motor bicycle provided with magneto ignition, but it was of what is termed the low tension type. The modern magneto machine produces a spark in a different manner and it is of a different nature electrically. As this book is not a technical treatise on motor cycle construction, the reader who wishes to know the details of various forms of magneto ignition should obtain Mr. A. P. Young's book, The Elements of Electro-Technics (Sir Isaac Pitman & Sons, Ltd.). The Singer bicycle was beautifully made and most ingeniously constructed, but owing to the lack of elasticity in the transmission (it was geared direct to the wheel by toothed gearing) the vibration of the engine was very apparent to the rider.
Between the advent of the Singer and the introduction of the Werner a good deal had been heard over here of another Parisian production, the De Dion Bouton tricycle. These machines had been privately imported by a few enthusiasts in 1898–99, but at the Stanley Show in November, of 1899, the Ariel Cycle Co., of Birmingham, exhibited a motor tricycle and a quadricycle (a tandem passenger machine with four equal sized wheels). Their machine was made under licence from the owners of the De Dion Bouton patents, as were the Eadie and Enfield tricycles and quadricycles which had French made engines and accessories. At the same exhibition a small belt-driven motor bicycle, called the Minerva, and hailing from Antwerp, made its appearance in this country.
The British motor cycle industry can be said to have started with the Stanley Show of 1899, because very little was known about motor cycles in this country until that time. In the following two years or so there was hardly a cycle maker who did not list a motor bicycle with a Minerva engine. Belgian and French
