ero Club, of whom
one of the most prominent and energetic members is the Hon. C. S. Rolls.

It had been announced that M. Santos-Dumont would bring an air ship
to England, and during the summer of the present year would give
exhibitions of its capability. It was even rumoured that he might circle
round St. Paul's and accomplish other aerial feats unknown in England.
The promise was fulfilled so far as bringing the air ship to England was
concerned, for one of his vessels which had seen service was deposited
at the Crystal Palace. In some mysterious manner, however, never
sufficiently made clear to the public, this machine was one morning
found damaged, and M. Santos-Dumont has withdrawn from his proposed
engagements.

In thus doing he left the field open to one of our own countrymen, who,
in his first attempt at flight with an air ship of his own invention and
construction, has proved himself no unworthy rival of the wealthy young
Brazilian.

Mr. Stanley Spencer, in a very brief space of time, designed and built
completely in the workshops of the firm an elongated motor balloon, 75
feet long by 20 feet diameter, worked by a screw and petrol motor. This
motor is placed in the prow, 25 feet away from, and in front of, the
safety valve, by which precaution any danger of igniting the escaping
gas is avoided. Should, however, a collapse of the machine arise from
any cause, there is an arrangement for throwing the balloon into the
form of a parachute. Further, there is provided means for admitting air
at will into the balloon, by which the necessity for much ballast is
obviated.

Mr. Spencer having filled the balloon with pure hydrogen, made his
first trial with this machine late in an evening at the end of June.
The performance of the vessel is thus described in the Westminster
Gazette:--"The huge balloon filled slowly, so that the light was rapidly
failing when at last the doors of the big shed slid open and the ship
was brought carefully out, her motor started, and her maiden voyage
commenced. With Mr. Stanley Spencer in the car, she sailed gracefully
down the football field, wheeled round in a circle--a small circle,
too--and for perhaps a quarter of an hour sailed a tortuous course over
the heads of a small but enthusiastic crowd of spectators. The ship was
handicapped to some extent by the fact that in their anxiety to make the
trial the aeronauts had not waited to inflate it fully, but still it did
its work well,