· BALLOONS, AIRSHIPS, AND FLYING MACHINES CHAPTER I THE ORIGIN OF BALLOONING ONE November night...

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BALLOONS,A IRSH IPS, AND FLYING MACHINES .

By GERTRUDE BACON .

MOTORS AND MOTORING . By Professor HARRYSPOONER .

RADIUM . By Dr. HAMPSON .

METEOROLOGY ; or,WEATHER E$PLAINED . By J.

GORDON M‘PHER SON ,M .A .

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CONTENTS

CHAP.

I . THE ORIGIN OF BALLOONING

II. THE COMING OF THE GAS BALLOON

I I I. FAMOUS BALLOON VOYAGES OF THE PAST

IV. THE BALLOONAS A SCIENTIFIC INSTRU

MENT

V. THE BALLOON IN WARFARE

VI . THE AIRSHIP

VII . THE FLYING MACHINE

VIII. CONCLUSION

BALLOONS,AIRSH IPS

,AND

FLYING MACHINES

CHAPTER I

THE OR IGIN OF BALLOONING

ONE November night in the year 1782, so thestory runs

,two brothers sat over their winter

fire in the little French town of Annonay,watching the grey smoke-wreaths from thehearth curl up the wide Chimney. Their nameswere Stephen and Joseph M ontgolfier, theywere papermakers by trade, and were notedas possessing thoughtful minds and a deepinterest in all scientific knowledge and newdiscovery. Before that night a memor

able night, as it was to prove—hundreds ofmil lions of people had watched the risingsmoke-wreaths Of their fires without drawingany special inspiration from the fact ; buton this particular occasion, as Stephen, theyounger of the brothers

,sat and gazed at the

familiar sight, the question flashed across hismind, What is the hidden power that makesthose curling smoke-wreaths rise upwards

, and

1 0 BALLOONS AND FLYING MACHINES

could I not employ it to make other thingsrise also 7Then and there the brothers resolved on an

MEDALLION SHOWING BROTHERS MONTGOLFIER.

experiment. They made themselves a smallfire of some light fuel in a little . tin tray orchafing

—dish,and over the smoke of it they

held a large paper-bag. And to their delightthey saw the bag fill out and make a feeble

THE OR IGIN OF BALLOONING 1 1

att empt to rise . They were surely on theeve of some great invention ; and yet, try asthey would, their experiment would not quitesucceed

,because the smoke in the bag always

became too cool before there was enough in itto raise it from the table. But presently,while they were thus engaged, a neighbour oftheirs

,a widow lady, alarmed by seeing smoke

issuing from their window, entered the room,

and after watching their fruitless efforts forsome while, suggested that they should fastenthe tray on to the bottom of the bag . Thiswas done, with the happy result that the bagimmediately rose up to the ceiling ; and inthis humble fashion the first of all balloonssailed aloft .That night of 1782, therefore,marks the firstgreat step ever made towards the conquest ofthe sky. But to better understand the historyof Aeronautics —a word that means thesailing of the air —We must go back farbeyond the days of the Montgo lfier brothers .For in all times and in all ages men havewanted to fly. David wished for the wingsof a dove to fly away and be at rest, and sincehis time, and before it, how many have notlonged to take flight and sail away in theboundless, glorious realms above, to explorethe fleecy clouds, and to float free in the bluevault Of heaven.

And since birds achieve this feat by meansof Wings, man

’s first idea was to provide'

him


self with wings also. But here he was at oncedoomed to disappointment . It is very certainthat by his own natural strength alone a manwill never propel himself through the air withwings like a bird , because he is made quitedifferently. A bird’s body is very light compared with its size. The largest birds inexistence weigh under thirty pounds . Aman’s body, on the contrary, is very heavyand solid . The muscles that work a bird’swing are wonderfully powerful and strong, farstronger in proportion than the muscles of aman’s arm. To sustain his great weight inthe air, a man of eleven stone would require apair of wings nearly twenty feet in span .

But the possession of such mighty wingsalone is not e nough . He must also possessbodily strength to keep them in sufficientmotion to prevent him from fal l ing, and forthis he would require at least the strength ofa horse .Such strength a man has never possessed, orcan ever hope to ; but even as it is, by longpractice and great effort, men have succeededat different times, not exactly in flying, butin helping themselves along considerably bymeans Ofwings . A man is said to have flownin this way in Rome in the days of Nero. Amonk in the Middle Ages, named E lmerus,it is stated, flewabout a furlong from the topOf a tower in Spain, another from St . Mark

’ssteeple in Venice, and another from Nurem

THE ORIGIN OF BALLOONING 13

burg. But the most successful attempt evermade in this direction was accomplished about200 years ago by a French locksmith Of thename of Besnier. He had made for himself a

a

pair Of light wo’

oden oars , shaped like thedouble paddle Of a canoe, with cup-like bladesat either end . These he placed over hisshoulders, and attached also t o his feet, and

BESNIER AND H I S OARS.

then casting himself Off from some high place,and violently working his arms and legs so asto buffet the air downwards with his paddles,hewas able to raise himself by short stagesfrom one height to another, or skim lightlyover a field or river. It is said that subsequently Besnier sold his oars to a mountebank,who performed most successful ly with themat fairs and festivals.But it was soon clear that the art of human


flight was not to be achieved by such means ;and when men found that they were unable tosoar upwards by their own bodily strengthalone, they set about devising some apparatusor machine which should carry them aloft.Many ancient philosophers bent their mindsto the inventing of a machine for this purpose.One suggested that strong flying birds, suchas eagles or vultures, might be harnessed toa car, and trained to carry it into the sky.

Another gravely proposed the employment ofa little imp —for in those days the existenceof imps and demons was most firmly believedin. A third even went so far as to give anactual Tempe for flying, declaring that

“ if theeggs of the larger description of swans , orleather balls stitched with fine thongs, be filledwith nitre, the purest sulphur, quicksilver,or kindred materials which rarefy by theircaloric energy, and if they externally resemblepigeons, they will easily be mistaken for flyinganimals . (l)The first man who appeared to have anyinkling of the real way of solving the problemof a flying chariot,

” and who in dim fashionseems to have foreshadowed the invention ofthe bal loon, was that wonderful genius, RogerBacon

,the Learned Friar Of Ilchester, the

inventor or re-inventor of gunpowder, wholived in the thirteenth century. He had anidea an idea which was far ahead of histimes

,and only proved to be true hundreds

THE ORIGIN OF BALLOONING 1 5

of years after that the earth’s atmospherewas an actual substance or “true fluid, and

as such he supposed it to have an uppersurface as the sea has, and on this upper surface he thought an airship might float, evenas a boat floats on the top Of the water.And to make his airship rise upwards toreach this upper sea, he said one must employa large hol low globe of Copper or othersimilar metalwrought extremely thin, to haveit as light as possible, and filled with etherea l

air or liquid fire .”

It is doubtful whether Bacon had very clearideas of what he meant by ethereal air.

”

But,whether by accident or insight, he had in

these words hit upon the true principle Of theball oon— a principle only put into practice fivecenturies later. He saw that a body wouldrise upwards through the air if it were filledwith something lighter than air, even as abodywill rise upwards through the water if itis made of, or filled with , something lighterthan water. We know that if we throw anempty bottle tightly corked into the sea itdoes not sink, but rises upwards, because it isfil led with air, which is lighter than water.In the same way exactly a light bag or ball oonwhich is fil led with some gas which is lighterthan air will not stay on the surface of theground, but will rise upwards into the sky toa height which depends upon its weight andbuoyancy.


Later philosophers than Bacon came to thesame conclusion , though they do not seem tohave seen matters more clearly. As recentlyas 1755 a certain learned French priest actuall ysuggested that since the air on the top of highmountains is known to be lighter than that atan ordinary level, men might ascend to these

great heights and bring down the light air inconstructions of canvas or cotton. By meansof

‘

this air he then proposed to fly a greatmachine, which he describes, and which seemsto have been as large and

.

cumbersome asNoah’s Ark . N eedless to say, the worthyFather’s prOposal has never yet been put intopractice .But it is time now that we return to thetwo brothers Montgolfier and their paper-bagof smoke. Their experiments proved at oncethat in smoke they had found somethingwhich was lighter than air, and which would,therefore

,carry a light weight upwards . But

of what this something was they had , at thetime

,but a confused idea. They imagined

that the burning fuel they had used had givenOff some Special l ight gas, with the exact natureOf which they were unacquainted . The veryword gas

,be it here said , was in those days

almost unknown, and Of different gases, theirnature and properties, most people had butthe very va

‘

guest notions .And so for some time the Montgolfiers

and their followers supposed that the presence


Of this_mysterious gas was necessary ,

to thesuccess Of their experiments, and they werevery careful about always using special kindsof fuel

,which they supposed gave off this gas,

to inflate their bags. Later experimentsproved

,however, what every one nowknows,

that the paper - bag rose, not because of thegases given Off by the fire, but by reason of

the hot air with which it became fil led. Nearlyall substances, no matter howsolid, expandmore or less under the influence of heat, andair expands very greatly indeed. By thusexpanding heated air becomes lighter thanthe surrounding air, and, because it is lighter,rises upwards in the atmosphere, and continuesto rise until it has once more regained theaverage temperature .Encouraged by the success Of their firsthumble experiment, the M ontgo lfiers nexttried their paper-bag in the Open air, whento their delight it sailed upwards to a heightOf 70 feet. The next step was to make amuch larger craft of 600 cubic feet capacityand spherical in shape, which they called a“Ball oon,

” because it was in appearance likea large, round, short-necked vessel used inchemistry which was technically known bythat name . This great bag, after being inflat ed , became so powerful that it broke loosefrom its moorings, and floated proudly upwards 600 feet and more, and came downin an adjoining field. After a few more suc

B

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THE ORIGIN OF BALLOONING 1 9

cessful‘

trials the brothers thought that thetime had come to make known their

_newinvention . Accordingly they constructed agreat balloon of 35 feet in diameter, andissued invitations to the public to come andsee the inflation. This was successfully madeover a fire Of chopped straw and wool

,and

the giant rose up into the sky amid the'

deafening applause Of a huge multitude,and

after attaining a height of 7000 feet, fell tothe ground 3. mile and a half away.

The news of this marvellous event spreadlike wild-fire throughout the kingdom ,

andsoon not only all France, but all Europe also,was ringing with the tidings . The FrenchR oyal Academy Of Sciences immediatelyinvited Stephen Montgolfier to Paris, andprovided him with money to repeat hisexperiment . He accordingly constructed ayet larger machine, which stood no less than72 feet high , had it most magnificentlypainted and decorated and hung with flags

,

and sent it up at Versailles in the presenceOf the King and all his court.This particular bal loon is noteworthy ashaving been the first of all balloons to carryliving passengers into the air. They werethree in number, a sheep , a cock, and a duck .

Breathlessly the assembled multitude watchedthese innocent victims placed in the basketand soar calmly and majestically above theirheads ; and eagerly they followed the balloon

20 BALLOONS AND FLYING MACHINES

to where it fell half a mile away to learntheir

_fate. Would they have been suffocatedin thOse upper regions Of the air which nohuman being had yet explored, or would theybe dashed to pieces in the descent ? Butthey found the trio quite uninjured ; theunimaginative sheep grazing quietly, and theduck cheerfully quacking . Forthwith the crythen arose that it was time for a man tohazard the ascent, and King Louis, who, likeevery one else, was vastly excited over thewonder, suggested that two criminals thenlying under sentence of death should be sentaloft .But now a brave French gentleman—M .

P ilatre de Rozier, a name ever to be remembered In the history of the conquest of the air—uprose in indignation. Shall vile criminalshave the first glory of rising into the sky $”

he cried, and then and there he proudlyclaimed for himself the honour Of being firstamong mortals in the history of the worldto sail the air. His courageous resolve waswildly applauded

,and forthwith preparations

were commenced for the new venture. Ayet larger balloon was made, in height astall as a church tower, with a mouth 1 5 feetacross . Around the mouth was fastened agallery Of wicker-work, three feetwide, to holdthe passengers . and belowall was slung withchains an iron brazier of burning fuel.By way of precaution, when all was com


plete De Rozier made a few short captiveexcursions, the balloon being fastened toearth by a rope. But all proving satisfactory,he decided to hazard a “ right away trip on

the 2 l st of November 1783,when he was alsoto be accompanied by an equally courageousfellow-countryman, the Marquis d

’

A rlandes.

It would be difficult to' conceive a more daringand perilous enterprise than these two braveFrenchmen set themselves . They were toventure, by an untried way, into unknownrealms where no mortal had been before ;they were to entrust their lives to a frailcraft whose capabilities had never yet beentested, and at a giddy height they were tosoar aloft with an Open fire, which at anymoment might set light to the inflammableballoon and hurl them to destruction.

