratch, and Cortis beating Derkinderen by two yards in the Ten Miles Scratch after a last-lap struggle; the Surrey's prizes are called decidedly mean.
- Ashley Barrett rides to Sandwich, a stagnant Cinque Port now miles from the sea, leaves his machine at the 'Bell' and walks two miles to Richborough Castle, the Roman Rutupiae, where he breaks his favourite knife on the mortar and gropes by candle through the Archaeological Society's tunnel round the puzzling cruciform block.
- Conclusion of Carr, Franklin, Herbert and Hindley's Easter tour, Shanklin, Bonchurch, a bad and dear dinner at the 'Esplanade,' Ventnor, and Carr's sleepwalking cry of 'Seize his backbone!' in the night, then the boat to Portsmouth and the wet ride home via Chichester, Storrington and Horsham, with a verdict that the island's roads are smooth gravel and every hill rideable.
- Dated list from the London Athletic Club's 2 miles handicap on May 10th to the Pickwick Bicycle Club at the Alexandra Palace on July 5th, including the Cambridge University B.C. invitation race and the Bicycle Union championships at 1, 5, 25 and 50 miles.
- 'Dr. Rufus' quotes Sir Hans Sloane's MSS. on Dr. James Sherard and Mr. Petiver's 1704 botanising journey through Kent and Sussex, whose chaise met a road by Wadhurst and Ticehurst that no carriage had attempted in twenty years, and a 1678 diary entry of a crossing to Ireland that took six weeks on the water.
- A favourable review of the half-crown pocket-book published at the office of 'The Country,' 170 Strand, calendar, run and engagement diaries, racing tables, lists of racers, fastest amateur and professional times, machines and inns, free of the personal element, though the reviewer asks why Stassen has been 'pilled' from the list of makers.
- Theo. Godlee protests that the new Rules and List of Members has dumped City-address members on the North-East District, insisting a man's office is not his residence, and finds unintended sarcasm in a balance-sheet note calling those who overpay 'gentlemen'; and H. Sharp argues bicycle handles should be round and straight like an oar, gymnastic bar or cricket bat, an inch and a quarter thick and of soft or waxed-string-covered wood, rather than carrot- or pear-shaped.
- 'M. D. R.' defends the Miles Distance Recorder against members' complaints, blaming soft metal, a badly cut first wheel whose indentation and space jam if the spring slips, paper packing that throws the cam out of true, and a clumsily fitted glass; a corrected machine is being made in Birmingham and will be convertible for any wheel size.