394 AND REE' S FATAL FLIGHT IN A BALLOON 



with heavy cordage, so as to enable it to resist the action of the sun. 

 An ingenious contrivance for direction motion was added. This 

 consisted of a rubber sail secured to the apex of the balloon, with 

 a rope leading to the car. In addition was a guide rope, which was 

 intended to drag on the ground or in the water, arrangements being 

 made to adjust it to different positions for 180 degrees of the cir- 

 cumference of a ring attached to the car. 



In the manufacture of the balloon three thicknesses of silk 

 were used, with varnish to bind them together and three thicknesses 

 of varnish on the outside. The gondola or car, which hung about 

 twenty-five feet below> was about five feet deep and six and a half 

 feet in diameter. It was made of wicker-work lined with varnished 

 silk, and was capacious enough to allow one of the aeronauts to 

 sleep while the others were on the alert. A lid of basket-work cov- 

 ered it, with a trapdoor in it by which the car could be entered or 

 left. While at work the men were to stand upon this lid, having a 

 large ring, waist high, to protect them. 



The cooking apparatus was ingeniously devised to prevent 

 danger of firing the inflammable gas of the balloon. It was done 

 in a copper cylinder let down from the car, an alcohol lamp sup- 

 plying the heat. This could be lighted by a mechanism in the car 

 and blown out by means of a rubber tube, while a reflecting glass 

 enabled the cook to see if it was burning. 



The guiding and steering apparatus represented the best means 

 that could be devised for this purpose before the advent of the 

 dirigible air-ship. The guiding ropes were of different lengths, the 

 shortest measuring about one thousand feet and the longest about 

 twelve hundred. These were intended to hang from a bearing-ring 

 just outside the car, and, when the balloon was not too high, to drag 

 on the ice or the ground. Experiments with this device in July, 

 1895, showed that when the rope was attached to the central 

 eyelet the balloon moved in the line of the wind, but when attached 

 to one or the other side its course was changed by a considerable 