Wild indeed was the applause of the crowdas the mighty craft, after due inflation, rosemajesticall y into the sky, carrying with it itstwo brave voyagers

the first that everburstInto that sil ent sea ;

and with what anxiety was its course followedas, rising rapidly to a height of 3000 feet, itdrifted away on an upper current which boreit right over the city of Paris. The travellersthemselves experienced various excitementsduring their adventurous trip. They hadconstantly to stir the fire and feed it with


fresh fuel ; they had alsowith wet spongescontinually to extinguish the flames whenthe light fabric from time to time ignited .

At one period they feared descending intothe river or on the house-tops, at anothera sharp shock gave them the impression that

AN EARLY HYDROGEN BALLOON.

their balloon had burst. But they camein the end through all perils and

alarms,descending quietly, after a voyage

Of twenty-five minutes’ duration, five miles .

from their starting-place.Thus was invented and perfected in thecourse of less than a year the first of all craft .


which carried man into the sky— the HotAir orMontgolfier Balloon. To this day largehot-air bal loons inflated by the same methodsemployed a hundred years ago occasionallytake passengers aloft . Indeed, there nowseems a likelihood that the use of the Mont

go lfier balloon will be largely revived formilitary purposes, since, with modern im

provement s, it would appear to be morequickl y and easily inflated than a gas balloonin time of warfare . With miniature hot-airballoons we are all familiar, for every schoolboy has made them for himself Of colouredpapers, and watched them float away on thebreeze with as much admiration and delightas the two brothers OfAnnonay watched theirbag first float upwards to the ceil ing .

But almost before the invention of the hotair balloon had been complet ed, and beforeP ilatre de Rozier had made his ascent , a rivalcraft had appeared upon the scene, to whichwe must more specially refer in the nextchapter.

CHAPTER II

THE COM ING OF THE GAS BALLOON

DURING the time of which we are speakingthere was living in London a famous chemistnamed Henry Cavendish . He was the son of


a nobleman, and a very rich man ; but heshut himself up entirely from the

.

world,and

devoted his whole time and energies to thestudy of science . SO afraid was he of beinginterrupted in his work that he lived the lifeof a hermit

,commanding his servants to keep

out of his sight on pain Of dismissal,and

ordering his dinner daily by means Of anote placed on the hall table . In the year1760— twenty-two years before the Mont

go lfier brothers began their experiments— thiseccentric man had discovered what was thenknown as “ inflammable air,

” but what wenow call hydrogen gas .Cavendish ’s experiments proved that hydrogen is the lightest Of all known substances

,

being about fourteen times lighter than at

mospheric air ; and soon after he had madeknown his researches, it occurred to a certainDr. Black Of Edinburgh that if a sufficientlythin . and light bladder were filled with this“ inflammable air it would rise upwa‘rdDr. Black even went so far as t o order aspecial bladder to be prepared for the purpose ; but by the time it was ready he wasbusy

'

with other work, and the experimentwas never made ; otherwise it is extremelyprobable that the honour Of inventing theballoon would have been won for this country,and not fe r France .A little later Tiberius Cavallo, an Italianchemist living in England, came yet nearer

THE COMING OF THE GAS BALLOON 25

to the great invention, for he filled a numberof soap-bubbles with the newly discoveredgas

,and saw them flo at high into the air.

He did not, however, think at the time thathis experiments would lead to any practicalresult, and so the matter dropped entirely,until the world was suddenl y electrified bythe tidings Of the wonderful hot-air ballooninvented by the brothers Montgo lfier atAnnonay.

The news Of this discovery recalled to theminds of many the almost forgotten experi

ments of the past; and it was forthwith suggested that balloons might be inflated with

'

hydrogen gas more successfully than withhot air.

’

I t was resolved immediately to putthis theory t o the test. A large subscriptionto defray expenses was raised in Paris without difficulty, for men

'

s minds were keenon the new-found art of sailing the sky ;and M . Charles

,Professor of Experimental

Philosophy, and two brothers, the Messrs .Roberts , well -known mechanicians, wereappointed to construct a suitable balloonand inflate it by the new method.

But they were immediately confronted witha difficulty. Hyd rogen being the lightestand most subtle Of gases, they were at a lossto know of what material to make theirballoon, t o prevent the gas escaping. Afterseveral failures they eventually constructeda bag of a Special kind of silk,

and coated


In the field where the balloon fell a partyof peasants were at work ; at its approachthey fled in abject terror. From a safe distance they watched the strange new monstersettle to earth and lie prone, and then theycautiously drew nearer to inspect it . The

silk still heavedwith the escaping gas, a ndthe countrymen were fully convinced thatan actual living creature of mysterious naturelay before them . One man seized his gunand fired full at it, and then supposing itto be mortally wounded , they all rushed inwith flail s and pitchforks to complete itsdestruction, finally tying it to the tail Of ahorse, who gall oped with it all over thecountry

,tearing it t o shreds . It was small

wonder that after such an occurrence theFrench Government issued a proclamation tothe people, telling them that these aeronau

tical experiments were t o be repeated,“

andwarning them not to be alarmed if they sawa balloon in the air, since it was a perfectlyharmless machine filled with gas

,and incapable

of injuring any one.This event took place about three months

after the first public ascent of the hot-airballoon. The new craft was immediatelyc alled a Charlier,

”after its inventor

,and

t o distinguish it from the Montgo lfier.

‘

There followed various exhibitions of therival airships, and after the voyage Of P il atred e Rozier and the Marquis D

’

A rlandes,


Messrs . Charles and Roberts resolved alsoto hazard an ascent in a ball oon inflated withhydrogen.

A new machine was therefore constructed,

which differed In many important details froniall others which had previously been made.It was twenty- seven feet in diameter

, of

varnished Silk, and over it was spread . a netof cordage . Instead of a gallery to carrythe passengers , as in the M ontgolfier,

” a carshaped like a boat was suspended from thenet with ropes and hung a few feet belowthe balloon . A valve to let out the gas wasalso provided, and the voyagers carried intheir car ballast and a barometer t o indicatetheir height. It will thus be seen that thisnew balloon was in all practical details thesame as the balloon of the present day.

The ascent took place on the 17th of December in Paris . Stephen Montgolfier waspresent, and launched a small hot-air ball oon,which amused the onlookers and indicatedthe direction of the wind. Then MM .

Charles and Roberts stepped into the car,

and . the balloon being liberated , they wereimmediately carried up t o a height of 6000feet

,where a glorious panorama of Paris and

the adjacent country -was Spread ‘ out beforetheir delighted vision After staying aloftabout a couple of hours they descended toearth again

,and Roberts got out of the car.

Charles decided to continue the voyage awhile


by himself,and

,lightened of his companion

’

sweight, the balloon this time rose tofeet . The sun had by this time set upon theearth

,but at this height Charles saw it rise

once more and set a second time . The thermomet er fell far below freezing-point, andhe was benumbed with cold

'

and felt violentpains in his ears . When at his greatest elevation he was obliged to pull the valve toprevent the balloon from bursting, and eventual ly descended without mischance aboutseven miles from where Roberts had lefthim.

It would be well now to describe a littlemore fully the way in which the “Mont

go lfier and Charlier balloons were in

flated. Each of the rival methods had itsadvantages and also

‘

its disadvantages . Inthe case of the hot -air balloon a Shallow pitwas dug, in which a quick-burning fire of

chopped wool and straw was lighted,and

the bag simply suspended over it. Theinflat ion was thus rapid, and its cost comparat ively small ; the great drawback beingthat as the bag was of very light material

,

it ran considerable risk of being ignited bythe fire ; and all the while it was filling itwas the uncomfortable duty of an unfortunateattendant to stand actually inside, roastedwith the heat and choked with the smoke

,

armed with a paddle with which to beat outthe flames whenever the bag caught alight.


This danger of fire was done away within the method . Of filling with hydrogen gas.The balloon, suspended from aloft as before,was connected by hose-pipes with a numberof casks containing iron or zinc filings uponwhich dilute sulphuric acid was poured. The

FILLING A HOT A IR BALLOON.

effect of mixing these substances together isto set up a brisk chemical action, in the courseOf which hydrogen gas is given off. In thiscase the hydrogen thus liberated came throughthe pipes and filled the balloon. The great disadvantages of this method of fil l ing

—which,it may here be mentioned, is occasionallyemployed at the present day— are the longtime it occupies, the great labour entailed,and the enormous expense.


It is said that when Robert s and Charlesreturned from their adventurous voyage theywere immediately arrested and thrown intoprison by order Of the King, who consideredit his duty t o put a stop to his subjects risking their lives in such dangerous enterprises .Public opinion was too strong for him, however, and the two heroes were quickly released,and Charles was rewarded by a pension Of

£200 a year for life .’

This newly discoveredart Of sailing the heavens had indeed firedpopular imagination to an extraordinary degree . Probably no invention has ever arousedgreater enthusiasm . Not only all Francebut all the civilised world went wild withexcitement for the time. Most extravagantstatements were made and written. A newkingdom

,it was declared, had been given to

mankind to conquer ; voyages might be madeto the moon and stars, and now it would evenbe possible t o take Heaven itself by storm $Ascent after ascent took place with theMontgo lfier

” and,the Charlier, both in

France and in other countries ; nor was itlong before the ball oon made its appearancein England . In August Of the next summer

( 1784 ) a Mr Tytler of Edinburgh made someshort voyages in a hot-air balloon of his ownmanufacture

,and in the following month a

much more adventurous attempt was successfull y carried out in London by a youngItalian Of the name ofVincent Lunardi.


Lunardi was at this time secretary to theNeapolitan Ambassador. He was keenlyinterested in the subject of ballooning, andpresently became fired with a desire to repeatin England those aerial experiments whichwere creating such a sensation on the Cont inent . He wasonly a poor man

,

and great diffi

cul t ies stood in

the way Of ac

complishing hisObject. He hadto excite “publicinterest in hisventure, to collect subscriptionsto defray the costof his balloon,which was t o bea Charlier,

” andto find a suitableSite in London VINCENT LUNARDI .for the inflationand ascent. He met with disappointmentsand disasters enough to discourage a lessenthusiastic man, but at length, after manytroubles, on the 1 5th of September his balloonwas ready and in process of filling in thegrounds of the Honourable A rtillery Company, in the city, where people hadassembled to witness the new wonder.

C

LUNARDI’

S BALLOON .


Lunardi continued his voyage over the towninto the country beyond . His balloon apparently attained a considerable height, for hefound that the condensed moisture round theneck had frozen

,and the gas , which to begin

with had only two-thirds filled the balloon,presently expanded so much that he wasobliged to untie the mouth to relieve thestrain. He had taken up with him as companions a dog and a cat . The cat was veryill at ease in the cold of the upper regions,and he resolved t o put her out ; so, comingdown to the ground, he handed her to a countrywoman standing in a field . Throwing outbal last, he then rose again and continued hisvoyage for some distance, eventuall y descending in a meadow near Ware . Some labourerswere at work on the spot, but they at firstrefused to come near him, and a young womanwas the first whom he could induce to helphim out of his car. A stone with a longinscription, set up in a meadow in the parishOf Standon, near Ware, marks to this day theplace where the first of all English balloonstouched ground .

The following yearwitnessed a yet bolderenterprise. Blanchard, a French aeronaut,and Dr. Jeffries, an American, determinedon an attempt to cross the Channel. On awinter s day, early in 1785 , they had theirball oon Inflated with hydrogen at Dover andboldly cast off to sea. The cold air appeared to


chill the gas more than they had foreseen , andlong before they were across the Channel theirballoon began settling down upon the water .They threw out al l their ballast, then a numberof books they were carrying, then their anchor,extra ropes

,and other gear. Still it seemed

very doubtful whether they woul d reach theFrench coast, and as a last resort they beganeven to throw away their clothes to lightenthe balloon. Fortunately at this moment theball oon Shot up into the air again , and eventuall y brought them down in safety near theforest of Guiennes.

SO far; although several hundred ascentshad been made , and in spite of the many andgreat dangers of the new-found art and theinexperience Of the early voyagers, no fatalaccident had marred the delight of sailing theskies. Disasters, however, were soon to come.It is sad to relate that the earliest to fal l avictim was the brave P ilatre de Rozier himself, the first Of. al l men to go aloft in a ball oon .

Fired with a desire to emulate Blanchard andJeffries, he decided that he himself wouldcross the Channel

,this time from France to

England ; and to avoid, as he imagined, thecooling of the gas, which had so nearly proveddisastrous on the previous occasion

,he hit on

the extraordinary idea of combining the principles of both the .Montgo lfier and Charlier ball oons, and suspending a fire ball oonbeneath another fil led with hydrogen gas. It


seems a remarkable thing t o us now that noone in those days saw the awful danger ‘Ofsuch a combination. The inevitable happened .

