29 chapters
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29 chapters
PREFACE.
PREFACE.
Close confinement to mercantile business for a dozen or more years brought on a feeling of discontent with the monotonous routine, that I at length tried to drive away by taking a little recreation on a bicycle. The machine, I found, was not only a source of great enjoyment, but it soon became a thing of practical value to me in the transaction of business. I took intense delight in riding the wheel a dozen miles to Hartford buying goods, quite content to let those who would sit inertly riding b
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Chapter I. Westward Ho! The beginning of a Seven Months’ Wheeling Tour across the Continent.
Chapter I. Westward Ho! The beginning of a Seven Months’ Wheeling Tour across the Continent.
S oon after leaving Port Chester, frequent explosions attracted my attention, and when within two miles of Tarrytown I came to a cluster of cheap shanties out in the woods, and found that it was the location of Shaft No. 11 of the new aqueduct for New York city. This shaft was only sixty feet deep, and as dump cars of rocks were constantly coming up, and empty cars going down, I thought it would be a fine thing to go down into the bowels of the earth. But no amount of entreaty, no amount of news
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Chapter II. Through the Highlands of the Hudson River.
Chapter II. Through the Highlands of the Hudson River.
Distance traveled in six days, 251 miles. N ow that the trees are bare, the terraced appearance of the Catskills is plainly visible, and in climbing up by the new mountain road to the Hotel Kaaterskill, along the northern slope of the Kaaterskill Clove, one wonders at first why the numerous little houses scattered all along up this Clove are not in danger of the catastrophe that befell the Willey House in Crawford Notch, New Hampshire. The sides of the Clove are as steep as the Notch, although n
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Chapter III. Up the Catskills and along the Erie Canal.
Chapter III. Up the Catskills and along the Erie Canal.
On the tow-path, at last. A path nearly 300 miles long and perfectly level for forty, fifty, and sixty miles on a stretch. How I looked forward to it. How I longed to get to it. How I thought the hard work was over when I reached it. What fun it would be to ride for hours without a dismount; what time I could make. This and a great deal more I had thought about, read of, and talked over. The great tow-path, the bicyclers’ paradise! Now I was there. Well, to state facts, it is no path at all, it
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Chapter IV. At Niagara and along Lake Erie.
Chapter IV. At Niagara and along Lake Erie.
AN ENTERTAINING ESCORT.—( Page 31. ) Thursday morning was clear and cool, and I left Buffalo with a last look at the black cloud of smoke hovering over it that stretched, thinner and thinner, far out over the lake. The roads were fine along the shore, and once or twice I laid down on the grass on the edge of the cliff that juts out over the water, perhaps forty feet below, and tried to imagine I was tired so I could have an excuse for stopping, but the cool breezes at my back urged me on and the
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Chapter V. Through Ohio and Indiana.
Chapter V. Through Ohio and Indiana.
FROM MUD TO MEADOW.—( Page 40. ) Tuesday I experienced some of the difficulties of the Western mud. A light drizzling rain in the morning made the roads too slippery to ride, and walking was hardly possible. The sticky mud accumulated under the brake and between the forks till, obliged to turn the machine around and push it backwards with the little wheel in the air, the big wheel finally stuck fast and slid along in the road. Then in pushing up hill with all the strength I had my feet would sli
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Chapter VI. At Chicago.
Chapter VI. At Chicago.
One night, soon after the machine had been put into the front parlor,—the farmers always think the best room in the house none too good for that “silver” horse, as some of them term it—and the knapsack had been laid away in the corner, the husband came in from the barn with two pails of milk, followed by his little boy, who was just old enough to walk if no threshold or hole in the rag carpet interfered with his progress. The milk was placed in the buttery on the floor, and the little youngster
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Chapter VII. Across the Mississippi.
Chapter VII. Across the Mississippi.
The other Sunday I came along to a meeting-house just after the bell stopped tolling, and riding out under the shed, I slipped off my knapsack, buttoned on a clean collar, put on my coat, and went in as quietly as possible, but every one in church except one old lady looked around at me, and I lost most of the Scripture lesson in consequence of this counter attraction. From her actions, afterwards, I think the said old lady was deaf and did not hear me come in, which accounts for her apparent ne
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Chapter VIII. Across the Missouri.
Chapter VIII. Across the Missouri.
When I left Grinnell, two members of their bicycle club, Messrs. Lee Taylor and Geo. Lewis, accompanied me for twenty miles or more, and although I was very glad of their company, the frequent tumbles they took coasting, made me sorry they had undertaken the ride, with the thermometer up in the nineties. Iowa roads are decidedly better than those through Illinois. Although there is the same system of repairing the highways in both States—the ancient system of farmers working out their road tax w
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Chapter IX. At the Base of the Rockies.
Chapter IX. At the Base of the Rockies.
