he negotiated a very
trying and dangerous landing, will be found alike interesting and
instructive. It was an ascent from the Crystal Palace, and the morning
was fair and of bright promise outwardly; but Coxwell confesses to
have disregarded a falling glass. The inflation having been progressing
satisfactorily, he retired to partake of luncheon, entirely free from
apprehensions; but while thus occupied, he was presently sought out and
summoned by a gardener, who told him that his balloon had torn away, and
was now completely out of control, dragging his men about the bushes. On
reaching the scene, the men, in great strength, were about to attempt a
more strenuous effort to drag the balloon back against the wind, which
Coxwell promptly forbade, warning them that so they would tear all to
pieces. He then commenced, as it were, to "take in a reef," by gathering
in the slack of the silk, which chiefly was catching the wind, and by
drawing in the net, mesh by mesh, until the more inflated portion of the
balloon was left snug and offering but little resistance to the gale,
when he got her dragged in a direction slanting to the wind and under
the lee of trees.

Eventually a hazardous and difficult departure was effected, Mr.
Chandler, a passenger already booked, insisting on accompanying the
aeronaut, in spite of the latter's strongest protestations. And their
first peril came quickly, in a near shave of fouling the balcony of the
North Tower, which they avoided only by a prompt discharge of sand, the
crowd cheering loudly as they saw how the crisis was avoided. The car,
adds Mr. Coxwell in his memoirs, "was apparently trailing behind the
balloon with a pendulous swing, which is not often the case... In less
than two minutes we entered the lower clouds, passing through them
quickly, and noticing that their tops, which are usually of white,
rounded conformation, were torn into shreds and crests of vapour. Above,
there was a second wild-looking stratum of another order. We could
hear, as we hastened on, the hum of the West End of London; but we were
bowling along, having little time to look about us, though some extra
sandbags were turned to good account by making a bed of them at the
bottom ends of the car, which we occupied in anticipation of a rough
landing."

As it came on to rain hard the voyagers agreed to descend, and Coxwell,
choosing open ground, succeeded in the oft-attempted endeavour to drop
his grapnel in front of