HELPFUL HINTS FOR BICYCLISTS.
1. A good bicyclist is careful of his roads, therefore when taking a header be careful not to hit the road too hard with your forehead. You might make a dent in the pavement.
2. In falling off your wheel do not fall on both sides at once. Failure to observe this rule will result in dividing you against yourself.
3. Always be courteous. If a trolley-car has the right of way over the track do not dispute with it. A boy in Massachusetts who broke this rule broke his right arm and his cyclometer at the same time.
4. Be cautious. In riding from New York to Brooklyn keep to the driveway. Don't try to wheel over the suspension-cable. Yon might slip and fall into the smoke-stack of a passing ferry-boat.
5. Keep your lamp lit when riding at night. The boy who thought he was safe because he had a parlor-match in his pocket came home with a spoke in his wheel that didn't belong there.
6. Do not be rough with ice-carts and furniture trucks. If you must run into one of them do it as gently and tenderly as if it were a baby-carriage.
7. A merciful rider is merciful to his wheel, so do not force a bicycle beyond the point of its endurance, unless you want to walk back with your wheel on your shoulders.
8. Keep cool. If in the course of a ride you find yourself in a tight place, with a skittish horse to the left and a steep ravine to the right, and a bull-dog directly to the fore, take ravine. You'll go into it, anyhow, and if you take it alone without dragging the dog or the horse after you your chances will be improved.
9. Never use spurs on the pneumatic tires of your wheel. The use of spurs in this manner is likely to leave your bicycle in a winded condition. Spurs are not comfortable, either, in case of a throw.
10. Do not be stubborn with a balky wheel. If the front wheel gets in a rut going east, and the hind wheel in another going west, dismount and argue the matter standing, unless you are tired, and want to lie down by the road-side without making the effort to do so unassisted.