AUTRE PAYS, AUTRE MCEURS."

Otago Witness, Issue 2310, 9 June 1898, Page 37

A UTRE PAYS, AUTRE MCEURS. "

"Yes," said a Brussels cycle agent the other day to a crowd of admiring devotees of the wheel. "Yes, there's a tremendous difference between an Englishman, a Frenchman, and a German — especially in the matter of buying cycles. i'l've tried all three nationalities," he went on, as a representative of the Hub pressed for particulars, " and my candid opinion is that the Englishman is the ideal customer, and after him the American.

" When he wants to buy a machine, the average Englishman first consults his cycling friends — who will give him practical hints enough to sink a strip — then, he goes through tlio catalogues, and finally examines the state of his finances, so that when he calls at the depot he has pretty well settled what make he's going to ride and what he i will pay for it. " All we agents have to do is, to show him the ' jigger,' explain its manifold beauties, , and agree with him that it is the right machine for him to buy. i

" But the Frericman, or Belgian for that matter, would try the patience of a Job among cycle agents. I' ye known a man make •30 visits before he_purchased~a fact, I can assure you. It happens this wny. Monsieur is possessed of a violent envy to mount a bicyclette. Bon! He hurries himself to the depot and desires to be shown the latest machines. You spread yourself o,ut to get his order, and spend an hour or so parading the various bicycles and explaining their points to him.~' Monsieur departs at last, 'convinced that, say, ' the' Gilt-there ' is the only absolutely perfect machine in' existence.

"In. a day or so he returns with Madame, to whom you." show the prospective' purchase'; with as much, eloquence and grace as you pos- '■ sess. Madame fincta that the colour of the enamel does not go with her new dress, or : that the handle bars are not quite aesthetic enough in their curves. More eloquence poured forth to convince Madame, and again Monsieur departs convinced — only to return, however, with *la belle-mere,' who gives it - as her unalterable opinion that the price is excessive, and much beyond Monsieur's means. More argument, more eloquence, and another departure. Pinaliy he brings hosts of cycling friends, who never look at the I machine — except perhaps to twiddle the pedals round — but talk for hours about the superiority of their own mounts, and at last, after some two dozen visits, he purchases. " Then there's the German. He's quite another type, and a rather amusing sort of fowl. Having consulted many medical works and philosophical treatises, he decides that a bicycle is ' Goot for der healt und pram.' That is the first step. "He then proceeds to the public library, surrounds himself five nights a week with encyclopaedia, nole books, mathematical engineering, and cycling works, until lie has ac- ' quired a diversified and choice knowledge of wheels that would astonish a cycle builder. "Next he obtains all the available catalogues — and these are legion — takes his wellfilled note book, and retires to the quiet seclusion of his study, where he gradually casts out ■ the unscientifically-built machines, and ' chooses the one that he considers to be built on the proper hygenic and mathematical principles. Finally he visits a cycle depot, and pours forth his accumulated wisdom on us, and decides that after all he won't get one, as he's evolved a better one out of his own inner consciousness." — .