When the ball oon was high in the air thefurnace of the hot-air machine set fire tothe highly inflammable hydrogen

,a fearful

explosion followed , and De Rozier and hiscompanion were dashed to pieces.

CHAPTER III

FAMOUS BALLOON VOYAGES OF THE PAST

UNFORTUNATELY the death of P ilatre deRozier was but the first Of a series of fatalaccidents which marred the early years of

the history Of ballooning. Shortly afterwardsanother French aeronaut, going up in tooshallow a car, fell overboard when at a greatheight and was killed . A

'

l it t l e later CountZambeccari, an Italian, ascended in a hot-airball oon,

which, on coming near the earth,

became entangled in a tree. The furnace itcarried set fire to the Silk . To escape fromthe flames, the Count leapt to the groundand was killed on the spot . A few yearsafter

,Madame Blanchard, wife of the manwho first>crossed the English Channel, made

a night ascent from Paris with a number Offireworks hung from the car. These, in some

FAMOUS BALLOON VOYAGES OF THE PAST 39

way,ignited the balloon, which fell to the

ground, killing the unfortunate lady in its fall.On the other hand ,many miraculous escapesare on record . One Of the earliest balloonistsspent the night alone aloft in the midst Of aterrific thunder-storm, with the lightning flashing all around him, and yet descended in safetywhen morning broke. M . Garnerin, a famousFrench aeronaut of this date, also was lost ina storm . His balloon became unmanageable,and borne to earth was dashed against amountain side, the occupant losing consciousness until the balloon, which had ascendedagain, brought him safely down once moremany miles away.

A marvel lous escape took place in 1 808,

when two Italians ascended in a gas balloonfrom Padua and attained a great height,estimated as approaching feet. Herethe balloon burst, and came precipitately tothe ground ; and yet, despite the terrific fall,the aeronauts escaped with their lives . Theexplanation of this seeming impossibility was,no doubt, the tendency which a balloon,emptied of its gas, possesses to form a naturalparachute. During a rapid fall the lowerpart Of the silk will, if loose, collapse intothe upper portion to form a kind of openumbrella, and thus very effectually break thedescent. Many balloonists have owed theirsafety in similar accidents to this fortunatefact.


The bursting of balloons when at highaltitudes has already been referred to ashappening on several previous occasions . Itis a danger which is always present when aballoon is aloft, unless due precautions aretaken, and the neglect of these precautionshas probably led to more ballooning accidentsthan any other cause. The explanation issimply the varying pressure exerted upon thebag of gas by the weight of the atmosphere .When an inflated balloon is resting upon theground, the vast ocean Of air above it ispressing upon it with a weight of approximately fifteen pounds to the square inch, andit is this pressure which prevents the enclosedgas from expanding , beyond a certain limit.The balloon then rises high into the air, wherethe weight Of atmosphere pressing upon it ismuch diminished. The higher it rises theless the pressure becomes, and the gas itholds soon expands so much that, unless avent is provided for it, the ball oon will burst .At the present day the neck of a balloon ISalways left wide open when the balloon IS inthe air, to allow of the escape Of the gasduring the ascent.A perilous adventure befell Mr. Sadler, an

English aeronaut, in 1 81 2, whilst attemptingto cross the Irish Channel. He started fromDublinwith a wind which he hoped wouldcarry him to Liverpool, but had gone onlya short distance when he discovered a rent,

FAMOUS BALLOON VOYAGES OF THE PAST 4 1

which seemed to be increasing, in the silkof his balloon. Climbing the riggingwithdifficulty

,he contrived to tie up the hole with

his neckcloth ._

He was by this time over thesea

,and having passed

,

near the Isle of Man,

found himself, as evening ,

was approaching,

close to the coast Of North Wales . Here heendeavoured to seek a landing, but just atthe critical moment the wind shifted, as itfrequently does in this treacherous Channel,and he was quickl y blown out to sea again.

There he remained for another hour vainlyendeavouring to make the land, and then,despairing of the attempt and seeing fiveShips beneath him, he came boldly down on

the water, trusting they would come to hisassistance.But he came down too far away from them,

and one and all continued their course andtook no notice. He was obliged, therefore, tothrow out ball ast and to rise into the aironce more. The sun was nowset upon thelevel Of the water, but as the brave aeronautrose he beheld it once more above the horizon

,

and was cheered by its beams . Presently hesaw beneath him three more vessels

,which

signall ed theirwillingness to help him,and

he immediately came down on the sea againas close to them as he could . But the wind

,

now rising fast, caught the half empty Silkof the balloon as it touched the waves

,and

bore it along over the surface of the water .


the Welsh coast not far from Holyhead, aftera voyage of 70 miles, lasting five hours . Thiswas the last attempt to cross the Irish Channel,until November 1 902, when the Rev. J. M .

Bacon and Mr. Percival Spencer, startingfrom Douglas, in the Isle of Man, landed ina rocky glen 1 5 miles beyond Dumfries,after a journey of 80 miles , accomplished inthree hours. Brave Mr. Windham Sadlerunhappily lost his life in a terrible balloonaccident in 1 824 .

But a more celebrated ball oonist, perhapsthe most famous of all , had by this time cometo the fore—Charles Green, fit ly called TheFather of English Aeronautics . ” It was hewho first introduced a new method of balloonfill ing, which quickly revolutionised the wholeart and practice. This was nothing more orless than the employment of ordinary household or coal gas for inflation, in place of thecostly and dangerous hydrogen.

While balloons were inflated only with purehydrogen—for the uncertain and dangerousmethod of filling with ho t air was soon almostentirely abandoned— no great strides could bemade in the art of sailing the skies . Thefil ling of a large bal loOn eighty years ago costno less than £250 , and few people could befound willing to provide so much money forsuch a purpose. Coal gas, however, was bythen to be found in every town Of any conse

quence ; and it was Green’s suggestion that


though this gas might be greatly inferior topure hydrogen in buoyancy or “lifting power,

”

it yet contained a sufficient quantity of hydrogen in it for all ordinary aeronautical purposes.The coronation of King George the Fourthwas the occasion chosen by Green t o put hisnew scheme to the test and fill a ball oon withcoal gas. The experiment was entirely successful , and henceforward balloon ascents became much commoner throughout the world,for Green’s discovery reduced the cost Of fillingtenfold, and the trouble and anxiety a hundredfold. Green himself became one of the mostfamous men of his day, and lived to make athousand ascents, some of them Of the mostdaring and exciting description .

The most celebrated event in all his career,

however, was the voyage of the Great NassauBalloon, in November 1 836 . This voyagecreated a tremendous sensation at the time

,

and has always been considered one of themost adventurous enterprises in the whole history of aeronautics. How it came about wasas followsThe managers of the Vauxhall Gardens

,

London, had‘ made, with Mr. Green

’s assistance, a very large and fine balloon Of crimsonsilk, which stood eighty feet high and held

cubic feet Of gas , andwhich wouldcarry, ifneeded, more than twenty persons .After it was made the proprietors proposedexhibiting it in Paris, and there was some

THE GREAT NASSAU BALLOON .


question Of howthis valuable and fragileproperty had best be conveyed so far. Mr.Ho l lond , a young gentleman of considerablewealth , and a great lover of adventure, atonce came forward , and proposed to take theballoon to the Continent by sky. His Offer wasaccepted, and to make the ascent more noteworthy, it was decided to start from Londonand cross the sea by night, making as long avoyage as possible, although it was alreadywinter time, and such a venture had neverbefore been made.Preparations were at once commenced . Thepassengers were limited to three—Mr. Green,who was to manage the ball oon, Mr. Hol l ond ,and his friend Mr. Monck Mason. A ton Of

ballast was to be carried, provisions for a wholefortnight were laid in, and, Since none couldtell to within a thousand miles or more wherethey might be drifted, passports to every kingdom in Europe were Obtained .

They left London late one November day,

and,rising under a north-west wind, skirted

the north Of Kent . Passing presently overCanterbury, they wrote a courteous messageto the mayor, and dropped it in a parachute .Some time later, when the short autumn twilight was beginning to wane, they saw beneaththem the gleam Of white waves, and knewthey had reached the boundary of the hithertomuch dreaded sea. Immediately afterwardsthey entered a heavy sea fog , which hid all


things from their sight, and darkness and deadSilence reigned around .

This lasted for fifty minutes, when theyemerged from the cloud and found the brightlights of Calais beneath them. It was thenquite dark, and they sped on through thenight over unknown towns and villages whoselights gleamed fainter and fewer as the timewent on. Then once again they entered thefog bank, and for long hours no sign or soundof earth reached them more.As the night wore on they suddenly hada startling and alarming experience. Theirballoon, which had been flying near the earth,was presently lightened by the discharge ofballast, and rose to a height of feet intothe air. ,

Immediately afterwards, when allaround was wrapped in the deepest silenceand the blackest darkness, there came thesound of a Sharp explosion from over theirheads

, followed by a rustling of the Silk, andimmediately the car received a violent jerk .

The same thing was repeated again and yetagain, and it is small wonder that the awfulconviction then seized the party that there, inthe darkness

,in the dead Of night, at that

fearful heigh,t their ball oon had burst, and

they were falling headlong to the ground .

Great indeed must have been their reliefwhen they found this was not the case, anddiscovered the real reason of their alarm.

It Is the tendency of a balloon when flying


near the ground to assume an elongated orpear shape ; and while their balloon was inthis position the netting, which was wet withdew

,had frozen hard and tight around it .

Immediately they rose to great heights thegas had expanded, and the balloon had become globular in Shape, with a result that thestiffened ropes sprang to their new positionwith the crack and jerk which had so startledthe party. When day broke next morningthey found themselves over long tracts Ofdesolate forest land, and fearing they wereapproaching the wild, inhospitable steppes ofRussia, they descended with al l speed, anddisciovered they were in the Duchy of Nassau,in Germany, nearWeilburg, where they werereceived with the wildest enthusiasm anddelight . From start to finish they had ac

complished a voyage Of 500 miles in eighteenhours.After this event Greenmade many othervoyages in the great Nassau balloon, and metwith many exciting adventures . On one occasion , ascending in a violent gale of wind, heand a passenger covered twenty miles in aquarter of an hour, and, on descending nearRainham, in Essex, were blown along acrossthe fields at a furious pace, until the anchorcaught, and brought them up with such awrench that it broke the ring and jerked thecar completely upside down. Green and hisfriend only escaped from being thrown out by

D

FAMOUS BALLOON VOYAGES OF THE PAST -51

however,it will be necessary to refer briefly

to the history of a most important accessoryof the balloon, hitherto unmentioned theparachute .The name parachute comes from two Frenchwords

, purer , to parry and chute, a fall, and itsignifies a contrivance, made more Or less inthe form Of an enormous umbrella, to breakthe fall from a ball oon or other great height .The principle of the parachute was understoodeven before the invention Of the balloon. InEastern countries, in particular, where theumbrella or parasol has been in familiar usefrom earliest ages, parachutes were frequentlyempl'oyed by acrobats to enable them to jumpsafely from great elevations. In France also

,

at the end of the eighteenth century, a captiveOfficer attempted to escape from a lofty prisonby similar means .The aeronaut Blanchard was the first toconstruct a parachute for use from a balloon

,

his idea being that it might prove of servicein the event Of an accident while aloft. In1785 he let down from a great height a parachute to which was attached a dog in a basket,which reached the ground gently and safely.

After this M . Garnerin, the famous balloonist already referred to, hazarded a parachutedescent in person, and his attempt beingeminently satisfactory, parachute descents became fairly common .

In August 1 8 1 4 Mr. Cocking, an English


gentleman Of scientific tastes, read a paper onparachutes , suggesting an amendment in theirshape and construction, before the Society Of

Arts, for which he was awarded a medal. Histheory was never put into practice, however,till twenty-three years later, when, fired nodoubt by the interest aroused by the famousNassau voyage, he resolved to put his invention to the test .He accordingly constructed his parachute

,

which was of enormous Size, of unwieldyweight, and in shape rather resembling anumbrella turned inside out . Despite thewarning Of friends that the untried machinewas unwisely built, he insisted on making adescent with it , and succeeded in persuadingMr. Green to take him and his craft aloftattached to the Nassau balloon .

On the 27th Of July 1 837 they started fromthe Vauxhall Gardens , Mr. Green in the caraccompanied by Mr. Edward Spencer (grandfather Of the present well-known firm ofaeronauts) , his friend and frequent companionMr. Cocking seated in his machine slungbelow. A height of 5000 feet was attained,and then Mr. Cocking, after bidding a heartyfarewell to the others, pulled the rope whichliberated his parachute from the balloon .

Relieved from the enormous weight, the latterrushed upwards into the sky with terrificvelocity, the gas pouring in volumes from thevalves and almost suffocating the occupants of

COO$ ING’S PARACHUTE.

