The daily morning journal and courier., 1905-11-28

the rider is hurled through space to 9 t:apeze some dis. ance aWay and fifty fe-L higher. FaiI-re to ca;en the tra- peze means certain death.
 AnothEr stactli;lS application of the same principle is made n an open air Der, or .uance which has been gym many times in America, England and Germany. Tle inc. .ined track IS erect ed on Ine shore of a lake OF river and is two hundred feel long. The s,aE,- ing platform is a hundred feet, the top of the upward curve about forty feet above the ground. When the bilyclisl rides off the end of the curve jnto space he lets go his machine and dives into the aer. This frightful plunge terrifes the spectators, but the real danger is that of being struck and killed by the bicycle, fale which 0e- fell James Fleet in Chicago.
 An acrobat named Thompson makes still more perilous plnge with the aid of simpler apparatus, leaping from the top of a very long vertical ladder into a tank some distance away, which measures only forty feet in length by eight feet in width. 4 slight error in making the leap would bring him to the ground instead of the tank.
 The automobile, the queen of sport, shares with the bicycle the glory of these dangerous exhibitions. One of the latest developments is the mon- strosity called the automobile, which is making fame and fortune foi Mile. du Tiers.
 Another young woman has been less abruptly terminated the exhibition of fortunate, for a terrible accident has the aptly named 'whirlwind of death" in which she appeared recently at Paris music hall. In this act the au- tomobile, after running down an in clined plane and up short curve, was projected into space in a nearly level position, like the bicycle of the human arrow. But when the vehicle had reached the highest point of its trajec- tory it was caused, by an ingenious combination of springs and levers, to turn a complete somersault. after which it continued it's flight to the re- ceiving platform, forty feet distant from the point where it had left the 1lISL SSCIlOu OL LllS SOuIsS'
 The act was particularly thrilling be- cause the vehicle, at the moment of the somersault, appeared to stop in it's onward flight and consequently to be in imminent danger of falling to the floor, twenty feet below This illusion
 was due to the very low position of the center of gravity, which caused the inverted body of the woman to move backward at that instant, faster than the center was moving forward. i What is the incentive which impels these men and women to risk their lives nightly before crowds of specta- tors? Is it ambition, vanity, love of applause, or simply the hope of mak- ing a fortune? The American Hoop the loop" was conceived in an essen- tially practical spirit, and 'Diavolo :" who received six hundred dollars a night, has becume a rich man. Mile. Dutrieu, ''the human arrow" earns eighty thousand dollars year, Me phisto" received one hundred and for- ty dollars, Mile, de Tiers two hundred dollars night in Paris and larger sums abroad. Imitators, of course, re- ceive less than originators. The cur- rent pay for looping the loop is from twenty dollars to forty dollars a night, which is not high, especnally if the performer owns the apparatus, which costs at least five hundred dollars.
 It seems, therefore, that the hope of gain is not the only incentive, but that 1 the performer, like the public. is att ! tracted by the very danger of the act a curious illustration of the fascina- i tion exerted by emotions which in themselves are disagreeable.