past between her wagon and the ditch; and holds her
long, stiff buggy-whip so that it " swipes " me viciously
across the face, knocks my helmet off into the mud
ditch, and well-nigh upsets mo into the same.
The woman-a crimson-crested blonde — jogs serenely
along without even deigning to turn her head.
Leaving the bicycle at “Isham’s “-who
volunteers some slight repairs-I take a flying visit
by rail to see Niagara Falls, returning the same evening
to enjoy the proffered hospitality of a genial member
of the Buffalo Bicycle Club. Seated on the piazza
of his residence, on Delaware Avenue, this evening,
the symphonious voice of the club-whistle is cast
adrift whenever the glowing orb of a cycle-lamp heaves
in sight through the darkness, and several members
of the club are thus rounded up and their hearts captured
by the witchery of a smile-a " smile " in Buffalo,
I hasten to explain, is no kin whatever to a Rocky
Mountain “smile” - far be it from it.
This club-wliistle of the Buffalo Bicycle Club happens
to sing the same melodious song as the police —
whistle at Washington, D. C.; and the Buffalo cyclers
who graced the national league — meet at the
Capital with their presence took a folio of club music
along. A small but frolicsome party of them
on top of the Washington monument, “heaved a
sigh " from their whistles, at a comrade passing along
the street below, when a corpulent policeman, naturally
mistaking it for a signal from a brother “cop,”
hastened to climb the five hundred feet or thereabouts
of ascent up the monument. When he arrived, puffing
and perspiring, to the summit, and discovered his
mistake, the wheelmen say he made such awful use of
the Queen’s English that the atmosphere had a
blue, sulphurous tinge about it for some time after.
Leaving Buffalo next morning I pass through Batavia,
where the wheelmen have a most aesthetic little club-room.
Besides being jovial and whole-souled fellows, they
are awfully sesthetic; and the sweetest little Japanese
curios and bric-d-brac decorate the walls and tables.
Stopping over night at LeBoy, in company with the
president and captain of the LeBoy Club, I visit the
State fish-hatchery at Mumford next morning, and ride
on through the Genesee Valley, finding fair roads
through the valley, though somewhat hilly and stony
toward Canandaigua. Inquiring the best road
to Geneva I am advised of the superiority of the one
leading past the poor-house. Finding them somewhat
intricate, and being too super-sensitive to stop people
and ask them the road to the poor-house, I deservedly
get lost, and am wandering erratically eastward through
the darkness, when I fortunately meet a wheelman in
a buggy, who directs me to his mother’s farm-house
near by, with instructions to that most excellent
lady to accommodate me for the night. Nine o’clock
next morning I reach fair Geneva, so beautifully situated
on Seneca’s silvery lake, passing the State
agricultural farm en route; continuing on up the Seneca
Eiver, passing-through Waterloo and Seneca Falls to
Cayuga, and from thence to Auburn and Skaneateles,
where I heave a sigh at the thoughts of leaving the
last — I cannot say the loveliest, for all are
equally lovely — of that beautiful chain of lakes
that transforms this part of New York State into a
vast and delightful summer resort.