54 BALLOONS oAND FLYING MACHINES

the car. Tli

eir position, indeed, for the timewas one of the greatest danger, and they werethankful to reach the earth unharmed

,which

they eventually did. But their fate washappier far than that Of the luckless Cocking

,

whose parachute, after swaying fearfully fromside to side , at length utterly collapsed, andfalling headlong, was, with its inventor, dashedto pieces .While Charles Green was making hisfamous ascents in England, an equally celebrat ed aeronaut, John Wise, was pursuing thesame art in America. During a long andsuccessful career, unhappily terminated by anaccident,Wise made many experiments in theconstruction Of balloons, their shape, size,varnish

,material, and so forth . His resul ts ,

which he carefully put together, have been of

the greatest value t o balloon manufacturersuntil the present time . In the course of hismany voyages he met with various excitingadventures . On one occasion while aloft hesaw before him a huge black

'

cloud of part icul arly forbidding aspect . Entering this

, he

found himself in the heart of a terrific storm.

His balloonwas caught in a whirlwind,and

set so violently spinning and swinging that hewas sea-sick with the motion, while, at thesame time, he felt himself half-suffocated andscarce able -to breathe . Within the cloud thecold Was intense ; the ropes of the balloon$became glazed with ice and snow till they

FAMOUS BALL PAST 55

resembled gla d, and thegloom was so great that from the car the silkabove became invisible. A noise resemblingthe rushing of a thousand mill-dams, intermingled with a dismal moaning sound of wind,surrounded me in this terrible flight . Wiseadds

,

“Bright sunshine was just above theclouds but though he endeavoured to reachit by throwing out ballast, the balloon had nosooner begun to rise upwards than it wascaught afresh by the storm and whirl ed downagain . Neither was he able, by letting outgas

,to escape

.

this furious vortex from‘

beneath ; and for twenty minutes he was sweptto and fro , and up and down in the cloud,before he could get clear Of it, or regain anycontrol over his ball oon .

On another occasion Wise made an exceedingly daring and bold experiment. ConvincedOf the power which , as has before been said,an empty balloon has of turning itself into anatural parachute, he determined to put thematter to the test, and deliberately to bursthis balloon when at a great height. For thispurposehe made a special balloon Of very thinmaterial, and fastened up the neck so thatthere was no vent for the gas . He thenascended fearlessly to a height Of feet

,

where, through the expansion of the hydrogenwith which it was filled, his balloon exploded .

The gas escaped instantly, so that in tenseconds not a trace remained. The empty

56 BALLooNS AND FLYING MACHINES

balloon at first descended with fearful rapidity,

with a strange moaning sound as the airrushed through the network. Then the silkassuming parachute Shape, the fall became lessrapid, and finall y the car, coming down inzigzags, turned upside down when close tothe ground, and tossed Wise out into a fieldunhurt.It was JohnWise’s great desire at one timeto sail a balloon right across the Atlantic fromAmerica to Europe . Long study of the upperwinds had convinced him that a regular currentOf air is always blowing steadily high aloftfrom west to east, and he believed that if anaeronaut could only keep his balloon in thisupper current he might be carried across theocean quicker, and with more ease and safety,than in the fastest steamship . Wise went sofar as to work out all the details for this plan,the size Of the ball oon required, the ballast,provisions, and number of passengers ; andonly the want Of sufficient money preventedhim from actually making the attempt. Curiously enough, about the same time, CharlesGreen, in England, was, quite independently,working at the same idea, which he also bel ieved , with proper equipment, to be quitefeasible.

THE BALLOON A SCIENTIFIC INSTRUMENT 57

CHAPTER IV

THE BALLOON AS A SCIENTIFIC

INSTRUMENT

So far, in our history Of aeronautics, we havereferred to ballooning only as a sport or pastime for the amusement of spectators, and forthe gratifying of a love of adventure. It isnow time to speak of the practical uses of theball oon, and how it has been employed as amost valuable scientific instrument to teachus facts about the upper atmosphere, itsnature and extent, the clouds, the winds andtheir ways

,the travel of sounds, and many

other things Of which we should otherwise beignorant.Before the invention of the balloon menwere quite unaware of the nature of the aireven a short di stance above their heads . Inthose days high mountain climbing had notcome into fashion, and when Pilatre de Roziermade the first ascent, it was considered verydoubtful whether he might be able to exist inthe strange atmosphere aloft. Charles andRoberts were the first to make scientificobservations from a balloon, for they took upa thermometer and barometer, and madecertain rough records, as also did other earlyaeronauts. The most interesting purely scien


years later other scientific ascents threw freshlight on this point, and also continued theother investigations that Gay Lussac hadcommenced .

Towards the close OfCharles Green’s famouscareer

,scientific men in England woke up to

the fact that the use Of a balloon as an important means for obtaining observations onmeteorology and other matters had Of latebeen very much neglected. The British Associat ion took the matter up, and providedthe money for four scientific ascents, which ,

were made by Mr. Welsh of Kew Observatory, a

$

trained Observer. Green was theaeronaut chosen to accompany him, and theballoon used was none other than the greatNassau ball oon, of whose many and wonderful adventures we have already spoken . Greenwas then nearly seventy years of age, but hisskill as an aeronaut was as great as ever, andWelsh was able t o Obtain many valuablerecords . During the last voyage a height wasattained almost as great as that reached byGay Lussac , and both men found much difficulty in breathing. While at this elevationthey suddenly noticed they were rapidly ap

proaching the sea, and so were forced to makea very hasty descent, in which many of theinstruments were broken.

The veteran Green lived to a ripe Old age,

dying in 1 870, aged eighty-five . When a veryo l d man he still delighted in taking visitors to


an outhouse where he kept the Old Nassauball oon, now worn out and useless, and , handling it affectionately, would talk of its famousadventures and his own thousand ascents

, dur

ing which he had never once met with seriousaccident or fail ure. After his death the Old

balloon passed into the hands of anotherequally famous man , who, after Green

’s retirement , took his place as the most celebratedEnglish aeronaut of the day.

This was Henry Coxwell. He was the sonof a naval Offi cer, and was brought up to theprofession Of a dentist. But when a boy ofonly nine years o l d he watched, through hisfather’s telescope, a bal loon ascent by Green,which SO fired his imagination that henceforward

'

balloons filled all his thoughts . Ashe grew Older the fascination increased uponhim . He would go long distances to seeascents or catch glimpses Of ball oons in theair

,and he was fortunate enough to be present

at the first launching Of the great Nassauballoon . He did not get the chance of avoyage aloft, however, till he was twentyfive ; but after this nothing could restrain hisardour, and, throwing his profession to thewinds, he made ascent after ascent on all possible occasions .In one of his early voyages he met with whathe descfibes as one of the most perilous descents in the whole history of ballooning. Theoccasion was an evening ascent made from the


Vauxhall Gardens one autumn night of 1 848 .

The aeronaut was a Mr. Gypson, and besidesMr. Coxwell there were two other passengers,one Ofwhomwas the well -known mountaineerand lecturer, Albert Smith. A number Of

fireworks which were to be displayed when

CO$WELL. GLAISHER.

were slung on a framework forty feetbelow the car.

The balloon rose high above London, andthe party were amazed and delighted with thestrange and lovely view of the great citybynight, all sight of the houses being lost in thedarkness, and the thousands Ofgas lamps, outlining the invisible streets and bridges, twink


ling like stars in a blue-black sky. Coxwellwas sitting, not in the car, but in the ring ofthe ball oon, and presently, when they wereabout 7000 feet above the town , he noticed thatthe silk, the mouth of which appears to havebeen fastened , was growing dangerously distended with the expanding gas. By his advicethe valve was immed iately pulled, but it wasal ready t oo late ; the balloon burst, the gasescaped with a noise like the escape of steamfrom an engine, the sil k collapsed, and theball oon began to descend with appallingspeed, the Immense mass Of loose silk surgingand rustling frightfully overhead. Everyt hingwas immediately thrown out of the car tobreak the fall ; but the wind still seemed tobe rushing past at a fearful rate, and, to addto the horror of the aeronauts, they nowcamedown through the remains of the dischargedfireworks floating in the air. Little bits ofburning cases and stil l smoul dering touchpaper blew about them, and were caught inthe rigging. These kindled into sparks, andthere seemed every chance of the whole ballooncatching alight. They were still a whole milefrom the ground, and this distance they appearto have covered in less than two minutes.The house-tops seemed advancing up towardsthem with awful Speed as they neared earth .

In the end they were tossed out of the caralong the ground, and it appeared a perfectmarvel to them all that they escaped with onl y


a severe shaking. This adventure did not inthe least abate Coxwel l ’s ardour for ballooning,and exactly a

'

week later he and Gypson successful ly made t he same ascent from the sameplace

,and in the same balloon— and loaded

with twice the number of fireworksBut Coxwel l ’s most celebrated voyage of alltook place some years later, on the occasionof a scientific voyage made in company withMr. James Glaisher. In 1 862 the British Association determined to continue the balloonObservations which Mr. Welsh had SO successfully commenced

,but this time on a larger

scale. The observer was to be Mr. GlaisherOf Greenwich Observatory, and Mr. Coxwell,who by this time had become a recognisedaeronaut

,undertook the management Of the

balloon. The first ascents were made in Julyand August . Mr. Glaisher took up a mostelaborate and costly outfit of instruments,which

,however, were badly damaged at the

outset during a very rapid descent, made perforce to avoid falling in the Wash .

”On

each occasion a height of over four miles wasattained ; but on the third voyage , which wasin September

,it was decided to try and reach

yet greater altitudes .The balloon with its two passengers leftWo l

verhampt on at 1 P .M .—the temperature on the

ground being At about a mile high adense cloud was entered

,and the thermometer

fell to In nineteen minutes a height of


two miles was reached, and the air was atfreezing-point. S ix minutes later they werethree miles aloft, with the thermometer stillfalling ; and by the time four miles high wasattained the mercI

‘

Iry registered onlyIn forty-seven minutes from the start fivemiles had been passed ; and now the temperature was 2

°

below zero . Mr. Coxwell, whowas up in the ring of the balloon and exertinghimself over the management Of it

,found he

was beginning t o breathe with great diffi cul ty.

Mr. Glaisher, sitting quietly in the car watching his instruments, felt no inconvenience.More ballast was thrown out , and the ballooncontinued to rise apace ; and soon Mr. Glaisherfound his eyes growing strangely dim. Hecould not see to read his thermometer, ordistinguish the hands of his watch. He noticedthe mercury of the barometer, however, andsaw that a height Of feet had beenreached

,and the ball oon was still rising.

What followed next had best be told inMr. Glaisher’s own words

Shortly after I laid my arm upon the table,possessed of its full vigour, but on beingdesirous of using it , I found it useless. Tryingto move the other arm, I found it powerlessalso . Then I tried to shake myself and succeeded , but I seemed to have no limbs . Inl ooking_

>at the barometer my head fell overmy left shoulder. I struggled and shook mybody again

,but could not move my arms.


Getting my head upright for an instant only,it fell on my right shoulder ; then I fell backwards

,my body resting against the side Of the

car,and my head on the edge. I dimly saw

Mr. Coxwell and endeavoured to Speak, butcould not. In an instant intense darknessovercame me ; but I was still conscious, withas active a brain as at the present momentwhile writing this . I thought I had beenseized with asphyxia, and believed I shouldexperience nothing more, as death would comeunless we speedily descended . Other thoughtswere entering my mind, when I suddenlybecame unconscious as on going to Sleep .

” Mr.Glaisher adds $ I cannot tell anything of thesense Of hearing, as no sound reaches the earto break the perfect stillness and silence of theregions between Six and seven miles abovethe earth .

”

Meanwhile, as stated, Mr. Coxwell was upin the ring, trying to secure the valve-line,which had become twisted. TO do this hehad taken Off a pair Of thick gloves he hadbeen wearing, and in the tremendous cold ofthat awful region the moment his bare handsrested on the metal of the ring they becamefrost-bitten and useless. Looking down

,he

saw Mr. Glaisher in a fainting condition,and

called out to him, but received no answer.Thoroughly alarmed by this t ime, he tried tocome down to his companion’s assistance ; butnow his hands also had become lifeless

,and

E


heights have been reached in balloons ; butnowadays those who attempt to ascend togreat elevations always provide themselves,before they start, with cylinders of compressed oxygen gas . Then when the atmos

phere aloft becomes so thin and rare ,

as t omake breathing difficult, they begin to filltheir lungs with the life-giving gas from thecylinders, and at once recover.After this perilous voyage Glaisher and

Coxwell made several other scientific bal loonascents . They met with various experiences .On one occasion, during a lofty ascent, theylost sight of the earth above the clouds fora while, but, the mist suddenl y breaking, theyfound themselves on the point of drifting out

to sea. Not a moment was to be lost, andboth men hung on to the valve-line untilit cut their hands . The resul t was a tremendously rapid descent . The balloon fellfour and a quarter miles in less than a quarterOf an hour, covering the last two miles inonly four minutes . They reached earth closeto the shore, and were fortunate to escapewith only a few bruises , though all the instruments were once more broken in the Shock.