Thus far I have been very lucky in not getting caught out in many showers, and it really has rained very little where I have been. A heavy rain at Omaha prevented further progress on the wheel, at least for a few days, and decided me to take the train. Partly through the influence of Mr. Charles M. Woodman, a wheelman, employed in the Union Pacific office, I secured a ticket to Denver at reduced rates. A cap has been the only thing I have worn on my head; the skin on my nose has peeled off sever
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Chapter X. On Pike’s Peak.
Chapter X. On Pike’s Peak.
That night we walked down a lane to a ranch to find shelter for the night, when a horse, taking fright at our machines, tried to jump over the gate at the foot of the lane, and in doing so, gate, horse, and all came down in a heap together with a crash. The horse jumped up and went off limping, but we thought the next ranch would be a safer place for us, and so we kept on a couple of miles and got an excellent supper, but our bed was on the floor in an old store-room. This slight hardship was so
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Chapter XI. Back to Denver.
Chapter XI. Back to Denver.
During the afternoon clouds gathered, but just before sunset the sun came out and the shadow of the Peak was plainly seen against the clouds to the east. Even the shadow of the square stone house was discerned, and then two of us went out to one end of the house, and surely, there we were, standing like the spectres of the Brocken near the shadow of the house, out over the plains twenty-five miles away and fourteen thousand feet above the ground. To be sure our shadows were not as clean cut as t
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Chapter XII. Across the Plains.
Chapter XII. Across the Plains.
With old coats and hats on and a lighted candle in our hands, we followed the overseer down through the trap-door. The ladders down which we climbed were straight up and down, and about all I could see as I followed the others was the light of their candles. About once in fifty feet we came to a platform and then started down another ladder. The ladders went close to one side of the shaft, which was protected with heavy timbers on the sides, and on the other side was the hole down which the buck
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Chapter XIII. Among the Mormons.
Chapter XIII. Among the Mormons.
But thirty miles of sand, railroad ties, and that blazing sun drove us into another freight train, and Wednesday morning we left Evanston and before noon were riding leisurely down Echo Cañon on our bicycles. I did not regret then that I was traveling on my wheel, for the roads were good and we stopped and enjoyed the grand scenery to our heart’s content. A train went whizzing by, and I saw passengers quickly calling each other’s attention to a particularly interesting place in the cañon. With t
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Chapter XIV. At the Big Trees.
Chapter XIV. At the Big Trees.
At one of the stations were some horned toads for sale, the first I had seen, and as I asked a passenger standing near what kind of animals they were, “I think,” said he, honestly enough, “they are what they call prairie dogs.” All day Sunday it was sand, sage-bush, and a sun so hot that it would almost blister, and the same kind of a country we had already seen so much of east of Ogden. So I occupied myself most of the time writing. During the day at the different stations situated along the sa
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Chapter XV. In the Yosemite Valley.
Chapter XV. In the Yosemite Valley.
The word valley hardly describes it, for the sides are perpendicular and almost a mile high, and this immense chasm is ten miles long and hardly a mile wide. The roar of the Merced River, so many thousand feet almost perpendicularly below, is heard even before one gets a glimpse of the river itself or even the valley, and my first thought was, is there any bottom to this chasm. On the opposite side of the valley I recognized Bridal Veil Fall from the many views I had seen of it, and a little far
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Chapter XVI. On the Shores of the Pacific.
Chapter XVI. On the Shores of the Pacific.
Californians delight as much as do the Mormons in camping out. It is the custom, after the harvest is over, for the farmer to lock up his house, take his whole family up into the mountains and stay for weeks. Many times a day I met these parties going or coming; and taking an early start some mornings I passed men and women lying on the ground under their wagons wrapped up in blankets, sound asleep, the silent running machine not disturbing them in their slumbers . In fact everywhere, at the Big
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Chapter XVII. With the Veterans.
Chapter XVII. With the Veterans.
The Avenue, which one here soon learns to know means Van Ness Avenue, is a fine broad street, just suited (as it is not a business street) for the easy formation of a parade, and the sight of the marching and counter-marching regulars, the State militia, and the ten thousand veterans, many of these carrying large silk flags, taken in connection with the scores of playing bands and drum corps, altogether, was very inspiring. Certainly the streets and buildings of San Francisco were never so gayly
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Chapter XVIII. Monterey and the Geysers.
Chapter XVIII. Monterey and the Geysers.
PERILS OF CAÑON COASTING.—( Page 174. ) Clark Foss, the celebrated driver, who owned this route, and was one of the twenty-five different men in different places who drove Horace Greeley on the ride when he promised “to get him there in time” (every one who ever came to California has heard the story; it is the worst chestnut ever perpetrated, but they still retail it), died about a year ago, and his son, Charlie Foss, now drives the six-horse open wagon. For three or four miles I was in constan
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Chapter XIX. Out on the Pacific.
