A cyclist sat by the roadside fence,
Sighing whither, ah whither, oh whither?
Is a passable path ever going to commence-
Yes, whither, ah whither, oh whither?
Here I've labored and pushed till I'm dusty
And sad,
And never a rest or a top have I had;
Still this 'ere road is so horribly bad,
I could lay down and perish and wither.


The country it looks like a barren desert,
This desert-filled, barren old country.
Like a man who's minus both stockings and shirt,
This cold, bleak, and barren old country;
I've tramped all the way from Bingen to Bot,
With the sun a scorching so terrible hot,
And never a rod of good wheeling I've got,
In this craven, confounded old country.

After scrambling and panting way up that big hill-
Such scrambling and panting and scrambling!
Only sad desolation awarded by skill,-
My scrambling, and panting, and scrambling.
For when at the top, 'mid grunting and groans,
I found the road covered with big cobblestones,
Then vowed by a mountain of "Nick's" saintly bones,
No more to go rambling.

My wheel is enameled an inch with this "sile"-
This mud-dabbled stony old highway;
While my breeches are nearly quite "done up in ile,"-
With trying to ride on this highway,
My "bearings" are lost, wherever I look,
The same lonesome landscape looms up like a spook,
As I plod 'long this boggy lone highway.

 

I was startled way back with a consumptive like bark-
A squeaky, disjointed, low howling,
Of a dog which had surely come out of the ark,
And ever since kept up his growling.
He looked at me once, then he laid down and sighed,
Such a sight he had evidently never espied,
And it injured his dogship's ancestral pride,
For such specimens wild to be prowling.

I know that I'm in a sorrowful plight,
Heavy laden with dirt and with sorrow,
With nothing to eat, and no one in sight,
But my cycle, too, weighed down with sorrow,
Oh what will become of me and my bi.
In vain for a supper and a bed do I sigh,
But nothing, not even a small piece of pie,
Will cheer up my soul till the morrow.

Alone in the desolate desert I'm stuck-
And here I keep sticking and sticking,
With a wee stock of patience, and much less of pluck-
I'm bulling the market on sticking.
My financial condition's a sorrowful plight.
In fact, all has vanished in meteor-like flight,
And busted I am, up higher'n a kite,
While my stomach is empty and kicking.

Oh, the beauties of cycling are surely untold,
There's lots to be written, be written,
A tale to harrow thy soul I'd unfold.
On the beauties that yet are unwritten.
With this wonderful pastime there really is naught
That can safely compare with this heroic sport;
Oh, give me a bicycle, rugged and taut,
With its form most truly I'm smitten.