Originally Posted by prathmann

But you could look for them in the past. The cylinder mounted under the downtube of the 1958 Legnano racing bike shown here:

is a gonfleur which reportedly was filled with compressed nitrogen gas (note: no liquid). Compared to CO2 cartridges, these needed to be much larger and at higher pressure since nitrogen doesn't liquify so easily and the cylinder just contained pressurized gas. So there's a considerable weight penalty and it would be lighter to carry a pump - but the refillable pressurized cylinder would allow for faster inflation.