s and enclosures are lost sight
of. I can compare it to nothing else than floating over dark blue and
boundless sea spangled with hundreds of thousands of stars. These stars
were the lamps. We could see them stretching over the river at the
bridges, edging its banks, forming squares and long parallel lines of
light in the streets and solitary parks. Further and further apart until
they were altogether lost in the suburbs. The effect was bewildering."

At 7,000 feet, one of the passengers, sitting in the ring, remarked that
the balloon was getting very tense, and the order was given to "ease
her" by opening the top valve. The valve line was accordingly pulled,
"and immediately afterwards we heard a noise similar to the escape
of steam in a locomotive, and the lower part of the balloon collapsed
rapidly, and appeared to fly up into the upper portion. At the same
instant the balloon began to fall with appalling velocity, the immense
mass of loose silk surging and rustling frightfully over our heads....
retreating up away from us more and more into the head of the balloon.
The suggestion was made to throw everything over that might lighten the
balloon. I had two sandbags in my lap, which were cast away directly....
There were several large bags of ballast, and some bottles of wine, and
these were instantly thrown away, but no effect was perceptible. The
wind still appeared to be rushing up past us at a fearful rate, and,
to add to the horror, we came among the still expiring discharge of
the fireworks which floated in the air, so that little bits of exploded
cases and touch-paper, still incandescent, attached themselves to the
cordage of the balloon and were blown into sparks.... I presume we
must have been upwards of a mile from the earth.... How long we were
descending I have not the slightest idea, but two minutes must have
been the outside.... We now saw the houses, the roofs of which appeared
advancing to meet us, and the next instant, as we dashed by their
summits, the words, 'Hold hard!' burst simultaneously from all the
party.... We were all directly thrown out of the car along the ground,
and, incomprehensible as it now appears to me, nobody was seriously
hurt."

But "not so incomprehensible, after all," will be the verdict of all
who compare the above narrative with the ascents given in a foregoing
account of how Wise had fared more than once when his balloon had burst.
For, as will be readily guessed, the balloo