Mr. Punch Awheel Part 18

"Oh, oh, Harry! Please get into a bank soon. I must have something soft to fall on!"

Ill.u.s.tration: _Miss Heavytopp._ "I'm afraid I'm giving you a lot of bother, but then, it's only my _first_ lesson!"

_Exhausted Instructor_ (_sotto voce_). "I only hope it won't be my _last_!"

Ill.u.s.tration: SORROWS OF A "CHAUFFEUR"

_Ancient Dame._ "What d'ye say? They call he a 'shuvver,' do they? I see. They put he to walk behind and shove 'em up the hills, I reckon."

A CYCLE OF CATHAY.--_The Yorkshire Evening Post_, in reporting the case of a motor-cyclist charged with travelling at excessive speed on the highway at Selby, represents a police-sergeant as stating that "he timed defendant over a distance of 633 years, which was covered in 64 secs."

The contention of the defendant that he had been "very imperfectly timed" has an air of captiousness.

"Many roads in the district are unfit for motorists," is the report of the Tadcaster surveyor to his council. We understand the inhabitants have resolved to leave well alone.

At a meeting of the Four Wheeler's a.s.sociation, a speaker boasted, with some justification, that a charge which is brought every day against drivers of motor-cars has never been brought against members of their a.s.sociation, namely, that of driving at an excessive speed.

Rumour is again busy with the promised appearance of a motor-bus which is to be so quiet that you will not know that there is one on the road until you have been run over.

Ill.u.s.tration: AN UNPARDONABLE MISTAKE.--_Short-sighted Old Lady._ "Porter!"

Ill.u.s.tration: NOSCE TEIPSUM.--_Lady Cyclist_ (_touring in North Holland_). "What a ridiculous costume!"

Ill.u.s.tration: _Sporting Constable_ (_with stop-watch--on "police trap"

duty, running excitedly out from his ambush, to motorist just nearing the finish of the measured furlong_). "For 'evin's sake, guv'nor, let 'er rip, and ye'll do the 220 in seven and a 'arf!"

MY MOTOR CAP

[Motor-caps, we are informed, have created such a vogue in the Provinces, that ladies, women and factory girls may be seen wearing them on every occasion, though unconnected, in other respects, with modern methods of locomotion.]

A motor car I shall never afford With a gay vermilion bonnet, Of course I _might_ happen to marry a lord, But it's no good counting on it.

I have never reclined on the seat behind, And hurtled across the map, But my days are blest with a mind at rest, For I wear a motor cap.

I am done with Gainsborough, straw and toque, My dresses are bound with leather, I turn up my collar like auto-folk, And stride through the pitiless weather; With a pound of scrag in an old string bag, In a tram with a child on my lap, Wherever I go, to shop or a show, I wear a motor cap.

I don't know a silencer from a clutch, A sparking-plug from a bearing, But no one, I think, is in closer touch With the caps the women are wearing; I'm _au fait_ with the trim of the tailor-made brim, The crown and machine-st.i.tched strap; Though I've neither the motor, the sable-lined coat, nor The goggles--I wear the cap.

Ill.u.s.tration: No, this isn't a collection of tubercular microbes escaping from the congress; but merely the Montgomery-Smiths in their motor-car, enjoying the beauties of the country.

LINES BY A REJECTED AND DEJECTED CYCLIST

You do not at this juncture Feel, as I, the dreadful smart, And you scorn the cruel puncture Of the tyre of my heart!

But mayhap, at some Life-turning, When the wheel has run untrue, You will know why I was burning, And was scorched alone, by you!

Ill.u.s.tration: FINIS

BRADBURY, AGNEW, & CO. LD., PRINTERS, LONDON AND TONBRIDGE