All About Inventions and Discoveries
The Romance of modern scientific and mechanical Achievements

3i6 All About Inventions circumstance that a syndicate undertook to place the invention upon the market. But shortly after its formation a minute examination of the Red Flag Act revealed the fact that by no manner of means could this statute be evaded. It was one of those few instances of legislation through which the pro- verbial coach-and-four could not be driven. Some- what mortified by this discovery, the syndicate re- solved not to provoke public hostility or to incense the stern majesty of the law, and abandoned the idea. In France things were now commencing to move rapidly, and the motor-car was beginning to assume the semblance of something practical. Dunlop gave the new locomotion a decided spurt by introducing, or re-inventing, the pneumatic tyre ; this type of tyre made its first appearance in 1870, and was the product of the inventive fertility of Thompson. But, although the petrol motor may be said to have been brought to a practical stage, there was a strange reversion to steam. Serpollet was responsible for this revival, and many carriages after his designs were built. Indeed, as a result of his interesting reversion, he may be said to have placed the steam-driven automobile upon a firm basis. Although the petrol vehicle has made enormous strides up to the present time, it has not completely driven its rival—steam— from this field of utilisation. But it is doubtful whether motoring would have advanced so rapidly had it not been for the tonic of competition and racing which was introduced in France. In 1894 the first race over the highroads was held—from Paris to Rouen, a distance of 80