stancy and victory breathe in the air of that historic city-just as palpably as do easy-going, laissez-aller, procrastinating whispers float in the very atmosphere of "dear dirty Dublin."

But I had not been an hour in the latter city ere I began to doubt the entire accuracy of my newspaper writer's remark about the cyclist's paradise. Rather is Dublin the cyclist's rampage ground, racecourse or warpath. Hooting, scooting, bellringing, bent double, time breaking, life imperiling Dublin cyclist, here's to your appalling memory! I got accustomed to you, whilst I was your awestruck neighbor, but you have grown weird and startling as at first, since I have returned to the dolce far niente of Canadian wheeling. The Irishman is impetuous on the sturdy support of his own two legs-what shall we designate him, when, uplifted and exhilarated by a high geared pneumatic wheel, he drives young men and maidens, old men and children, not to mention old women, scuttling like autumn leaves in an East wind, out of his way? Faugh the ballagh! Clear the track! and he is gone, before the affrighted squeak of his victims has died in the air. He gets there, truly, but just as truly he doesn't care how, through, under or over what he flies, so long as he makes time and arrives comparatively whole in wheel and carcase. He is forever up for repairs. The cycling depots are busy, busy, mending punctured tires, straightening bent pedals, adjusting handle bars, pushing saddles as far back as possible, that the "monkey on a stick" attitude may be duly observed, and the air resounds with rumors of slips and slides, and contusions and smashes, tales of woe of various kinds and degrees. These are usually told with a chuckle and a grin, as if it were rather a capital joke to arrive home, sitting uneasily on a jaunting car, with a demented looking wheel, wavy in the tire and erratic in the spokes, reposing behind the driver, for, as a merry-eyed Irish lad told me gleefully, "You see, a jaunting car just seems built to carry a wheel."

In every direction round Dublin stretch perfect roads and pretty scenery; guidebooks are compiled giving the minutest particulars as to distance, state of roads and scenic attractions, and if one enthusiast affects the South, and assures you that the Northern or Western roads are

abominable and uninteresting, there always follow him two more ready to pick up the gauntlet in defense of the disparaged localities, and to belittle the beauties of the Wicklow hills. It must be always remembered that what may be a trying road, if taken at full speed and carelessly, is possibly a very decent highway under other conditions, and I generally observed the "other conditions myself. I rode a Raglan wheel, and the only occasion when my mind misgave me was when I stood, on the morning of my departure from Dublin, looking the dainty machine carefully over to make sure it was in perfect order, and thinking of the trials that lay before it. I may add that it was as good as ever at the end of the trip. After the costume and the wheel, came the itinerary. (Isn't that sequence a confession of sex ?) I had maps and advice galore, and a good share of undiluted Hibernian pessimism, with large portions of much watered veracity, and highly colored adjectives. And in the face of it all, I often wilted and stormed. However, much gabbling and contradiction had its final result in a route selected partly because of its scenic interest, a good deal because of its good roads, and in some instances, because of "pure cussedness" and obstinacy on my part in fixing my hopes on seeing some out of the way place, which for one reason or another was an object of curiosity or interest to

Pretty and grotesque were the names which jostled together in my memory, and fell in decidedly un-Celtic accents from my lips. The Dargle, fondly dilated on by the author of my being in far off childish days. Blackrock-just under my nose, as it were. (Why had I always in fancy located it at or near Cork?) The Scalp, the Powerscourt Waterfall, Glen-da-lough, Enniskerry, Avoka; shades of poets and saints-what an essence of romance and holiness combined was here! Kilkenny, where a Bishop held out kindly hand of welcome; Cashel, where the chapel of King Cormac, the Holy Stone, and Druids only know what of upturned sacrificial altar and hoary interest is to be found; Tipperary, where the plucky Smith-Barry and the Land League met in mortal combat, and which I had determined within myself to visit, coûte qu'il coûte! Kilkenny Caves and Mallow Castle, and various "kils" and

"ballys" and such delightful localities. We wanted to go here, there, and to all points of the compass at one and the same time, but finally succeeded in arranging a route which could be gone over in the time at our disposal, accidents notwithstanding, and which I have designated in the accompanying map. I have dropped naturally from singular to plural, because by this time there. was a "we"-a handsome Irish cousin, who had pledged himself in black and white to ride with me to the world's end, if I would allow him. He knew scarcely more of the road than I did, had never seen Killarney, and was not the least bit interested in the natives, but he took keen delight in a pretty view, his muscles were in undoubted condition, his savoir faire admirable, and for these good reasons his offer was accepted as a distinct blessing, and as eminently comforting to a lone woman. liable to be shot or engulfed at any

moment!

