Year: 1874

bags of ballast, too, must have fallen
like stones. The final thing I remember
during cur descent was drolI enough.
Just before the balloon left the Pre-
dOrsay, my dear, kind brother had
thrown over my shoulders a light pale
tot, observing, with q laugh, that I
might feel it rather cold mp there. -
donned this garment as we ascended.
and I remember saying as We came
laundering down, "Charley's coat will
be torn to ribbons" So much for nano-
ramic effects when the jaws of death
seemed to be yawning for us. To the
possession OF what is ordinarily termed
"presence of mind" on the occasion. I
disdainfully decline to lay claim. What
did in the matter of the grapnel and
the ballast was done mechanically and
wellnigh unconsciously and was des-
perately and mortally terrified. A few
days after the accident I mot the aero
naut's assistant, and I had the curiosity
to sound him as to my deueanor during
the fall.


"Sir, " he very candidly replied, 'fyou
kept your mouth wide open, and you
were as blue as your breaches"


I had been clad at the time in light
summer attire. And you ?" I con
tinued.


"WelI out of it." quoth the aero
naut's assistant, who was seemingly q
philosopher and so went his way.


MeanWhile-the term is wellniCh in
appropriate, since there was scarcely
any "while" to he mean''-the aero
naut, who looked like sailor, had not
lost his presence of mind, and had not
been idle. He saw at a glance, this
brave little old man-althoUgh he had
been forgetful in the matter of the slip
knotted handkerchief-whe our sin
gle chance of safety lay. He jumped
up into the shrouds of the balloon. cut
the cords which attached the neck of
the machine to the hoop, and away to
the very top of the netting few the
whole Of the exhausted silk body of the
sausage. Then it formed a cupoIa of
the approved umbrella pattern-it form
ed a parachute It steadied Instantly.
There was no collapse, and down we
came swiftly, but easily, in q slanting
direction, alighting among the cabbages
in market-gaTden,F Fulham fields. The
car struck the elastic earth with vio-
lence, and rebounded, clearing q hedge.
a distance of some twenty feet. Then
the silk, and the netting, and the hoop,
and the car itself. fell atop of us among
the cabbages. We were dragged forth
from the ruins of the sausage, only to
be hustled aud robbed of all the money
in our pockets by a ruffianly crew of
working gmarket-gardeners and the pro-
prietor of the light cart, who consented
TO drive me from Fulham to KensiDgton
Gore, demanded a guiDea rs his fare, on
the ground that "balloOns didn't fall
every day." He was far from compli-
mentary, too, about the accident itself.
remarking ironically that this "wos
cum of carryin' up a lot of dogs and
monkeys" This Ingenious but mercen-
ary person had mistaken our wind bag
dragons and fishes swGliug through the
air, when we assembled, for living an
imals.


I viii omit any account of the con-
gratulations which were induIged in on
our return to Gore house yet I cannot
conclude this paper without noting a
pregnant but somewhat strongly-worded
remark made by the little old aeronaut.
While everybody was grasping his
hands, and paying him welI-deserved
compliments on his intrepidity, he sud
denly drew on one side, folded his arms,
and sternly inquired, "Who the -
will say now that you can't come down
in a parachute?" The manner of put
ting the query was irreverent, but the
matter thereof was cogent. Three and
twenty years after the event have mar
rated, find myself forcibly imbued
with the conviction that it is possible to
descend in safety from any height by
means of a paracL ute, but that there
are ten thousand chances to one against
the man who tries the venture surviving
to tell the tale. And please to remem-
Der that I had no intention of coming
down in a parachute. I contracted to
come down in a sausage balloon but
will do the inventor the Justice to men
ton that he never asked me for my
share of the expenses.