Mr. Glaisher was able to make manyinteresting notes of the condition of thewinds and clouds at high levels . He Observed how frequently different currents ofair are blowing aloft in different directionsat the same time. These differing winds


affect the shape of the clouds among whichthey blow. High above the ground hefrequently met with a warm wind blowingconstantly from the south-west ; and he bel ieved that it is largely due to this mild airstream passing always overhead that Englandenjoys such much less rigorous winters thanother countries that lie as far north of theequator. This mildness of our climate haslong been attributed to the Gulf Stream

,

that warm current Of the sea which sweepsup from the tropics past our shores . But itmay well be that there is besides an “AerialGulf Stream, as Mr. Glaisher call s it, blowingconstantly above our heads, which also servesto warm the air, and make our winter climatemild and moist .One fact these experiments seemed toestabli sh was, that when rain is fall ing froman overcast sky, there is always a higher layerof clouds overhanging the lower stratum .

Nothing surprised Mr. Glaisher more thanthe extreme rapidity with which the wholeSky,up to a vast height, coul d fill up entirely

with clouds at the approach of a storm .

Another point noted was that , when a windis blowing, the upper portion Of the currentalways travels faster than that next theground. This is due

,Of course, to the

Obstacles the wind meets as it sweeps overthe earth

,and which check its onward

progress.

THE BALLOON IN WARFARE 69

These,and very many other facts of the

greatest interest to the meteorologist, werethe outcome of Mr. Glaisher’s experiments .Later voyages of a Similar kind have addedgreatly to our knowledge of the conditionof the air, and it seems certain that in thefuture the balloon will be much more usedby scientific men, and by its means they willbe able to predict the weather more accuratelyand further ahead than at present, and learnmany other things of which we are now inIgnorance.

CHAPTER V

THE BALLOON IN WARFARE

BUT there is another practical use for theballoon to which we must now refer, andthat a most important one— its employmentin war-time . It was not long after the invent ion Of this ship Of the skies that soldiersbegan to realise what a valuable aid it mightbe to them in times of battle

,enabling them

to see inside a camp,fort, or beleaguered

city, or watch the enemy’s movements from

afar Off. The Opportunity for first puttingthe matter to the test very soon arose.Within a very few years of the earliest balloon experiments in France there commenced


in that very country the dreadful FrenchRevolution, and soon the nation found itselfat war with all the world

,and forced to hold

its own, alone, against the armies of Europe.This danger quickened the minds of all tothe importance of making use of every possible means of defence in their power. Itwas suggested that the newly discoveredballoon might be turned to account , andimmediately a school for military ballooningwas established near Paris . Fifty youngmilitary students were trained in the newart, and suitable balloons were provided .

The value Of their work was soon apparent .In June 1794 was fought the battle Of

Fleurus, between the French and Austrians .Before the fight a balloon party had carefullyobserved the position Of the Austrian forces ,and, through the information they gave, theFrench were able to gain a speedy and deoisive victory. In this way, and at this earlystage, the value Of the war balloon was atonce established .

Curiously enough , Napoleon woul d makeno use of balloons in his campaigns , and evendid away with the balloon school at Paris.The reason given for his prejudice is a curiousone . At the time of his coronation a large,unmanned balloon

,gaily decorated , and carry

ing thofi sands of lights, was sent up fromParis during the evening’s ill uminations . Itwas a very beautiful Obj ect, and behaved


splendidly, sailing away into the night, amidstgreat popular rej oicing, until it was lost tosight in the darkness . But at daybreak nextmorning it was seen approaching the city Of

Rome,where it presently arrived, actually

hovering over St. Peter’s and the Vatican .

Then,as if its mission were fulfilled, it settled

to earth,and finally fell in Lake Bracciano .

But as it fell it rent itself, and left a portionOf the crown with which it was ornamentedon the tomb of the Roman Emperor Nero .

Napol eOn, who was always a superstitiousman

,saw in this extraordinary voyage some

dreadful forecast of his own fate. He wasmuch disturbed , and forebade the matterever to be mentioned in his presence ; norwould he henceforward have any more todo with balloons .Military balloons were used by the Frenchagain, however, during their war in Africa in1 830 . The Austrians also used them in 1 849,and it is said the Russians had them at thesiege of Sebastopol in the Crimean War. AMontgo lfier balloon was made use of by theFrench in 1 862 at the battle Of Solferino ;and the Americans also employed balloonsduring the Civil War a year later. TheAmerican war balloons were comparativelysmall ones, inflated with hydrogen. Thehydrogen was manufactured in the way al

ready described , by pouring dilute sulphuricacid upon scrap-iron. For making the gas


upon the field two large tanks of wood called“generators were used. In these the waterand scrap-iron were placed and the acid pouredupon them

,the gas produced being carried

to the balloon through pipes, passing first

AMERICAN WAR BALLOON.

through vessels filled with lime-water to cooland purify it. When on the march fourwaggons were sufficient to carry the wholeapparatus. The inflation

,which took some

time, was made as close to the scene Of

action as was considered safe,and when

the balloon was once full a party of men


could easily tow it about to where it wasneeded .

But the time when the balloon was mostlargely and most usefully used in time ofwar was during the Siege Of Paris. In themonth of September 1 870 during the FrancoPrussian War

,Paris was closely invested by

the Prussian forces, and for eighteen longweeks lay besieged and cut Off from all therest of the world. NO communication withthe city was possible either by road, river,rail, or telegraph, nor could the inhabitantsconvey tidings Of their plight save by one

means alone. Only the passage of the airwas Open to them .

$uite at the beginning of the siege it occurred to the Parisians that they might useballoons to escape from the beleaguered town

,

and pass over the heads of the enemy to safetybeyond ; and inquiry was at once made todiscover what aeronautical resources were attheir command.

It was soon found that with only one or

two exceptions the balloons actually in existence within the walls were unserviceable or

unsuitable for the work on hand, being mostlyOld ones which had been laid aside as worthless . One lucky discovery was, however, made.Two professional aeronauts , of well-provedexperience and skill , were in Paris at the time.These were MM . Godard and Yon ,

both ofwhom had been in London only a short time


with the few o ld balloons then in Paris . Twowere moored captive at different ends of thetown to act as Observation stations fromwhence the enemy’s movements could bewatched. Captive ascents were made in themevery few hours . Meanwhile M . Duruof, aprofessional aeronaut , made his escape fromthe city in an Old and unskyworthy ballooncalled “Le Ne

ptune,

” descending safely outside the enemy’s lines , while another equallysuccessful voyage was made with two smallballoons fastened together.And then, as soon as the possibility Of

leaving Paris by this means was fully proved,

an important new development arose. SO

far, as was shown, tidings Of the besieged citycould be conveyed to the outside world ; buthow was news from without to reach thoseimprisoned within ? The problem was present ly solved In a most ingeniousway.

There was in Paris, when the siege commenced , a society or club of pigeon-fancierswho were specially interested in the breedingand training of carrier or “homing pigeons.The leaders Of this club now came forwardand suggested to the authorities that , withthe aid of the balloons

,their birds might be

turned to practical account as letter-carriers .The idea was at once taken up, and henceforward every ball oon that sailed out Of Pariscontained not only letters and despatches

,but

also a number of properly trained pigeons,

7G BALLOONS AND FLYING MACHINES

which, when liberated , would find their wayback to their homes within the wal ls of thebesieged city .

When the pigeons had been safely broughtout of Paris, and fallen into friendly hands beyond the Prussian forces, there were attachedto the tail feathers Of each of them goosequills, about two inches long, fastened on by asilken thread or thin wire . Inside these weretiny scraps of photographic film, not muchlarger than postage stamps, upon which a largenumber Of messages had been photographedby microscopic photography. So skilfully wasthis done that each scrap of film could contain2500 messages of twenty words each . A birdmight easily carry a dozen of these films, forthe weight was always less than one gramme,or 1 54 grains . One bird, in fact, arrived inParis on the 3rd of February carrying eighteenfilms, containing altogether messages.To avoid accidents, several Copies Of the samefilm were made , and attached to different birds .When any Of the pigeons arrived in Paris theirdespatches were enlarged and thrown on ascreen by a magic-lantern, then Copied andsent to those for whom they were intended .

This system Of balloon and pigeon postwent on during the whole siege. Betweensixty and seventy balloons left the city, carry

g al t ogether nearly 200 people, and twoand a half mil lion letters, weighing in allabout ten tons . The greater number of


these arrived in safety, while the return journeys

,accomplished by the birds , were scarcely

less successful. The weather was very umfavourable during most Of the time, and coldand fogs prevented many pigeons from makingtheir way back t o Paris. Of 360 birds broughtsafely out of the city by balloon only about60 returned, but these had carried betweenthem some messages .Of the balloons themselves two, each with itsluckless aeronaut

,were blown out to sea and

never heard of more . Two sailed into Germany and were captured by the enemy, threemore came down too soon and fell into thehands of the besieging army near Paris, andone did‘ not even get as far as the Prussianlines . Others experienced accidents andrough landings in which their passengers weremore or less injured. Moreover, each balloonwhich sailed by day from the city becameat once a mark for the enemy’s fire ; so muchSO that before long it became necessary t o

make all the ascents by night, under coverof darkness.They were brave men indeed who daredface the perils Of a night voyage in an untried balloon

,manned by an unskilled pilot,

and exposed to the fire Of the enemy, intowhose hands they ran the greatest risk Of

falling. It is small wonder there was muchexcitement in Paris when it became knownthat the first Of the new balloons made during


the siege was to take away no less a personagethan M . Gambetta

,the great statesman

,who

was at the time , and for long after, the leadingman in France . He made his escape byballoon on the 7th of October, accompaniedby his secretary and an aeronaut, and managed to reach a safe haven

,though not before

they had been vigorously fired at by shotand shell, and M . Gambetta himself hadactually been grazed on the hand by abullet.Another distinguished man who hazarded thesame perilous feat, though for a very differentreason

,was M . Janssen, a famous astronomer.

On the 22nd of December of that year therewas to take place an important total eclipseof the sUn, which would be visible in Spainand Algeria. It had long been M . Janssen’sintention to Observe this eclipse, and for thispurpose he had prepared a special telescopeand apparatus ; but when the time drew nearhe found himself and his instruments shut upin besieged Paris, with no possible means ofescape except the dangerous and desperatehazard Of a voyage by Sky.

But SO great was the astronomer’s en

thusiasm for his work, that he resolved tobrave even this risk. Taking the essentialparts of his telescope with him, and, as aeronaut

,an active young sailor, he set sail in

the darkness of a winter’s morning, longbefore dawn, passed safely over the enemy’s


lines, and continued the voyage till nearlymid-day

,when they sighted the sea, and

came down near the mouth Of the riverLoire

,having travelled 300 miles in little

more than five hours. Neither Janssen orhis telescope were injured in the descent,though the wind was high at the time ; andboth reached Algeria in time for the eclipse.It must have been a most bitter disappointment to the ardent astronomer, after all hisexertions, that when the great day arrivedthe sun was hidden by clouds, and he wasunable to Observe the sight for which he hadrisked so much .

Since the Franco-Prussian war, militaryballooning has been largely developed

,and

nowall great armies possess their properlyequipped and trained balloon corps . Theball oons in use in the British Army at thepresent day are made, not of silk, but Of goldbeater’s skin, a very thin, but extremely toughmembrane prepared from the insides of oxen .

This is, of course, much stronger and moredurable than ordinary ball oon fabric, but muchmore expensive . The balloons are comparat ively small ones, of feet capacity

,and

are inflated with hydrogen . The hydrogen isnow no longer made upon the field

,but is

manufactured in special factories, and carriedcompressed in large steel cylinders. By thismeans the time occupied in fil ling the balloonis much reduced, but the weight of the


cylinders is very great. As will be remembered, balloons were made of considerable useduring the late Boer War. A t the siege ofLadysmith they were thought of much valuein directing the fire of the British Artillery

,

and again at Spion Kop and Magersfontein

are said to have done good service.SO far we have shown of what use balloonsmay be in times of peace and war. Everyyear sees fresh improvements and developments in balloons for military purposes and inthose employed for making meteorological andother similar Observations ; and there is nodoubt that great advances may shortly beexpected in both these directions . But thereis yet another and totally different science towhich the balloon may lend its aid

,and help

greatly to add to our knowledge ; and this isthe science Of geography, or the study of theearth ’s surface .One of the earliest ideas suggested by Mont

go lfier’

s Invention was that the balloon mightbe turned to practical account in the exploringof unknown and inaccessible tracts Of the world.

