he mean time, we are not informed! Leaving Jupiter, they
"coast" along the planet Mars, and finally reach the earth, where they
resolve to disembark. Accordingly "ils passerent sur la queue de la
comete; et trouvant une aurore boreale toute prete, ils se mirent
dedans, et arriverent a terre sur le bord septentrional de la Mer
Baltique"![4]

The vehicle, however, has not formed the sole obstacle to those
projectors:--the _viaticum_, especially the food, has been a
difficulty not readily got over. Before Bishop Wilkins alludes to his
flying chariot, he remarks, that even if men could fly, the swiftest
of them would probably be half a year in reaching the end of his
journey; and hence a problem would arise, "how it were possible to
tarry so long without sleep or diet?" Of the former obstacle, however,
he quickly disposes,--"seeing we do not then spend ourselves in any
labour, we shall not, it may be, _need_ the refreshment of sleep:
but if we do, we cannot desire a softer bed than the air, where we may
repose ourselves firmly and safely as in our chambers"! Of the latter
he finds somewhat more difficulty in disposing,--"and here it is
considerable, that, since our bodies will then be devoid of gravity
and other impediments of motion, we shall not at all spend ourselves
in any labour, and so, consequently, not much need the reparation of
diet, but may perhaps live altogether without it, as those creatures
have done, who, by reason of their sleeping for many days together,
have not spent any spirits, and so not wanted any food; which is
commonly related of serpents, crocodiles, bears, cuckoos, swallows,
and such like. To this purpose, Mendoca reckons up divers strange
relations, as that of Epimenides, who is storied to have slept
seventy-five years; and another of a rustic in Germany, who, being
accidentally covered with a hay-rick, slept there for all the autumn
and the winter following, without any nourishment Or, if we must needs
feed upon something else, why may not smells nourish us? Plutarch, and
Pliny, and divers other ancients, tell us of a nation in India, that
lived only upon pleasing odours; and it is the common opinion of
physicians, that these do strangely both strengthen and repair the
spirits. Hence was it that Democritus was able, for divers days
together, to feed himself with the mere smell of hot bread.[5] Or, if
it be necessary that our stomachs must receive the food, why then it
is not impossible that th