Chapter XIX. Out on the Pacific.
Lying out on one of the benches on the upper deck with the cold, raw wind blowing into his pale face, was a young gentleman of thirty, with blue eyes, but a face so smooth and fair that he looked much younger, another Bartley Hubbard, if I ever pictured one. He had been stripped of the blanket he had brought up from the hole of misery, where it seems he had spent the night near me, the steward saying, as he took the blanket, “he must go below to lay down,” but rather than do that he lay shiverin
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Chapter XX. At Shoshone Falls.
Chapter XX. At Shoshone Falls.
At the terminus of the Oregon Railway and Navigation Company’s line at Huntington, I went into the baggage car to get the machine. “$3 to pay on that,” said the baggage-master. As I had traveled over 1400 miles on the Union and Central Pacific railroads without being charged a penny for the machine, this charge for one day seemed to be rather exorbitant, and I said so. “Well,” said the baggage-master very confidently, “I can’t help that. It is $1.50 on the other division, and the same on this.”
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Chapter XXI. In the Yellowstone Park.
Chapter XXI. In the Yellowstone Park.
Coming to another smaller stream soon after, I hoped to avoid further delay by riding with a spurt down into the water and across, as I had done many times before under similar circumstances, but the pebbly bottom was not so firm as it looked, and the wheel slowly came to a standstill in the middle of the stream, while I quickly dismounted into the water, in so doing ripping both inside seams of my nether garment down to the knees. This necessitated more fine tailoring behind some bushes, and, b
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Chapter XXII. Through the Black Cañon and the Royal Gorge.
Chapter XXII. Through the Black Cañon and the Royal Gorge.
As this young man holds a high office in the church, and is the son of George Q. Cannon, who is still a fugitive from justice, for practicing polygamy, this prompt action of the church may at first seem meritorious, but the licentious reputation of the son has long been known, and it is thought this public confession and prompt excommunication was for effect upon the large number of Eastern people present. But if so, the effect was hardly favorable, even if it was hoped it would be. The whole se
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Chapter XXIII. A Visit to Prudence Crandall.
Chapter XXIII. A Visit to Prudence Crandall.
“But,” she added, “he has never sent them. Probably so busy he forgot it. I do wish I could see them, for I had a chance once to read part of ‘Innocents Abroad,’ and I do like his beautiful style of expression. And here is Major Kinney, and George G. Sumner, and Rev. Mr. Twichell. What grand good men they are. And this—you say you have heard him preach! How much I would give to hear that great soul speak,” and she handed me Rev. Mr. Kimball’s photograph, and several others, every one of which is
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Chapter XXIV. The Triennial Conclave at St. Louis.
Chapter XXIV. The Triennial Conclave at St. Louis.
Some of the members of the Womans’ Christian Temperance Union in the Eastern cities, who do such a grand good thing by freely furnishing ice-water to the thirsty crowd at all such out-door public gatherings, might suggest the idea to some of the members of the society in this city with good results. Still, notwithstanding the fact that saloons here keep open day and night, seven days in the week, the number of arrests for drunkenness last year was a little less than forty-two hundred, which is n
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Chapter XXV. The Wheelmen’s Illuminated Parade.
Chapter XXV. The Wheelmen’s Illuminated Parade.
The Simmons Hardware Company, agents for the Columbia bicycles in this city (in whose employ were Messrs. Jordan, Sharps, Dennis, and Smith, and other wheelmen, whose acquaintance I made), had just moved a part of their immense business into a new six-story brick block, which was to all outward appearances substantially built, when one Sunday evening, without the slightest warning, the upper floor dropped and carried with it the five other floors down into the basement, burying and ruining one h
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Chapter XXVI. Through Kentucky.
Chapter XXVI. Through Kentucky.
Toward night I came suddenly upon another saddle-horse around a bend in the road. Saddle-horses are in such customary use, both by men and boys, that it is no uncommon sight to see half a dozen such horses hitched to trees near the school-houses, the scholars riding them to and from school. This particular horse was hitched in front of a saloon out in the country, and before I could stop he pulled back, broke the bridle, and ran down the road. A man came reeling out of the saloon into the road w
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Chapter XXVII. Down the Chesapeake and Ohio Canal, and Home again.
Chapter XXVII. Down the Chesapeake and Ohio Canal, and Home again.
I stopped for a few minutes near a pair of bars. A squirrel came running along on the stone wall to these bars with something in its mouth, and, jumping down to the ground, skipped across to the other side, and went on his way along the wall. Pretty soon he came back, and in a short time had another chestnut in his mouth to be stored away with the first. As he jumped down to the ground to cross the space between the walls for the third time, a good-sized rat sprang out from under a large stone,
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