The herald and news. [volume] (Newberry S.C.) 1903-1937, 1907-11-12

~dlU luo 11e144S OoS' AO14AAAS VAN -
sing taut. Then my feet were gent
ly swung off the earth, and without
the slightest jerk I found myself IN
midair. The band was playing, people
were yelling and waving their hands,
all their faces turned upward, and 1t
seemed that I was hanging station
ary couple Of hundred feet above
them. Then they began to get small
Ter without seeming to move further
away. The race track looked like
somebody's small back yard and the
main fairbuilding like hen-house.
Smaller and smaller they became
and knew although there was scarce
" anv sensation of motion thatsl
must be going nearly straight upward
at an immense rate Of speed.
Where was that sick ''unsettled
inside" feeling one always expert
ences in elevators, and which I had
imagined was going to partially spoil
the fun? It was absolutely absent.
There was no dizziness, scarcely any
feeling of movement, except an lnde-
scribable floating in the mist Of a
perfect calm. But things below kept
getting smaller and smaller, and the
distance T could see in every diree-
ton began to widen proportionally.
The entire lanseape seemed composed
of little geometric splotcha7 OF color,
all of either shades. The liver SEEM
ed a strip Of heavy FURNISHED cop
per wire, stretching away to hazy in
finity in both directions. Houses,
mills, whole solid blocks Of buildings
in Augusta, looked like chlldren's
playthings.
A Beautiful World.
What a beautiful world! But by
some peculiar mental freak l seemed
in those three or four minutes to
have lost ny identity with the scene
below. .Hne houses I saw were really
TOYS. The river was but a strip OF
shining wi1e, the fields no more than
SQUARES Of boundless checker-board.
Why, it wasn't even so real as that'
it was a picture, painted panorama,
kindergarten landscape. [ wasn't
hign in the air at all, I was in anoth-
er world that had no position IN
space, either high or low, relative to
the little picture that looked 50 pref
ty and unreal. I did mot feel the
dizziness that often comes with
height because I had absolutely lost
the mental conception Of height.
In this dream I had forgotten all
about Broadwick. the balloon, the
fairgrounds, myself, everything. But
when T heard his revolver pop once
and then g. second time recollected
that he had told me he would signal
in that way the time when | reached
a sufficient altitude to begin looking
for a place to make the parachute
drop.
Of course, the spell once broken, l
came back to reality with a rush,
took a firmer grip on the ropes,
squinted upward at the ballon, and
with this sudden relaxation Of my
forgotten position came the first and
only moment Of fright I experienced
during the entire trip. In second 1t
had passed.
The air at that altitude is absolute
" pure, and just sufficiently rare to be
exhilirating. The sky is bluer be-
cause it is seen undimmed by the dust
that hovers just above the earth and
obscures ordinary vision. This same
dust gave to the circle Of the horizon
border Of gorgeous color, which
ehaneed to brilliant flame at the
point where the sun was dropping to-
ward the hills.
But Broadwiek, on whose Judg'
ment and equipment I had rlsked my
neck, had given MS signal, and it was
time to "cut,' that is to part com
pany from the balloon and trust te
luck and the parachute.
| I felt a decided hesitancy IN com
plying with this part of the program
Ny teacher had told me the chute wa:
; rugged to drop three hundred feet Ike
> a bullet before opening. That wor
RED me some. But I got good SrlI
on the parachute ring above my head
settled into the little trapeze seat, ant
jerked.
Loose From the Balloon.
= The bottom seemed to drop out O.
: everything. For less than a Fraction