It was suggested that in a balloon men mightsail over and survey country that they werenot able to reach in any other way. Desertscould be crossed in this fashion, forests andmountain ranges

,and even the desolate ice

tracts of _t he North and South Poles.All this is, in truth, perfectly possible , andanother day may be accomplished ; but at


present great difficulties and dangers stand inthe way of exploring by balloon, and up t othe present time, with one great exception,no special attempt has been made . It hasalready been mentioned that both Wise andGreen wished to cross the Atlantic by sky,and indeed at the present moment plans areactually being made on the Continent for aSimilar voyage. This, however, can scarcelybe called exploring. Other suggestionswhich may presently be put to the testare the crossing of the Sahara, and also of

another great desert in Central Arabia, intowhich no white man has ever succeeded inpenetrating. Recent expeditions both to theNorth and South Poles have also taken withthem balloons to be used captive for theObservation of the state Of the ice ahead,and for obtaining wide views around .

The one great attempt at exploring byballoon which has so far been made has, unfortunately, met with hopeless and terribledisaster—this was the ill-fated voyage to theNorth Pole of Andree and his companions .The idea Of reaching the Pole by balloonwas first proposed many years ago, and bothFrench and English aeronauts at differenttimes have made suggestions as to the bestway in ’ which it might be accomplished .

Nothing, however, was attempted until aboutthe year 1 894 , when M . S . A . Andree, a wellknown Swedish ball oonist

,who had already

F


The winter passed, and by the end of nextMay they were back again at Dane ’s Island.

Their shed and apparatus had suffered damageduring their absence

,and had to be repaired

,

and their preparations were not complete untilthe end Of June. But again the wind wascontrary

,and for three weeks more they waited

impatiently. All this while the balloon re

mained inflated . and by the long . delay must

have lost a considerable amount Of its buoyancy. At last the wind changed , and thoughit was not exactly in the direction they wished

,

being a little west of south,instead Of due

south,Andree felt he could wait no longer

,

and at half-past two in the afternoon Of July1 1 th set sail, with his two friends, on his daringvoyage .What followed is soon told . Eleven dayslater one of the carrier pigeons taken byAndree in his ball oon was picked up by afishing

-boat Off Spitzbergen. Fastened to itwas the foll owing message “July 1 3th ,

P .M . 82°

2’ north lat. , 1 5

°

5’cast long.

Good journey eastward . All goes well on

board —ANDREE .

”

This was the latest news ever heard of theill—fated voyagers . Later on two of Andree ’sbuoys, thrown out from the balloon, werefound ; but the messages these contained weredated on the evening of July 1 1 th , only a fewhours after the start. If the date Of the firstfound message can be relied on, it would seem


that after forty-eight hours Andree’s balloonwas still sailing well, and he had alreadyaccomplished the longest voyage aloft evermade.Of his subsequent fate, and that of his companions, nothing is known . Search expeditions have failed to find any trace of them orof the balloon, and the many rumours receivedhave been proved to be false. There can beno possible reason to doubt that these bravemen perished in their daring attempt, and thattheir bones lie in theArctic Sea or in the wasteof ice and snow that surrounds the Pole .

CHAPTER V I

THE A IRSHIP

So far in our story we have traced the originand progress of the balloon, showing how fromsmall beginnings it has grown t o be an important invention, of great use to the scientificObserver

,the soldier, and the explorer, and the

means of teaching us much fresh knowledge .But in spite Of the high hopes of. earlyaeronauts, and the extravagant propheciesmade when the first ball oons ascended intothe Sky,

-\ it has long been evident that the

balloon alone has not solved the problem of

human flight or accomplished the conquest

THE AIRSHIP 85

of the air. An ordinary balloon is, in fact,nothing more than a mere lifting machine

,

no more capable Of sailing the Sky, in theproper sense Of the word, than a cork floatingin the water is capable of sailing the sea. Ithas no movement Of its own, but drifts simplyat the mercy of the wind, and quite beyondcontrol. By the discharge Of ballast, or bythe letting out of gas, the aeronaut can indeedcause it to rise or sink at pleasure, and sometimes when two currents Of air are blowingaloft in different directions at the same timehe may, by passing from one to the other,“tack ” ‘

his balloon to some extent across theSky. Otherwise he has no power of guidingor directing it in the least degree, and shouldhe lose sight Of the earth above the clouds

,

has even no method of tell ing in whichdirection he is travell ing.

Early inventors thought they would be ablet o steer balloons by means of sails, like a boat,but they soon found that this was impossible.The effect of hoisting a sail at the side Of

a balloon was merely to swing the balloonround until the sail was in front, while meant ime it continued its course unaltered . Theuse of a rudder and other means were alsotried, but without success ; nor can suchmethods ever hope to succeed so long as aballoon floats in the air at the same pace ast he wind that carries it forward . A balloont ravelling with the wind may

‘

be compared


to a boat drifting idl y with the tide . Aslong as she drifts she refuses to answer herrudder, which swings idly. But presently theboatman hoists a sail, and the wind carries theboat onwards faster than the tide , and thenimmediately the rudder comes into action .

Or should there be no wind , he may accom

plish the same thing by dragging an anchoror other weight in the water, and so slowinghis boat down until it moves Slower thanthe current ; he will then again find that hisboat will answer her helm.

To steer his course in a balloon, therefore,the aeronaut must so arrange that he istravell ing faster or slower than the wind inwhich he finds himself. To travel faster

,he

must employ some sort of engine or motort o drive his craft onwards . TO travel Slower

,

he must trail something along the groundbeneath to act as a drag .

Part of the equipment Of every balloon isa long trail-rope, which , when the balloonis aloft, hangs some 300 feet below the car.The object of this rope is t o break the forceof the fall when the ball oon comes down tothe earth at the end of the voyage . In thegreater number of cases a ball oon , in its finalswoop to the ground , falls the last few hundredfeet with considerable, and often uncomfortable

,spee d . But when provided with a trail

rope,as it descends more and more of the

heavy rope will lie along the ground, and Sp

THE AIRSHIP 87

lighten the weight of the balloon, and lessenthe Shock of falling.

If then a trail-rope were used of such lengththat it would sweep along the ground whilethe balloon was flying in the air, the effectwould be to put a drag or brake on theballoon

,and so render it capable of being

steered to some extent with a sail ; and thisis what has actually been done in all attemptsof the kind. But since a long rope draggingrapidly across the country is a very dangerousObject, capable of doing great damage, andalso liable t o catch in trees and other obstacles,such experiments can only be tried with safetyover the sea, or, as in the case of Andree

’svoyage, over desert or uninhabited country.

The best way of steering a balloon, therefore, is to provide it with some mechanicalpower which shall urge it onwards at a greaterspeed than the wind ; and when this is done,it has ceased to be a balloon in the popularsense of the word, and has become an “airship .

”

There is a great deal Of confusion betweenthe terms airship, and flying machine

,

”

and the two words are Often considered asmeaning the same thing. But while

,strictly

speaking, neither word in itself has any verydefinite meaning, it is gradually becomingmore general to apply them to two widelydifferent objects . According to this plan

,

although both names stand for an aerial vessel


capable of travelling in the sky by its ownmotion, an airship is a machine supportedin the air by reason Of its buoyancy, whilea flying machine is kept aloft only by virtueof its onward movement .In other words, part of the construction. of

an airship consists Of a bag or balloon, fil ledwith gas or hot air, which causes the wholet o rise and maintain its position in the air.This balloon part is quite independent of themachinery which drives the airship forward

,

and indeed if the engine ceases working, thevessel becomes nothing more than an ordinaryballoon in its nature, and will behave likeone . An airship , therefore, is in principlean apparatus lighter than air.A flying machine , on the contrary, isheavier than air

,and maintains its position

aloft merely by the power it Obtains from itsengines, assisted by its special construction.

The inventors of flying machines take astheir analogy the flight of birds . Birds arecreatures heavier than air, which yet manageto rise and fly by reason of the strength andconstruction of their wings . In the sameway the heavy flying machine essays to flyby the power of its machinery. And , asbird aloft, if its wings became disabled, wouldinstantly drop towards earth, so a flyingmachine\ would immediately commence tofall if its engine stopped or ceased to movewith sufficient power. The airship and the

THE AIRSHIP

flying machine,therefore, may be regarded

as rival aerial vessels, and their inventors andadvocates

,sometimes known as lighter-than

air-ites and “heavier-th‘

an-air-ites, thoughboth working for the same end , are endeavouring to accomplish their aim by widely differentmethods .Up to the present day the airship—t o whichwe will first turn our attention— has beenmuch more largely and successfully experi

mented with than the flying machine. It is,however

,the Opinion Of many, including the

great authority Sir'

Hiram Maxim, that in thefuture the flying machine will become themore important invention of the two. Inall Nature ,

” says S ir H iram, we do not finda single balloon. A l l Nature’s flying machinesare heavier than air.” And from this he arguesthat, as Nature is ever our best guide and example, a flying machine heavier than air willbe in the end most likely to succeed .

One of the earliest airships which achievedany success was invented by a Frenchman,M. Giffard, about the year 1 852 . He madehis ball oon of an elongated or cigar Shape

,a

form adopted by airship inventors as offeringless resistance to the air than the ordinaryglobular or pear Shape . To this balloon,which was 1 04 feet long and 39 feet indiameter, he attached a steam engine ofthree-horse power, weighing 4 62 lbs. andworking a screw - propeller, which, by its

THE AIRSHIP 91

in the air is amply shown by the fact thatit returned to its Shed fi ve times out of theseven on which it was publicly taken out .It also attained a speed of fourt een miles anhour

,and indeed it would seem that R enard

and Krebs, although their names are nowalmost forgotten, accomplished nearly as greatthings twenty years ago as the popular airship inventors of the present day.

One of the greatest difficulties with whichearly inventors had to contend was the enormous weight Of their engines. The machinerythey were obliged to use to drive their airshipsthrough

“

the air weighed more than their balloons

,unless made Of unwieldy size, had power

to lift. The same difficulty indeed exists atthe present time, though to a much less degree .Of late years , and especially since the introduction of the motOr-car, great progress hasbeen made in the construction of light butpowerful engines

, or motors , and the employment of petrol vapour instead of coal or Oilhas very greatly lessened the weight Of thefuel which has to be carried .

In consequence of this improvement manyairships have recently been made which havemet with varying success, and many more areat the present moment in process Of construc

t ion. Among the host of inventors, whosenames it would here be impossible even t o mention , three stand out from the rest in specialprominence—Zeppelin, Santos Dumont, and


Stanley Spencer—all three the inventors ofa irships which have , by actual experience,proved their power Of steering a course acrossthe sky.

Of these rival airships, by far the largestand most elaborate was that built by the firstnamed

,Count Zeppelin, a distinguished vet

eran soldier of the German army. For manyyears he had spent his time and fortune inmaking experiments in aerial navigation, andat length in 1 900, having formed a companyand collected a large sum of money for thepurpose, he produced an enormous airship,which , from its size, has been compared to aman ofwar. In shape Count Zeppelin’s invent ion resembled a gigantic cigar, 4 20 feet Inlength, pointed at both ends . The framework was made of the Special ly light metalaluminium, covered over with silk, and thoughfrom outside it looked all in one piece, withinit was divided into seventeen compartments

,

each holding a separate balloon made of oiledsilk and absolutely gas-tight. The Object ofthis was to prevent the tendency the gas hasto collect all at one end as the Ship forces itsway through the air. These balloons werefill ed with pure hydrogen, the cost Of the inflaLtion alone being £500 . Beneath was slung along gangway, 346 feet in length, with twocars, also made of aluminium, attached to it,In these cars were placed two motor-enginesOf sixteen horse—powei each, driven by benzine

THE AIRSHIP 93

and working a pair Of screw-propellers attachedto the balloon . A steering apparatus wasplaced at each end, and the whole machine,with five passengers, weighed about el everitons .To lessen the effects of a possible fall, the

ZEPPELIN ’S AIRSHIP OVER LA$E CONSTANCE.

experiments were carried out over water, andthe great airship was housed In a Shed built onLake Constance. The cost of this Shed alonewas enormous, for it was elaborately con

structed on pontoons, and anchored in sucha way that it could be turned round to allowthe airship to be l iberated from it m the best


direction t o suit the wind . The trial trip wasmade one evening in June 1 900, when a verylight wind was blowing. The great machinerose into the air, carrying Zeppelin and fourcompanions to a height of 800 feet. Thesteering apparatus then being put into action

,

it circled round and faced the wind, remainedstationary for a short while

,and then sank

gracefully and gently upon the water. A fewdays later another and more successful trialwas made. The wind at the time was blowing at sixteen miles an hour, but in spite ofthis the airship slowly steered its course againstthe wind for three and a half miles, when, oneof the rudders breaking, it was obliged to comedown. On one or two other occasions also itmade successful voyages, proving itself to beperfectly manageable and capable Of beingsteered on an absolutelycalm day . The expenseOf the experiments was, however, tremendousmoney fell Short, and the great machine, theresult of many years’ labour and thought, hassince been abandoned and broken up.

