The Mastery of the Air

our time we marvel at the daring of modern airmen, who ascend to giddy heights, and, as it were, engage in mortal combat with

fier balloons had ascended and descended with no outward happenings, yet none could tell what might be the risk to life in committing oneself to an ascent. There was, too, very sp

ture aloft. But everyone interested in aeronautics in those days saw that the man who first traversed the unexplored regions of the air would be held in high honour, and it seemed ha

he construction of his balloon. It was of enormous size, with a cage slung underneath the brazier for heating th

at. The balloon made a perfect ascent, and quickly reached a height of about half a mile above sea-level. A strong current of air in the upper regions caused the balloon to take an opposite direction from that intended, and the aeronauts drifted right over Paris. It would

re, which it took the aeronauts all their time to extinguish. At times, too, they came down perilously near to the Seine, or t

uent experiments with this gas by Dr. Black, of Glasgow. It was soon decided to try to inflate a balloon with this "inflammable air"-as the newly-discovered gas was called-and with this end in vie

e of silk and varnished with a solution of india-rubber and turpentine. The first hydrogen balloon was only about 13 feet in diameter, for in those early days the method of prep

les away. We are told that some peasants at work near by fled in the greatest alarm at this strange monster which settled in their midst. An old print shows them cautiously approaching the balloon as it lay heaving on the ground, stabbing it with pitchforks, and beating it with flails and sticks. The story goes that one of the alarmed farmers po

n a specially-constructed hydrogen-inflated craft. This balloon, which was 27 feet in diameter, contained nearly all the features of the modern balloon. Thus there was a valve at the top by means of which the gas could be let o

ople were met together just outside Paris on the 17th December to see Professor Charles and his mechanic, Robelt, ascend in their new craft. The a

es was affected by violent pain in his right ear and jaw. During the voyage he witnessed the strange phenomenon of a double sunset; for, before the ascent, the sun had set behind the hills overshadowing the valleys, and when he rose above the hill-tops he saw the

nt was made in Great Britain, by Mr. J. M. Tytler. This took place at Edinburgh in a fire balloon. Previous to this an Italian, named Lunardi, had in November, 1783, dispatched from the Artillery Ground, in London, a sm

100 feet in diameter, and stood about 130 feet high. It was inflated with hot air over a stra

idea of suspending a small fire balloon under the neck of another balloon inflated with hydrogen gas. In the light of our modern knowledge of the highly-inflammable nature of hydrogen, we wonder how anyone could have attempted such an adv