ends of the rods by strings. The movements
were such that when the right hand made the right wing descend in front,
the left foot made the left wing descend behind; and in like manner
the left hand in front and the right foot behind acted together
simultaneously. This diagonal action appeared very well contrived; it
was the action of most quadrupeds as well as of man when walking; but
the contrivance, like others of the same kind, failed in not being
fitted with gearing to enable the air traveller to proceed in any other
direction than that in which the wind blew him. The inventor first flew
down from a stool, then from a table, afterwards from a window, and
finally from a garret, from which he passed above the houses in the
neighbourhood, and then, moderating the working of his machine, he
descended slowly to the earth."

Tradition records that under Louis XIV. a certain rope-dancer, named
Alard, announced that on a certain day he would perform the feat of
flying in the air. We have no description of his wings. It is recorded,
however, that he set out on his adventurous flight; but he had not
calculated all the necessities of the case, and, falling to the ground,
he was dangerously hurt.

Leonardo da Vinci might have known the art of flying in the air, and
might even have practiced it. A statement to this effect, at least, is
found in several historians. We have, however, no direct proof of the
fact.

The Abbe Deforges, of Etampes, announced in the journals in 1772 that
he would perform the great feat. On the appointed day multitudes of the
curious flocked to Etampes. The abbe's machine was a sort of gondola,
seven feet long and about two feet deep. Gondola conductor, and baggage
weighed in all 213 pounds. The pious man believed that he had provided
against everything. Neither tempest nor rain should mar his flight,
and there was no chance of his being upset; whilst the machine, he had
decided, was to go at the rate of thirty leagues an hour.

The great day came, and the abbe, entering his air-boat amidst the
applause of the spectators, began to work the wings with which it was
provided with great rapidity. "But," says one who witnessed the feat,
"the more he worked, the more his machine cleaved to the earth, as if it
were part and parcel of it."

Retif de la Bretonne, in his work upon this subject, gives the
accompanying picture of a flying man, furnished with very artistically
designed wings, fitting exactly to