Year: 1873

pense, corruption and discord to our existing
party trials and conflicts of factions and races.
Let President Grant be admonished that if
the taxpayers were not prepared for ST.
Domingo they are not yet sufficiently relieved
of their burdens from the war to run the risks
of another slice from Mexico.'


Navigation Of the Air-The Proposed


Balloon Voyage Across the Atlantic.


The proposal of Professor Wise to cross
the Atlantic in . balloon revives the long
mooted question of the practicability of aerial
navigation. One element-water- been
brought into tolerable subjection for safe and
experiment. is to be made to control the air for
the same purpose. sudden fit of economy
on the part Of the Boston City Fathers, after
the last fire, prevented the protector Of the
transatlantic balloon from carrying his enter
prise into effect. He accordingly appeals to
His opinion, expressed in an interview which
we publish to-day, is that an easterly current
prevails in the upper atmosphere of sufficient
force to carry balloon not only across the ocean,
but even around the globe. He says that
sailing in the air will have to be learned just
as was the navigation Of the sea-" 1t is GER
tain that such a mode Of transoceanic travel
can only be tested by actual experiment, and
plausible reasons are given to prove its pacti-
cability. It should be of sufficient interest,
therefore. to our capitalists to induce them to
assist in the building and equipment Of an air
ship suitable for the purpose. A great deal of
money is expended in experiments which pre-
sent less chances Of success than the one in
question. A committee might be appointed
of responsible citizens to raise fund necessary
to defray the expenses of the proposed voyage
and to see that the protector carries out his
promises Of penetrating that silent sea"
which overhangs the stormy waters Of the
North Atlantic.


Our knowledge Of this upper aerial ocean
may be very briefly stated. Setting out from
the equatorial parallels towards either pole,
there unquestionably exists very decided air
movement far above the sea level. On the LIST
Of May, 1912, the island Of Barbados was
suddenly obscured by dense cloud and its
surface quickly covered by shower Of ashes
from an eruptive volcano, and this proved to
be the volcano of st. Vincent, more than
hundred miles to the westward
As the northeast trade wind had been long
and steadily blowing at Barbados in
full force it was clear that the erupted ashes
shot from the seething crater above the mov-
ing surface sheet Of the trade wind, had en-
countered an aerial river rushing in the oppo-
site direction. When, on the Goth of Janu-
ary, 1885, the fiery furnaces Of the volcano
Coseguina, lying in the belt Of the northeast
trade winds, belched forth their dreadful
masses Of fame, lava and ashes the latter were
borne in direction just contrary to the sur
face wind and lodged in heavy showers on the
tree tops Of Jamaica, lying eight hundred
miles to the northeastward. The return trade
wind which in both these instances trans
ported the volcanic dust in the Atlantic was
Loa, in the Sandwich Islands, at on altitude
of nearly fourteen thousand feet, in the shape
of succession Of violent and hurricane-like
southwesterly gales, extremely cold and Pro-
fessor Piazzi Smyth also observed the same
with the appendant Clouds on the Peak of
Teneriffe, sailing with great velocity fifteen
thousand feet above the ocean. 1t is also well
known that the red dust which often falls on
ships decks near the Cape Verde Islands and
in the Mediterranean has been traced by the
microscopic Ehrenberg and found to be the
silicious skeletons Of animalculm from the
clouds of South America, thus further
proving the existence of such an upper wind.
The velocity of this sublime aerial stream hos
occasionally been determined by observations
on the high cirrus clouds to reach one hundred
and twenty miles on hour; and Mr.. Glaisher,
who met it at ten thousand feet above the sea,
(and called it "true aerial Gulf Stream")
found it three thousand feet in thickness, and
moving with q velocity Of seventy or eighty
miles an hour.


These facts all countenance the Boston aero
naut in the expectation Of meeting swift and
propitious current for his voyage. But it must
be considered these are all detached and frag-
mentary observations, and prove no perma-
nent current. Professor Piazzi Smyth found
the current at times reversed on Teneriffe, and
records an instance during his short stay of
heavy northeasterly gale The most powerful
and regular currents Of the aqueous ocean arc