A far happier fate has so far attended theefforts of the brave young Brazilian, AlbertSantos Dumont. The wealthy son Of a successful coffee-planter, he had always from hisboyhood been keenly interested in aeronautics

,

and,coming to Paris, he constructed in 1 898

an airship of a somewhat novel kind. Hisballoon was cigar-Shaped, 83 feet long, andholding 6500 feet of pure hydrogen . A t

THE AIRSHIP 95

tached to the balloon, and working a propeller,was a small motor like those used for motorcycles, and astride of this Santos Dumont

SANTOS DUMONT ’S AIRSHIP.

rode , bicycle fashion, steering his course witha rudder. In this ingenious machine heascended from the Botanical Gardens in Parisand circled several times round the largecaptive balloon then moored there, after which


he made a number of bold sweeps in the air,

until an accident occurred to his engine andhe came precipitately to the ground . Thoughshaken he was by no means discouraged

,and

declared his intention of continuing his ex

periment s until he Should have invented anairship which, in his own words

,should

be not a mere plaything, but a practicalinvention , capable of being applied in athoroughly useful fashion .

Accordingly he constructed one machineafter another, gaining fresh knowledge byeach new experience

,a nd profiting by the acci

dents and failures which continually beset himin his dangerous and daring work. Beforelong also he received an additional incentiveto his labours . Early in the year of 1 900 ‘

it

was announced by the Paris Aero Club, asociety Of Frenchmen interested in aeronautical matters, that one of its members,M . Deutsch, had Offered a prize of 1 00,000

francs—about £4000—to the man who, starting from the Aero Club grounds at Longchamps In a balloon or flying machine, shouldsteer his course right round the E iffel Towerand back to the starting-place— a distance Ofthree and a half miles—within half an hour.If the prize were not won within a certaintime, his

'

offer was to be withdrawn, andmeanwhil e he proml sed a certain sum Of

money every year for the encouragement ofaeronautical experiments .

THE AIRSHIP 97

The offer Of this reward set many inventorsto work upon the construct ion of variousaerial vessels of all kinds, but from the beginning Santos Dumont was well to the fore.By the middle Of 1 90 1 he had completed whatwas his sixth airship— a cigar-Shaped balloon,1 00 feet long, its propeller worked by a motorcar engine Offifteen horse power—and with it,on July 1 5th , he made a splendid attempt forthe prize . Starting from the Club grounds,he reached the E iffel Tower in thirteenminutes

, and , circling round it, started backon his homeward journey . But this time hisvoyageWas against the wind, which was reall ytoo strong for the success of his experiment ;part Of his engine broke down, and the balanceof the vessel became upset ; and although hemanaged to fight his way back to the startingpoint, he arrived eleven minutes behind time,and so failed to fulfil M . Deutsch’s conditions .Again, on the 9th of August, having in themeantime made further trials with his machine

,

he embarked on another attempt to carry Offthe prize . He chose the early hours of themorning, starting shortly after Six from theClub grounds , where only a few friends, amongthem the keenly interested M . Deutsch, werepresent . The day was apparently perfect, andwhen, after the lapse of five minutes only, hehad reached the Tower and swung gracefullyround it, every one was convinced that thistime the prize was certain to be won But

THE AIRSHIP 99

A new machine, Santos Dumont VII . ,

was ready in less than a month, and tested on

the 6th Of September. It behaved beautifully,and all went well until the trail-rope caughtin a tree . In liberating it the framework became bent, and the airship was being towedback to its shed when a sudden gust of windtore it away from those who held it. It immediately rose into the air, and on DumontOpening the valve the whole collapsed and fellto earth with a great shock . Again the luckyinventor escaped unhurt, though owning thistime that he had “felt really frightened .

” Tendays later, in another trial, the airship camein contact with some trees, which piercedthe silk and let out the gas, so that it fellprecipitately twenty feet . But the aeronautappeared to bear a charmed life, for once morehe was none the worse for the fall. Severalother unsuccessful trials followed, and then,on the 1 9th ofOctober, Santos Dumont madeanother grand attempt for the prize.Starting with the wind in his favour

,his

machine travell ed at the rate Of thirty milesan hour, and rounded the Eiffel Tower in nineminutes . But in the journey homewards theairship had to struggle with a wind blowingat thirteen miles an hour. In endeavouringto “tack ” the machinery became upset, andDumont, leaving his car, crawled along theframework to the motor, which he succeededin putting in order again. But this naturall y


occasioned some delay,and though he accom

pl ished the rest of his journey in eight minutes,the Committee at first decided he had exceededthe all otted time by forty seconds, and so hadlost the prize . Great popular indignation wasexcited by this decision, for public sympathywas all with the daring and persistent youngBrazilian, and M . Deutsch himself was mostanxious he Should receive the award . Finally,he was considered t o have fairly won it, andthe money,which he afterwards divided amongthe poor, was formally presented to him.

Early in the next year Santos Dumont cont inued his experiments at Monaco, and on one

occasion came down in the sea, and had to berescued in the Prince OfMonaco ’s own steamyacht. After this there was a talk of furthervoyages being made in England, but the pro

ject came to nothing, and although Dumontmade other ascents in Paris in the summer of1 903, he does not appear t o have eclipsed hisprevious record.

But although Santos Dumont came throughall his accidents and perils SO happily, hisexample led to terrible disaster on the partOf a luckless imitator. In 1 902 M . Severo,also a Brazilian, was fired with a desire t oShare his fellow -countryman ’s fame, and healso constructed an airship with which heproposed to do great things . But whileDumont was a skilled aeronaut of large ex

perience, as well as a mechanician, Severo

THE AIRSHIP 1 01

knew scarcely anything about the subject,and had onl y been aloft once or twice. Proofof his ignorance is Shown by

‘

the fact that hismotor-engine was placed only a few feet awayfrom the valve through which the gas fromthe balloon woul d escape .The ascent took place in Paris early in themorning of the 1 2th of May, and was witnessed , unhappily, by Severo

’s wife and son.

Bidding them good-bye, he stepped into thecar, and , accompanied by an assistant, roseabove the town. The ball oon rose steadily,and appeared to steer -well . Then Severocommenced to throw out ballast, and whenthe airship had risen 2000 feet it was suddenl y seen to burst into a Sheet of flameA terrible explosion followed, and then thewhole fell to the ground a hopeless wreck

,

and the two men were dashed to pieces in thefall. It is believed that this dreadful disaster

,

which recalls the fate of Pil atre de Rozier, wascaused by the hydrogen gas, which escapedfrom the valve during the rapid rise, becomingignited by the engine, which, as has been said,was placed dangerously close.Nor was this

,unhappily, the only accident

of the kind in Paris during the year. Onl yfive months later, on the 1 3th of October,Baron Bradsky ascended with an assistant ina large airship Of his own invention . Throughfaulty construction, the steel wires which fastened the car to the balloon broke, the two

THE AIRSHIP 1 03

him when, in 1 902, he set to work tobuild an airship which he . had long beendevising.

His first machine was a comparatively smallone , capable onl y of lifting a light man. Ittook the usual form Of a cigar-shaped balloon,the framework of which was built Of bamboo,driven forward by a screw-propeller worked bya small petrol engine. Warned by the fateof the unfortunate Severo , Mr. Spencer placedhis engine far away from the valve. Profitingalso by Santos Dumont’s experience, he constructed his ball oon in such a manner that,should it become torn and the gas escape, theempty silk would collapse into the form Of aparachute and break the fall. Furthermore,there was an arrangement by which, whilealoft, ordinary air could be forced into theballoon to replace any loss Of gas, and s

okeep the silk always fully inflated and “taut ”

—a very important factor in a machine thathas to be driven forward through the atmos

phere.

With this airship Mr Spencer, as also hisequally daring wife, made several highly successful trials at the Crystal Palace

,when it

was found to steer well and answer its helmmost satisfactorily. Mr. Spencer also madetwo long voyages, from London and fromBlackpool, on both of which occasions hefound he coul d manoeuvre his airship withconsiderable success, make circular flights ,


and sail against the wind, provided it wasblowing onl y at moderate speed .

Encouraged by his success, he next built aSimilar but much larger machine, nearly ahundred feet long, holding 30 ,000 cubic feetOfgas, and driven by a petrol motor of twentyfour horse-power. In this case the propeller, Instead Of being placed at the rear, as in general,is at the front of the airship

,thereby pul ling

it forward through the air instead Of pushingit from behind . By this arrangement Mr.Spencer thinks his balloon would have lesstendency to double up when urged against astrong wind . The steering is done by a ruddersail at the stern, and t o cause his machine tosail higher or lower, the aeronaut points itshead up or down by means ofa heavy balancerope .This new airship was ready by the summerof 1 903, but the unfavourable weather Of thatstormy season again and again interfered withthe experiments . On the 17th Of SeptemberMr. Spencer announced his intention Of sailingfrom the Crystal Palace round the dome ofSt . Paul

’s, and returning to his starting-place .The Cathedral was indeed safely reached, butthe increasing breeze, now blowing half a gale,baffied all his attempts t o circle round . Againand again

,till his hands were cut and bleeding

with the strain Of the rOpes, he brought hismachine up, quivering, to the wind, but all tonO

'

purpose,until at length, abandoning the

THE FLYING MACHINE 1 05

attempt, he sailed with the current to Barnet.More favourable results may doubtless belooked for with better weather conditions .In France during 1 903the brothers Lebaudymade some successful trips with an airship of

their own construction . Many other airshipsare now being built in all parts of the world,in preparation for the aeronautical competitions to take place in America on the occasionof the St . Louis Exhibition Of this year.

CHAPTER VII

THE FLYING MACHINE

IT is now time we turn our attention fromthe airship to its important rival, the flyingmachine .At first Sight it may perhaps appear thatso far the flying machine has accomplishedless than the airship, and gives less promiseof success, since up to the present time noflying machine has taken a man any distanceinto the air, or indeed done much more thanjust lift itself Off the ground . Neverthelessthose who have made a study of the matterare full Of hope for the future . Many expertsdeclare that already the limits of what canbe done with the airship, which depends uponthe lifting power of its gas to raise it and


tage gained by increase of strength will bemore than counterbalanced by increasedweight. On this point S ir Hiram Maximsays $ It is not possible to make a balloon

,

strong enough to be driven through the airat any considerable speed, at the same timelight enough to rise in the air ; thereforeballoons must always be at the mercy of awind ' no greater than that which prevailsat least 300 days in the year ; adding

,

“Those who seek to navigate the air bymachines lighter than air have, I think, comepractically to the end of their tether. ”

With‘

the flying machine, on the contrary,the same difficulty does not arise. S ince itis at all times heavier than air, and is keptaloft Simply by its motive power and mechanism, its weight is Of no consequence

,pro

vided only its engine is sufficiently powerful.It may, therefore, be built as rigidly as needbe, while, from its size—which is muchsmaller in proportion to its lifting power thanin the case Of the airship and also fromits construction, it is much less liable to beaffected by the wind .

In constructing a flying machine which isheavier than air the inventor has before himtwo examples of bodies which , though heavierthan the atmosphere, yet contrive to rise upwards into the sky ; these are, firstly, birds, ands econdly, the familiar schoolboy toys, kites .To imitate the flying powers of birds and

1 08 BALLOONS AN D FLYING MACHINES

kites,he must first understand the means by

which their flight is accomplished ; and hewill find

,on examinat ion, that to a large

extent the same principle underlies each— theprinciple Ofwhat is termed the aeroplane .A S we watch birds— especially large birds,

$ESTREL.

as hawks and gulls— winging their way aboutthe sky, we may notice that their flight isaccomplished in two ways ; either they aremoving through the air by flapping theirwings up and down, or else with wings wideoutstretched they are soaring or sailing in theair for long times together without apparentlymoving their wings at all . Certain birds, suchas vultures and albatrosses, possess this power


of soaring flight to an extraordinary degree,and the exactway in which they keep themselves poised aloft is indeed still a mystery.