A week was spent round and about Dublin, where I rode blissfully through sylvan scenes and intersecting tramlines with equal immunity from far worse fates than possible shooting or engulfing to wit: puncturing my pneumatic tire, or landing on a greasy, wet, stone pavement and spoiling my clothes. I had, at any rate, found my niche in the paradise of the newspaper article, though I rode very meekly and neither shouted at nor scared my fellowmen, as is the habit of the gentlemen angels on wheels. Some people don't call them by this pretty name, and one crusty editor, with an anti-pneumatic soul, and a lack of la politesse, actually nicknamed them "cads on casters." Perhaps a fair medium between the two is about what they deserve, for though they are "impetuous," their hearts are in the right place. Mine was not, however. It seemed to be straying somewhere away "over there," where the blue Wicklow Mountains looked down at me, ever whispering even amid the laughter and pranks of the merry " Ohne Hasts," as we skurried out to the farm club-house for tea; even over the "sough" of the sea round Ireland's Eye as we hilariously picnicked at Howth; even louder than the crash of the band as we trundled easily round Phoenix Park, or leaned against our wheels on Kingstown pier-ever whisperng, "Come, we will please you

better!" And so one cool Monday morning, after dawdling and forgetting and doing and undoing, in true Dublin fashion, until half-past eleven-until I was ready to cry with impatience and exasperation, we set out southward, and sped, too swiftly for an all-day ride, out of the tarrying city, where the "Ohne Hasts" grow, into the land of promise.

Our first day's ride was to end at Glenda-lough, the place of the Seven Churches; we were to ride through Powerscourt (don't say Power, but Pore, please!), which is the home of Lord Powerscourt, and also the home of a wonderfully pretty little waterfall, made by the River Dargle, which takes a leap over a precipice some seventy feet in height, and falls in sprays and sparkles that are dainty and tinkling and pretty as one could wish to see. We took unapostolic purses and two coats, also some small toilet comforts, in the waterproof bundles on our luggage carriers, and the Irish cousin (whom some fellow-student of Trinity had basely nicknamed Tim) carried a semblance of a watch on his chain, which, being interpreted, turned out to be a dear little drinking-glass of the telescopic variety, with a compass on its cover. Of course we had sandwiches. I was the commissariat, and carried the provisions in a hand-bag on my lamp-hook; Tim was the canteen, and relied on the mountain springs for drinks. We pedaled merrily along, only arrested by the small catastrophe of my chain-guard becoming loose unbeknown to me, and getting promptly whirled by my left pedal into a shapeless lump of twisted wires. go back and get it mended?" said Tim doubtfully. But I was too much afraid that if we turned back we should never get started again, to listen to such a suggestion; so I climbed on my wheel after freeing the pedal of its bedeviled necklet, and by dint of sitting on my skirt, contrived to keep it from catching in the chain. Of course it wasn't pretty, nor very comfortable to the cyclist, whose one care in mounting is to adjust. her skirt as carefully as an exquisite parts his hair; but it was better than the misery of turning back, at all events, and in the beauty of the mountains and the smoothness of the road, I soon forgot to consider appearances. Enniskerry came upon us in pretty wise nestling in the shadow of the "Sugar,

loaf," a grand cone-shaped peak which is a landmark far across the country side. The canteen located a mountain spring, the commissariat dispensed the toothsome sandwiches, and we lunched on the top of a low wall, and looked across admiringly at Enniskerry. It is a sweet little picture with its church spire, its white cottages straggling along the street, and cuddled into a little bunch of a village, while the protecting Sugarloaf towers heavenward behind it. "We've got to get to the other side of him," said Tim, waving a sandwich in the direction of the mountain. "We go through the Scalp (which means a cleft or gorge), and if you don't get a hill long enough to satisfy you before night "and an expressive pause ensued as Tim engaged his energies on the last sandwich. "How long?" I asked, with the confidence of the greenhorn. "Three miles," muttered Tim, in a rather muffled and sandwichy voice. "What!" I gasped. He nodded gravely. "A scorcher; you'll have to walk it," he said, calmly. "I won't." "All right, old lady, let's get on to Powerscourt. Have another drink?" Tim had by this time arrived at a sufficient estimate of me never to argue with me; he made his statement, and when I disputed it, or rebelled, he simply said, "All right," and allowed subsequent experience to convince me.

