South-eastern Independent. (McConnelsville, Ohio) 1871-1871, 1871-08-25
ABOUT KITES AND THINGS.

Did you ever hear of the man who har-
messed pair of kites to light carriage,
arranged set of strings so that he could
manage them, and took a ride one hun
dred and ifty miles long? His kites were
like the common paper kites all boys
make, only they were twelve feet high,
and made of linen. And it really happen
ed in England fifty years ago.
Putting 'Fsfp9 20 useful work seems
sometaing lis {strying to lead butterflies
into industrious ways; and yet, when you
think about it they have been useful
good many times.
More important to the world than the
Englishman's carriage-drawing kite was
our own Ben Franklin's kite. 1t was
not famous for its beauty, for it was only
silk handkerchief stretched across two
sticks, but it is immortal as the means of
a great discovery.
You must know that Ben's kite flour
ished more than hundred years ago, be-
fore the days of lightning rods and tele-
graphs, when the wisest man did not
know as much about electricity as the
merest school-boy knows now, thanks to
Ben and his kite. Been was much inter-
ested in electricity and had a shrewd sus-
piciOn that lightning was the same thing.
He determined to find out about it So
oneday when a thunder cloud was coming
up, instead of running into the house and
getting on feather-bed, as I've seen peo-
pie do, he went out into the field and put
up his kite When it was near the cloud,
he tied q key to the end of the hempen
string-and waited. Pretty soon he saw
the loose fibres of the kite string stand up;
instantly he touched his knuckles to the
key, and received an electric shock. That
settled the matter. As soon as lie found
out the nature of lightning, to protect
houses from its pranks he invented the
lightning rod.
When the lightning leaves the clouds it
rushes at once the nearest way to the
earth. If house is in its track, so much
the worse for the house; the lightning
hasn't time to turn out. But when men
put up nicely pointed rcd over the house,
expressly for path for the lightning, it
very amiably accepts the kindness and
travels down the rod instead of through
the house; which is more satisfactory all
around.
Perhaps you never heard of another
useful kite, owned by a man called Steeple
Jack He lived in Edinburg nearly
twenty years ago, and his business, as you
may guess from his name, was repairing
high steeples, upon which no one else
could go. No steeple was so tottering
that Jack would not mount it; and this is
how he did it: He just put up his kite
and managed to catch the cord on the top
of the steeple, then Jack-whO was 1.-THE
and thin-would climb this tiny rope, seat
himself on the top, and do his work. His
tory does not state how he got down from
his airv perch.
IL Is not necessary to tell our city boys
anything about Chinese kites, since the
Pacific Railroad brings US so many of
them that every other boy has one; but
the country boy may like to know that
they are as unlike the American kite as
In the first place they have no
tails. In the second place they are of the
most fsntastic shapes and gorgeous colors.
They are made and painted to represent
fishes, owls, dogs, dragons, cats, rOosters,
and funny little men, and, though they
lre not artistic, they can be recognized.
They are made of thick paper laid over
split bamboo sticks, and it looks funny
enough to see these grotesque Oriental
toys sailing over our sober American
towns.
The flying of kites is as much nation
Il game in China as baseball is in Ameri-
"a. 1t is not mere fun either, for the kite
string is prepared with pounded glass and
1ther things, so that it will cut. Then
here are match games between the kite
iyers, in which the object is to cut each
1ther's string and let the kite down. Trav-
slers tell US that the little boys run after
he fallen kite in China exactly as they do
n America, so 1 conclude that boys will
De boys" the world over.
In America, kites come down and go
nome at dark, like good children; but in .
China they have lighted lanterns hung on
hem, and fly them as late as they please
"Kite time" comes, believe, in the
1 would like to have some
me tell me who regulates the time for the
rarious games. They succeed each other
S regularly as day follows night. First
here are kites, and by the time every boy
las one, down to the baby, they suddenly
go out" and every boy has his pockets
ull of tops, lockwood and other wood,
worry, iron, and tin. Balls drive out the
OPS, and themselves disappear before mar
lies. And while l write, every boy IN the
.ity, I'm sure, is stalking over the ground
IN stilts.-Our Young Folks.