AEROSTATION*.

to a hoop which passed round the middle of the balloon. Tothis a sort of car was suspended a few feet below the under partof the balloon;- and, in order to prevent the bursting of the ma-chine, a valve was placed in it; by the opening of which some,ofthe inllammab\e air might be occasionally let out. The car wasof basket work^covered with linen, and beautifully ornamented.Being furnished 'with proper instruments for observation, they tooktheir seats about 2 P. M. on the 1st December, 1783. Theweight of the whole apparatus, including that of the adventurers,was ti04 lbs. When the balloon began to rise the thermometerstood at of Fahrenheit, and the barometer at 30.18 inches ; itcontinued to ascend till the mercury fell to 27 inches, from whichthey calculated their height to be about 600 yards. '1 browingout ballast occasionally as they found the machine descending bythe-escape of some of (he inflammable air ; they found n practica-ble to keep at pretty near the same-distance from the earth duringthe vest of their voyage; the quicksilver fluctuating between 27and 27.63 inches, andthe'thermometer between 33° and 37°, thewhole time. They continued in the air an hour and three quar-ters, and alighted at the distance of 27 miles from Paris; havingsuffered no'inconvenience during tiieir vovage, nor'experiencedany contrary currents of air, as had been tell by M. Pilatre andthe Marquis. As the balloon still retained a great quantity of in-flammable gas, M. Charles determined to take another voyage byhimself. M. Robert accoidingjy got out of the machine; whichnow being 130 pounds lighter, arose with such velocity, that in20 minutes lie was almost <JO00 feet in the air, and entirely out ofthe sight of terrestrial objects. The globe, which had been ratherflaccid, soon began lo swell, and the inflammable air e-caped ingreat quantity', fie also drew the valve to prevent the balloonfrom bursting.; and the inflammable gas, being considerablywanner Ifrtn the external air, diffused itself ail rgund, and wasfelt dike a warm atmosphere. In ten minutes, however, the ther-mometer indicated a great variation of temperature : his lingerswere benumbed with cold, and he felt a violent pain in his rightear and jaw, which he ascribed to the expansion of the air in theseorgans as well as to the external cold. But the beauty of theprospect which he now enjoyed, made amends for these inconve-niencies. At his departure the sun w as set on the vailies ; but theheight to w hich M. Charles was got in the atmosphere, renderedhim ,again visible, though only for a short time. He saw, forafew seconds, vapours rising from the vailies and rivers. Theclouds seemed to ascend from the earth, and collect one upon theother, still preserving their usual form ; only their colour was grey&ml uniform for want of sufficient light in the atmosphere. Bythe light of the moon, he perceived that the machine was turninground with him in the air; and he observed that there were con-trary currents which brought him back again. Ife o‘>scrved also,.with surprise, the effects of the wind, and that the streamers of hisbanners pointed upwards; which, he -avs, could not be the effecteither of his ascent or descent, as he was moving horizontally attlte time. At last, recollecting his promise of returning to hisfriends in half an hour, he pulled the valve', and accelerated hisdescent. When within 200 feet of the earth, he threw out two orthree pounds of ballast, which rendered the balloon aaain station-ary ; but, in a little time aflerwatds, he gently alighted in a lieldabout three miles distant from the place whence he set out;though, by making allowance for all the turnings and windings ofthe voyage, lip supposes he lnd gone through-nme miles at least.By the calculations made, it appears that he rose at this time notless than 10,300 feet; a height somewhat greater than that ofMount JF.tna. Vincent Lunardi, a native of Italy, was the first who ventured lo commit himself to the atmosphere in F.nglaiul.His balloon was made of oiled silk, Its diameter being 33 feet. Itwas rot furnished with a valve, but the inflammable air was intro-duced through an aperture in the neck, through which also itmight he let out. M. I.unardi departed from the Artillery-Ground on the 13th of September 1784, at two o’clock, lie tookwith him a dog, a cat, and a pigeon. His first direction wasnorlh-west by we-t; but when the balloon rose higher, he wascarried hv a current of -air nearly north. At ten minutes pastfour he landed on a meadow near Ware in Hertfordshire . In thecourse of his voyaae the thermometer stood as low as 29°, and heobserved That the drops of water collected round the balloon werefrozen. Several attempts to direct the machine through the at-mosphere, were made in 1784. Messrs. Morveau and Bertrand,

