The Dominion of the Air [21]
remarkable as having been the first to fairly cross the heart of London. Captain Snowdon, R.N., accompanied the aeronaut. The ascent took place from Chelsea Gardens, and proved so great an attraction that the crowd overflowed into the neighbouring parts of the town, choking up the thoroughfares with vehicles, and covering the river with boats. On being liberated, the balloon sped rapidly away, taking a course midway between the river and the main highway of the Strand, Fleet Street, and Cheapside, and so passed from view of the multitude. Such a departure could hardly fail to lead to subsequent adventures, and this is pithily told in a letter written by Garnerin himself: "I take the earliest opportunity of informing you that after a very pleasant journey, but after the most dangerous descent I ever made, on account of the boisterous weather and the vicinity of the sea, we alighted at the distance of four miles from this place and sixty from Ranelagh. We were only three-quarters of an hour on the way. To-night I intend to be in London with the balloon, which is torn to pieces. We ourselves are all over bruises."
Only a week after the same aeronaut ascended again from Marylebone, when he attained almost the same velocity, reaching Chingford, a distance of seventeen miles, in fifteen minutes.
The chief danger attending a balloon journey in a high wind, supposing no injury has been sustained in filling and launching, results not so much from impact with the ground on alighting as from the subsequent almost inevitable dragging along the ground. The grapnels, spurning the open, will often obtain no grip save in a hedge or tree, and even then large boughs will be broken through or dragged away, releasing the balloon on a fresh career which may, for a while, increase in mad impetuosity as the emptying silk offers a deeper hollow for the wind to catch.
The element of risk is of another nature in the case of a night ascent, when the actual alighting ground cannot be duly chosen or foreseen. Among many record night ascents may here, somewhat by anticipation of events, be mentioned two embarked upon by the hero of our last adventure. M. Garnerin was engaged to make a spectacular ascent from Tivoli at Paris, leaving the grounds at night with attached lamps illuminating his balloon. His first essay was on a night of ear]y August, when he ascended at 11 p.m., reaching a height of nearly three miles. Remaining aloft through the hours of darkness, he witnessed the sun rise at half-past two in the morning, and eventually came to earth after a journey of some seven hours, during which time he had covered considerably more than a hundred miles. A like bold adventure carried out from the same grounds the following month was attended with graver peril. A heavy thunderstorm appearing imminent, Garnerin elected to ascend with great rapidity, with the result that his balloon, under the diminished pressure, quickly became distended to an alarming degree, and he was reduced to the necessity of piercing a hole in the silk, while for safety's sake he endeavoured to extinguish all lamps within reach. He now lost all control over his balloon, which became unmanageable in the conflict of the storm. Having exhausted his ballast, he presently was rudely brought to earth and then borne against a mountain side, finally losing consciousness until the balloon had found anchorage three hundred miles away from Paris.
A night ascent, which reads as yet more sensational and extraordinary, is reported to have been made a year or two previously, and when it is considered that the balloon used was of the Montgolfier type the account as it is handed down will be allowed to be without parallel. It runs thus: Count Zambeccari, Dr. Grassati of Rome, and M. Pascal Andreoli of Antona ascended on a November night from Bologna, allowing their balloon to rise with excessive velocity. In consequence of this rapid transition to an extreme altitude the Count and the Doctor became insensible, leaving Andreoli alone in possession of his faculties.
Only a week after the same aeronaut ascended again from Marylebone, when he attained almost the same velocity, reaching Chingford, a distance of seventeen miles, in fifteen minutes.
The chief danger attending a balloon journey in a high wind, supposing no injury has been sustained in filling and launching, results not so much from impact with the ground on alighting as from the subsequent almost inevitable dragging along the ground. The grapnels, spurning the open, will often obtain no grip save in a hedge or tree, and even then large boughs will be broken through or dragged away, releasing the balloon on a fresh career which may, for a while, increase in mad impetuosity as the emptying silk offers a deeper hollow for the wind to catch.
The element of risk is of another nature in the case of a night ascent, when the actual alighting ground cannot be duly chosen or foreseen. Among many record night ascents may here, somewhat by anticipation of events, be mentioned two embarked upon by the hero of our last adventure. M. Garnerin was engaged to make a spectacular ascent from Tivoli at Paris, leaving the grounds at night with attached lamps illuminating his balloon. His first essay was on a night of ear]y August, when he ascended at 11 p.m., reaching a height of nearly three miles. Remaining aloft through the hours of darkness, he witnessed the sun rise at half-past two in the morning, and eventually came to earth after a journey of some seven hours, during which time he had covered considerably more than a hundred miles. A like bold adventure carried out from the same grounds the following month was attended with graver peril. A heavy thunderstorm appearing imminent, Garnerin elected to ascend with great rapidity, with the result that his balloon, under the diminished pressure, quickly became distended to an alarming degree, and he was reduced to the necessity of piercing a hole in the silk, while for safety's sake he endeavoured to extinguish all lamps within reach. He now lost all control over his balloon, which became unmanageable in the conflict of the storm. Having exhausted his ballast, he presently was rudely brought to earth and then borne against a mountain side, finally losing consciousness until the balloon had found anchorage three hundred miles away from Paris.
A night ascent, which reads as yet more sensational and extraordinary, is reported to have been made a year or two previously, and when it is considered that the balloon used was of the Montgolfier type the account as it is handed down will be allowed to be without parallel. It runs thus: Count Zambeccari, Dr. Grassati of Rome, and M. Pascal Andreoli of Antona ascended on a November night from Bologna, allowing their balloon to rise with excessive velocity. In consequence of this rapid transition to an extreme altitude the Count and the Doctor became insensible, leaving Andreoli alone in possession of his faculties.