closed in, and still the
silken ball pursued its course. So long as lights were burning in the
towns and villages which it passed in rapid succession, the solitary
voyagers looked down on the scene with delight; sometimes they could
even catch the hum of the yet busy multitude, or the bark of a
watch-dog; but midnight came, and the world was hushed in sleep.

As soon as the people were again stirring below, the guide-rope was
hauled into the balloon, and the grappling-iron lowered; and after
sundry difficulties from the danger of getting entangled in a wood, and
grievously affrighting two ladies, who stood awhile petrified with
amazement at the unusual apparition, the voyagers succeeded in alighting
in a grassy valley, about six miles from the town of Weilburg, in the
Duchy of Nassau. Here every attention and accommodation was afforded
them, and thus ended this remarkable journey, an extent of about five
hundred British miles having been passed over in the space of eighteen
hours.

AN ADVENTURE OF PAUL JONES.

John Paul Jones was a famous naval commander in the service of the
United States, during the revolutionary war. He was a native of
Scotland, but having come to Virginia and settled before the war broke
out, he joined the patriots as soon as hostilities commenced, and
rendered the most important services through the whole of the long and
arduous contest, by which our independence was acquired.

The following account of one of his adventures is given by his
biographer.

Eager to retaliate upon Britain for some predatory exploits of her
sailors on the American coast, and exasperated by the resolution which
the English government had taken, to treat all the supporters of
independence as traitors and rebels, Captain Paul Jones entered the
Irish Channel, and approaching his native shores, not as a friend, but
as a determined enemy. On the night of the 22d of April, 1778, he came
to anchor in the Solway Firth, almost within sight of the trees which
sheltered the house in which he first drew the breath of life.

Early next morning, he rowed for the English coast, at the head of
thirty-one volunteers, in two boats, with the intention of destroying
the shipping, about two hundred sail, which lay in the harbor of
Whitehaven.

In this daring attempt he would probably have succeeded without
difficulty, had not the strength of the opposing tide retarded his
progress so much, that day began to dawn before he co