More on cyclealities

from
Kate Douglas Wiggin

The Philadelphia-born, Welsh-American author and educator is best known for her Rebecca of Sunnybrook Farm (1903). She also provides the only reference to cyclealities outside the biking world. That's the good news; the bad news is that the characters in her novel, Penelope's Experiences in Scotland, are as much in the dark about this word as we are today...

"We ought really to have kept house in Edinburgh," observed Francesca, looking up from the Scotsman. "One can get a `self- contained residential flat' for twenty pounds a month. We are such an enthusiastic trio that a self-contained flat would be everything to us; and if it were not fully furnished, here is a firm that wishes to sell a `composite bed' for six pounds, and a `gent's stuffed easy' for five.

Added to these inducements there is somebody who advertises that parties who intend `displenishing' at the Whit Term would do well to consult him, as he makes a specialty of second-handed furniture and `cyclealities.' What are `cyclealities,' Susanna?" (She had just come in with coals.)

"I cudna say, mam."