at Dijon , raised themselves with an inflammable air balloon to theheight, as was thought, of 13,000 feet; passing throng!) a space of18 miles in an hour and 23 minutes. M. Morveau had preparedoars for directing the machine through the air; but they were da-maged by the wind, so that only two remained serviceable ; byworking these, however, they were able to produce a sensibleellect on the motion of the machine. In a third aerial voyageperformed by M. Blanchard, he-seemed-to produce some ellectby the agitation of bis wings, both in ascending, descending, mov-ing sidewise, and even in some measure against the wind: how-ever, this is supposed, will] some degree of probability, to havebeen a mistake, as, in all his succeeding voyages, the effects ofhis machinery could not be perceived. Messrs. Charles and Ro-berts prepared their balloon in form of an oblong spheroid, 4Gfeet long, and 27i in diameter, made so as to float.with itslongest part parallel to the horizon. It was furnished with wingsin the shape of an umbrella without the handle, to the top ofwhich a stick was fastened parallel to the aperture of the umbrella.Five of these were disposed round the car, which was near 17 feetin length. The balloon was filled in three hours, and, with theaddition of 450 lbs. of ballast, remained in aqvilibrio with theatmosphere. About noon, on the 19th September 1784, theybegan to ascend; and having risen to the height of 1400 feet,they perceived some thunder clouds near the horizon, which theytook great pains to avoid. From their account, however, itshould seem, that they had safely passed through the thunderclouds; as, about 40 minutes after three, they heard a loud clapof thunder; and, three minutes af'er, another much louder; atwhich lime (he thermometer sunk from 77 to 59 degrees. Thissudden cold, occasioned by (lie approach of the clouds, condens-ed the inflammable air so that (he balloon descended very low,,and they were obliged to throw out 40 pounds of ballast; yet onexamining the heat of the air within the balloon, they found it tobe 104°, when that of the external atmosphere was only G3.When they had got so high that the mercury in the barometerstood only at 23.94 inches, they found themselves becalmed ; themachine going two feet in a second, though it had beforegone- at the rate of 24 feet in a second. On this thev determinedto try the effect of their oats to the utmost; and, by workingthem for 35 minutes, and marking the shadow of the balloon oi>the ground, it appeared, that in that time, they had described thesegment of an ellipsis, whose longest diameter was 6000 feet.Alter having travelled about 150 miles, they descended, only onaccount of the approach of night, having still 200-pounds of ballastleft. The el feat of their wings is described llms:—“Far fromgoing against the wind, as is said by some persons to be possiblein a certain manner, and some aeronauts pretend to have actuallydone, we only obtained, by means of two oars, a deviation of 22degrees: it is certain, however, that if w e could have u.-cd ourfour oars, w e might have deviated about 40 degrees from the di-rection of the wind ; and as our nuichiue,would have been capa-ble of carrying seven persons, it would have been easy for livepersons to have managed and put in action eight oars, by meansof which a deviation of about 80 degrees would have been ob-tainejl. We had already observed (sav they), that if we did notdeviate more than 22 degrees, it was because the wind carried inat the rate of 24 miles an hour; and it is natural to judge, that, ifthe wind had Teen tw ice as strong as it was-, we should not havedeviated more than one-luilf of what we actually did ; and, on (hecontrary, if the wind had been only half as strong, our deviationwould have been proportionably greater.”—'The death of M. B.do Rozier, the brst aerial navigator, and of his companion M. Hotmain, has Ivon much lamented. T hey ascended at Boulogne onthe 15th of June, with an intention of crossing the channel to Fng-larid. Tiieir balloon was spherical, 37 feet in diameter, tilled withinflammable air, and under it was suspended a small Montgolfier,or lire balloon, ten feet in diameter. This Montgollier was de-signed for rarefying the atmospheric air, and thus diminishingthe specific gravity of the whole apparatus. For 20 minutes theyappearerl to pursue the proper course ; but the balloon seemed tobe much inflated, and the aeronauts appeared anxioti' to de-eend.Having asi ei tied about three quartets of a mile, the whole appiwratus was in Humes, and the unfortunate adventurers fell to theground, and were killed on the spot. T'heie have been othermi-fortunes, chiefly arising from the inadvertency of the aeronaut.The most daring expedition in the atmosphere was that ot M.

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