d the right
wing was lower than the left and struck first. The time of this flight
was fifteen seconds and the distance over the ground a little over 200
feet.

Wilbur started the fourth and last flight at just 12 o'clock. The first
few hundred feet were up and down as before, but by the time three
hundred feet had been covered, the machine was under much better
control. The course for the next four or five hundred feet had but
little undulation. However, when out about eight hundred feet the
machine began pitching again, and, in one of its starts downward, struck
the ground. The distance over the ground was measured and found to be
852 feet; the time of the flight 59 seconds. The frame supporting the
front rudder was badly broken, but the main part of the machine was not
injured at all. We estimated that the machine could be put in condition
for flight again in a day or two.

While we were standing about discussing this last flight, a sudden
strong gust of wind struck the machine and began to turn it over.
Everybody made a rush for it. Wilbur, who was at one end, seized it in
front, Mr. Daniels and I, who were behind, tried to stop it by holding
to the rear uprights. All our efforts were vain. The machine rolled over
and over. Daniels, who had retained his grip, was carried along with it,
and was thrown about head over heels inside of the machine. Fortunately
he was not seriously injured, though badly bruised in falling about
against the motor, chain guides, etc. The ribs in the surfaces of the
machine were broken, the motor injured and the chain guides badly bent,
so that all possibility of further flights with it for that year were at
an end.

[Illustration]

Some Aeronautical Experiments

_By Wilbur Wright_

The difficulties which obstruct the pathway to success in flying machine
construction are of three general classes: (1) Those which relate to the
construction of the sustaining wings. (2) Those which relate to the
generation and application of the power required to drive the machine
through the air. (3) Those relating to the balancing and steering of the
machine after it is actually in flight. Of these difficulties two are
already to a certain extent solved. Men already know how to construct
wings or aeroplanes which, when driven through air at sufficient speed,
will not only sustain the weight of the wings themselves, but also that
of the engine, and of the engineer as well. Men also know how to