vel
dirigible balloon, cylindrical in shape, with conical ends, 83 feet long
by 12 feet in diameter, holding 6,500 cubic feet of gas, and having a
small compensating balloon of 880 cubic feet capacity. For a net was
substituted a simple contrivance, consisting of two side pockets,
running the length of the balloon, and containing battens of wood, to
which were affixed the suspension cords, bands being also sewn over the
upper part of the balloon connecting the two pockets. The most important
novelty, however, was the introduction of a small petroleum motor
similar to those used for motor tricycles.

The inventor ascended in this balloon, inflated with pure hydrogen, from
the Jardin d'Acclimatation, Paris, and circled several times round the
large captive balloon in the Gardens, after which, moving towards the
Bois de Boulogne, he made several sweeps of 100 yards radius. Then the
pump of the compensator caused the engine to stop, and the machine,
partially collapsing, fell to the ground. Santos Dumont was somewhat
shaken, but announced his intention of making other trials. In this bold
and successful attempt there was clear indication of a fresh phase in
the construction of the airship, consisting in the happy adoption of the
modern type of petroleum motor. Two other hying machines were heard of
about this date, one by Professor Giampietre, of Pavia, cigar-shaped,
driven by screws, and rigged with masts and sails. The other, which had
been constructed and tested in strict privacy, was the invention of
a French engineer, M. Ader, and was imagined to imitate the essential
structure of a bird. Two steam motors of 20-horse power supplied
the power. It was started by being run on the ground on small wheels
attached to it, and it was claimed that before a breakdown occurred the
machine had actually raised itself into the air.

Of Santos Dumont the world was presently to know more, and the same
must be said of another inventor, Dr. Barton, of Beckenham, who
shortly completed an airship model carrying aeroplanes and operated by
clockwork. In an early experiment this model travelled four miles in
twenty-three minutes.

But another airship, a true leviathan, had been growing into stately and
graceful proportions on the shores of the Bodenzee in Wurtemberg, and
was already on the eve of completion. Count Zeppelin, a lieut.-general
in the German Army, who had seen service in the Franco-German War, had
for some years devoted his f