第31章 CHAPTER VIII. JOHN WISE--THE AMERICAN AERONAUT.(4)

It is not a little remarkable that this pioneer of aeronautics in American--a contemporary of Charles Green in England, but working and investigating single-handed on perfectly independent lines--should have arrived at the same conclusions as did Green himself as to the possibility, which, in his opinion, amounted to a certainty, of being able to cross the Atlantic by balloon if only adequate funds were forth-coming.

So intent was he on his bold scheme that, in the summer of 1843, he handed to the Lancaster Intelligencer a proclamation, which he desired might be conveyed to all publishers of newspapers on the globe. It contained, among other clauses, the following:--

"Having from a long experience in aeronautics been convinced that a constant and regular current of air is blowing at all times from west to east, with a velocity of from twenty to forty and even sixty miles per hour, according to its height from the earth, and having discovered a composition which renders silk or muslin impervious to hydrogen gas, so that a balloon may be kept afloat for many weeks, I feel confident with these advantages that a trip across the Atlantic will not be attended with as much real danger as by the common mode of transition. The balloon is to be 100 feet in diameter, giving it a net ascending power of 25,000 lbs." It was further stated that the crew would consist of three persons, including a sea navigator, and a scientific landsman. The specifications for the transatlantic vessel were also to include a seaworthy boat in place of the ordinary car. The sum requisite for this enterprise was, at the time, not realised; but it should be mentioned that several years later a sufficient sum of money was actually subscribed. In the summer of 1873 the proprietors of the New York Daily Graphic provided for the construction of a balloon of no less than 400,000 cubic feet capacity, and calculated to lift 14,000 lbs. It was, however, made of bad material; and, becoming torn in inflation, Wise condemned and declined to use it. A few months later, when it had been repaired, one Donaldson and two other adventurers, attempting a voyage with this ill-formed monster, ascended from New York, and were fortunate in coming down safely, though not without peril, somewhere in Connecticut.

Failing in his grand endeavour, Wise continued to follow the career of a professional aeronaut for some years longer, of which he has left a full record, terminating with the spring of 1848. His ascents were always marked by carefulness of detail, and a coolness and courage in trying circumstances that secured him uniform success and universal regard. He was, moreover, always a close and intelligent observer, and many of his memoranda are of scientific value.

His description of an encounter with a storm-cloud in the June of 1843 has an interest of its own, and may not be considered overdrawn. It was an ascent from Carlisle, Pa., to celebrate the anniversary of Bunker's Hill, and Wise was anxious to gratify the large concourse of people assembled, and thus was tempted, soon after leaving the ground, to dive up into a huge black cloud of peculiarly forbidding aspect. This cloud appeared to remain stationary while he swept beneath it, and, having reached its central position, he observed that its under surface was concave towards the earth, and at that moment he became swept upwards in a vortex that set his balloon spinning and swinging violently, while he himself was afflicted with violent nausea and a feeling of suffocation. The cold experienced now became intense, and the cordage became glazed with ice, yet this had no effect in checking the upward whirling of the balloon. Sunshine was beyond the upper limits of the cloud; but this was no sooner reached than the balloon, escaping from the uprush, plunged down several hundred feet, only to be whirled up again, and this reciprocal motion was repeated eight or ten times during an interval of twenty minutes, in all of which time no expenditure of gas or discharge of ballast enabled the aeronaut to regain any control over his vessel.

Statements concerning a thunderstorm witnessed at short range by Wise will compare with other accounts. The thunder "rattled" without any reverberations, and when the storm was passing, and some dense clouds moving in the upper currents, the "surface of the lower stratum swelled up suddenly like a boiling cauldron, which was immediately followed by the most brilliant ebullition of sparkling coruscations." Green, in his stormy ascent from Newbury, England, witnessed a thunderstorm below him, as will be remembered, while an upper cloud stratum lay at his own level. It was then that Green observed that "at every discharge of thunder all the detached pillars of clouds within the distance of a mile around became attracted."

The author will have occasion, in due place, to give personal experiences of an encounter with a thunderstorm which will compare with the foregoing description.