We got on to Powerscourt in peace and satisfaction, and on producing an order, which we had got for the asking from Lord Powerscourt's agent, we were admitted by an ancient lodge-keeper into the beautiful demesne, and took a ride through that sixteen thousand acres which own Lord Powerscourt as lord of the soil. Of course it goes without saying that the roads here were something perfect, and on either side clumps of rhododendrons, white, pink and crimson in full bloom, ferns and wild flowers, rustic bridges and shaven turf, grand old trees, and many a tinkling rill, at the sound of whose silvery voice we always fancied we heard the first echo of the far-famed waterfall. But sixteen thousand acres gives quite a lengthy ride, and we were surfeited with glimpses of lovely places, soft lawns, bosky dells, dainty deer flitting under the great oaks, or staring knee-deep in the feathery ferns, before we came to the foot of the cliff and in sight of the little lace-like

fall, leaping and dashing from a rock seventy feet above us. This is one of the picture places of Ireland, and the only part of it reserved from the tourist is in the immediate vicinity of the Hall, where one reads on a signboard that tourists are requested not to take the road past the front of the residence. Out of the handsome demesne, in a sudden flurry of mist and rain we presently wheeled to face the scorcher-that threemile hill of which I had lightly spoken at lunch. Of course I tried to ride, but the stones were damp and slippery, and I was soon glad enough to dismount and even accept the help of Tim's sturdy hand to assist me in pushing along my wheel. The mountain air was sweet and light and bracing, and a grand view rewarded this long climb-not to mention the happy consciousness that for all this mounting there must be a corresponding descent once we had passed the Scalp. One can always bear hard things if one is sure of their reward. The climb had been absolutely lonely and desolate, but now we began to meet people, on cars and on foot, with cloaks and shawls over their heads, and on all those patient faces was a smile gentle and kind. I don't deny that I smiled first, often I laughed, too, at the quaint greetings of "More power to you, ma'am !" "God bless the lady!" "Eh, it's you that do be going!" with which our hurried passing was announced. One quaint carload, an Irish wedding party with a smiling, pretty bride in a tulle veil and white wreath, and a very tipsy but beaming bridegroom, halted at the inn at Roundwood, where we were having our tea, and very strange and peculiar it seemed to my American eyes to see the cars turn by the inn door, and the host bring out the tiny glass of botheen, which the bride must sip and the groom drain at every hospitable door. No wonder the poor fellow was heavy-headed and rather unsteady on his seat! Tim gravely informed me that it is the duty of the best man at Irish weddings to produce the groom at the ceremony in a state of almost inebriation, hardly knowing what he is doing or saying. We temperately confined ourselves to tea, the good Irish tea, which puts to shame many a modish brew in this our land, and the inn servant put bread and butter galore at our disposal, and charged us a quarter

apiece. It was not far to Glen-da-lough, where our dinner was ordered; so we partook more delicately of the bread and butter than we usually did, and soon wheeled out of Roundwood in the

most charming sunlit evening that I ever looked at. The ruined chapel of Annamoe necessitated a halt, an agonized climb over an iron-spiked gate and an inspection of the quaint little chapel,

where two potheen bottles reposed in the font, and scores of names were scribbled over the whitened walls. "Sure, 'tis Annamoe Chapel, my lady; we do not be goin' there now," explained one of a lounging group by the wayside, as, flurried and breathless, I scrambled over the gate into their midst. "A straight wheel to Glen-da-lough and no more halts!" ordered Tim, who was thinking of his dinner; and so we proceeded down a charming road, and at a quarter to eight we alighted at the loweaved white white cottage where we were to spend the night. It is not an inn,though tourists may stop there in very limited numbers, but it is the cleanest, coziest, most reasonable and best managed cottage in all Ireland, and its name is "Richardsons."

To be continued.