We cannot, however, as we watch, say, ahawk, hovering in the air with motionlesswing

,help being “struck by its resemblance

to the schoolboy’s kite, kept afloat high inthe sky by the action of the wind properlyapplied to its surface, and we can at oncesee that the bird makes use of the sameprinciple as the kite In its soaring or hoveringflight . Indeed, just as a kite sinks to earthwhen the wind drops, so in a dead calm evenan albatross has t o flap its wings to keepafloat .It is to the principle of the kite, therefore,that the inventor of the flying machine mustturn . He must adapt the same principle t ohis apparatus, and this he does in his aeroplane,which, as will be seen, is an all-importantpart of his machine, and which , in its simplestform, is nothing more or less than a kite.We knowthat if a light flat body, suchas a kite, is lying upon the

‘ ground, and thewind gets under it so as to tilt it, it wil l belifted by the wind into the air. The string Ofa kite is SO adjusted that as the kite rises itis still held at an angle to the wind’s force

,

and SO long as the kite remains tilted at thenecessary angle so long it will continue torise or poise itself in the air while the windblows. When schoolboys fly their kites they

THE FLYING MACHINE 1 1 1

a substitute for the strength of the wind, andalso a substitute for the pull of the string whichkeeps the kite at the best angle to profit bythat strength . The first they achieve by usinga suitable engine or motor, and the second bysupplying it with what are call ed aeroplanes—large flat surfaces, light but rigid, inclinedat a suitable angle to the horizon . By the useof these the power of the engine 1 s employed tobest advantage In causing the machine to sailthrough the sky.

The great advantage Of the aeroplane overany other mode Of flying is thus described byMajor Baden-Powell, one ofour greatest livingauthorities on aeronautical matters $ Whenpeople realise that in the case of the . aeroplanea contrivance like the awning of a small steamlaunch is capable of supporting the man andthe engines, and that in the case of the balloona mass like a big ship is necessary to lift thesame weight, one can readily understand theadvantages Of the aeroplane, especially whento the drawbacks of the bulky balloon areadded the great difficulties inherent in theretention of a large volume of expensive

,

inflammable, and subtle gas, ever varying inits density.

The most successful inventors of flyingmachines at the present day are all Americans

,

though one of them has made his experimentson this side of the Atlantic. They are S irHiram Maxim , inventor of the famous gun,

1 1 2 BALLOONS AND FLYING MACHINES

and one of the greatest mechanicians living ;Professor Langley, Secretary Of the Smithsonian Institute,Washington and the brothersWright .Mr. Maxim, as he then was, commencedhis experiments in the early nineties . Aswe have already shown, he went to Naturefor his guide, and in constructing his flyingmachine took as his analogy the flight of

birds . Birds urge their way onwards in theair by reason of the strength of their wings .A flying machine must do the same by thepower of its engine ; and as a bird

’s wingsmust be strong in proportion to the bird’sweight, so the strength or horse

-power Of theengine must stand in a certain proportionto the number Of pounds it weighs . Mr.Maxim’s first task, therefore, was to discoverwhat proportion this must be, and by hisexperiments he arrived at a conclusion whichProfessor Langley in America, working atthe same task at the same time, but quiteindependently, had also proved to be true,namely

,that the faster a machine travels

through the air the greater weight it maycarry ; or, in other words, the quicker a bodymoves through the atmosphere the less tendency will it have to fall to the ground . Aquick-flying bird like an albatross , therefore,flies with less exertion, and so could carry agreater weight, than a Slow-moving bird like agoose. It must therefore be to the advantage

THE FLYING MACHINE

Of the flying machine that its engines shouldattain as great a speed as possible.Maxim’s next task was to construct a suitable engine. Light but powerful engines hadnOt then reached the pitch of perfection they

THE MA$ IM AIRSHIP.

have now, and his results proved at the time a

perfect revelation of what could be done inthis direction, and led to great advances beingmade.Next came the designing of the greatmachine itself. It was an enormous apparatus,weighing over three tons , capable Of carryingthree men, and supported by no less than 4 000

H

THE FLYING MACHINE 1 1 5

struct ing a flying machine which shal l fly byvirtue of its own motion.

Meanwhile in America Professor Langleywas experimenting, independently, almost onthe same lines . He also was bent on producinga flyingmachine, but instead Of starting to workupon a large apparatus like Maxim, he beganby making models, and gradually worked hisway up to bigger things . For many monthshe studied to understand the principle Of thoseingenious little toys sometimes seen, which, bymeans of the tension of a twisted india-rubberband, will keep afloat in the air for a fewseconds ; Next he constructed small modelsdriven by steam, in which he found his greatdifficulty was in keeping down the weight .For years he , persevered in his work withoutany great success , until in 1 896 he produceda model machine which he called an aerodrome .” It was quite small, weighing withits engine only 25 lbs . , and measuring but1 4 feet from tip to tip of its aeroplanes . The

experiments were made over water, and thenecessary momentum was given by droppingit froma platform 20 feet high . On morethan one occasion this little flying machinerose with great steadiness in the face of thewind to a height of 1 00 feet, moving sosmoothly that it might have carried a glassof water without spilling a drop ; and then,the steam of its engine being exhausted, sankdown gracefully upon the water, having flown

1 1 6 BALLOONS AND FLYING MACHINES

about half a mile in a minute and a half.This success encouraged Professor Langleynext to construct a full-sized flying machineon the same lines but this on its first voyageplunged headlong into the water and was hopelessly damaged . The United States Government have since granted him a sum of moneyto continue his experiments .Latest of all the airship inventors, andperhaps SO far the most successful, are thebrothers Wright . Up to the date of writingthis the full details of their work are not yetmade public, but it is known that on the 17thof December 1 903, their machine, which consists of two large aeroplanes driven forward byan engine of Sixteen horse-power, after beingstarted along a short track on level ground,rose into the air and flew for about half amile .It remains for us now to make brief mention

of how men have tried, and are stil l trying, toimitate the soaring or gliding flight of birdswithout the use of machinery to assist them .

We have seen how an albatross can, when thewind is blowing, convert itself, as it were, intoa kite

,and keep aloft in the air for a wh ile

without moving its wings . S imilarly manypeople have attempted, by attaching themselves to a large supporting surface or aeroplane

, and casting themselves off from aheight, to glide with the wind across widestretches of country. In this mode of soaring


flight some have made considerable progress .Herr Lilienthal, a German, Was perhaps for atime the most successful. He started fromsmall beginnings, jumping Off a spring boarda few feet high, and gradually increasing theheight as he became more accustomed to hisapparatus . Later he had a large artificialmound made specially for him, and from thetop of this he would throw himself into theair, and with a favourable wind sail a distanceof four hundred yards at a considerable heightabove the ground . L il ienthal

’

s experiments,however, came to a sad end . On August thel 1 th , 1 896, after he had glided along in the airfor about two hundred yards

,a sudden gust of

wind caught the wide-spread wings of hisapparatus, and tilted it upwards . This causedhim to lose his balance, and he fell from aheight of Sixty feet and broke his Spine . Asimilar accident also caused the death, a fewyears later, of a young Englishman, Mr.Percy S . Pilcher, who had been following upLil ienthal

’

s experiments .The -greatest difficulty now to be overcomein solving the problem ofhuman flight, whetherwith soaring apparatus or flying machine, maybe summed up in one word Everyschoolboy knows that the great art of kiteflying consists in so adjusting the point of

attachment of the string and the length of

the tail that his kite is properly balanced,and

is not liable to turn over or dip ” when in

CONCLUSION 1 1 9

be at the cost of much labour, and, it is tobe feared, at the sacrifice of many morebrave lives.

CHAPTER VIII

CONCLUSION

IN our last chapters we have, in some measure,brought our aeronautical history up to thepresent day

,though of necessity many im

portant“

points and notable voyages have beenpassed over unnoticed . It now remains to usbut to gather up the loose ends of the story,and then briefly to indicate the direction inwhich we may expect new advances in thefuture .And, first of all, it may be well to mentiona few ballooning records . ” The largestballoon ever known was used as a captiveat the Paris Exhibition of 1 878 . It was of

cubic feet capacity, and capable oflifting more than fifty passengers at a time.Other mammoth balloons of almost as greatdimensions have also been employed for captivework ; but the largest balloon intended speciallyfor “right away ” ascents was the Giant,built in Paris in 1 863 by M . Nadar. It held

cubic feet of gas, and was made ofyards of best white silk, at 55. 4d . a


yard . The car was particularly elaborate,

almost as big as a small cottage, being oftwo stories, and divided into several rooms .It proved, however, to be a very dangerousadjunct, for on the two occasions it wasused those within received very serious injuryduring rough landings, and it was soon putaside and replaced by an ordinary basket .None Of these monster sky craft appear tohave been very successful, and at the presentday the largest balloons in general use do notexceed or cubic feet capacity.

The honour of the longest aerial voyageever made rests with the unfortunate Andree,who, if his dates are to be relied upon, hadbeen forty-eight hours aloft in his balloonwhen he despatched his last found message.Not far behind in point of time, however. wasCount de la Vaulx, who in the summer of1 90 1 attempted to cross the Mediterranean byballoon. Contrary winds in the end baffledhis venture, and he was forced to descend onthe deck of a steamer which was following hiscourse, but not before he had spent forty-onehours in the sky. The year previous the Counthad also achieved a record long-distance voyagein connection with some ball oon competitionsheld during the French “Exposition of 1 900 .

Starting from Paris , he descended in Russia,1 1 93mile s away, having been aloft thirty-sixhours all but fifteen minutes .For lofty ascents the palm still rests with

CONCLUSION 1 21

Glaisher and Coxwell, whose famous voyageOf 1 862, when, as related, a height offeet (or seven miles) is said to have beenreached, has never been equalled . The exactaltitude attained on this occasion is, however,as we have explained, only conjectural , neitherbeing capable at the last of taking observations, and no height being registered over

feet. On July 31 st , 1 901 , two Germanscientists

,Dr. Berson and Dr. Suring, ascended

from Berlin to a registered altitude offeet, or well over six miles . They were provided with compressed oxygen to breathe, buteven then became unconscious during the last800 feet of the ascent. Three years before Dr.Berson had made a verylofty ascent in England,accompanied by Mr. Stanley Spencer, whena height of feet was reached . A terribleaccident occurred in connection with a loftyscientific ascent made from Paris in 1 875 byTissandier, inventor of the airship alreadymentioned, and two companions . Their ohject was to attain a record height, in whichthey indeed succeeded, reaching feet .But despite the artificial air they took withthem to breathe, they all three became uhconscious in the extreme upper regions, andwhen, after one of the most awful voyagesin the whole history of ballooning

,Tissandier

came. to himself, itwas to find the bodies Ofhis two friends stiff and cold beside him inthe car.

CONCLUSION 1 23

In November 1 902, Mr. Bacon, aecom

panied by Mr. Percival Spencer, crossed theIrish Channel by balloon, the second timeonly this dangerous passage has been made,the first occasion being the voyage of Mr.Windham Sadler, eighty-five years before .Mr. Bacon’s voyage was partly undertaken forthe Admiralty, who lent the services of a gunboat to follow the balloon’s course over thesea . One of the Special Objects of investigation was to test a theory, long held, that froma considerable height aloft the bottom of thesea becomes visible, even in rough weatherwhen the surface is troubled with waves .This point was very successful ly settled, foralthough the sea was very rough, Mr. Baconnot only saw, but succeeded in photographing,from a height of600 feet, the beds of sand androck lying in ten fathoms at the bottom ofthe Irish Channel—a feat never before accompl ished .

In scientific Observations of the upperatmosphere a valuable ally to the ball oonhas been found in the kite. The making ofkites has now reached a high pitch of perfect ion, and by their means self-recordingscientific instruments can be raised to vastheights in the air, and even men carried aloftwith safety A kite which latterly hasexcited much attention is the Cody kite.With this, during the autumn of 1 903, itsinventor, a Mexican, hazarded a bold ven

1 24 BALLOONS ‘AND FLYING MACHINES

ture. Harnessing it to a light boat,and

waiting for a favourable wind,he started

from Calais at eight O’clock one Novemberevening, and was safely towed all night acrossthe Channel, reaching Dover at five the nextmorning.

The aeronautical competitions at the St.Louis Exhibition , in America, have givena great impetus to one branch at least ofaeronautics, while the labour of manyscientific workers throughout the whole worldis directed to the improvement of our presentmodes of exploring the heavens , and theturning to best

'

account of the means alreadyat our disposal . Never since the days whenthe Montgo lfier brothers floated their firstfrail craft has SO much interest as now been .

manifested in the conquest of the sky, andnever has progress been more rapid and sure .Whether the day will ever come when manwill rule the atmosphere as be '

nowdoes thesea is, as yet, uncertain, but there are manywho hope and believe not only that he will,but that the day is not far distant when ‘ thebirds will no longer hold undisputed swayover the empire of the air.

Printed by BALLANTYNE, HANSON Co.

Ed inburgh 67° London

· BALLOONS, AIRSHIPS, AND FLYING MACHINES CHAPTER I THE ORIGIN OF BALLOONING ONE November night...

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