450 ANNUAL RECORD OF SCIENCE AND INDUSTRY. 



o-reater part of the aeronauts content themselves with send- 

 ing some account of their voyages to the local press ; but 

 such accounts, however brilliant they may be in a literary 

 point of view, are of little use to meteorological studies. 

 The French Society for the Promotion of Aerial Investiga- 

 tion has consequently requested all the aeronauts of that 

 country to send to it, as the central bureau, careful accounts 

 of the voyages made by the aeronauts, giving the baro- 

 metric heights, the direction and velocity of the winds and 

 clouds as well as of the balloon, the temperatures, and, if 

 possible, the hygrometric conditions. By thus centralizing 

 the observations, it is believed that a great service will be 

 rendered to meteorology. And similarly it is earnestly to 

 be desired that the aeronauts of America, both professional 

 and amateur, would communicate to some central body 

 than which none can be more appropriate than the Army 

 Weather Bureau the exact results of their various ascen- 

 sions. 



RECENT PROGRESS OF AERONAUTICS. 



In reviewing the recent progress of aeronautics, Villeneuve 

 recently stated that Henry Giftard, who constructed the first 

 steam aerostat, had, in the course of his studies, been led to 

 invent the injector, which is known under his name, and 

 which has given to him both a reputation and fortune, wdiich 

 he richly merited. Paul Bert, in studying the influence of 

 barometric pressure upon animal life, was led to a process 

 for the preservation of the bouquet and the flavor of wine. 

 Of the great number of aerial voyages that have been made 

 of late, those especially worthy of mention as having for their 

 object the improvement of aeronautics, or the application of 

 the balloon to the study of meteorology, physiology, spectro- 

 scopy, etc., are the following : First, that undertaken on the 

 22d of March by Croce-Spinelli and Sivel. These two brave 

 aeronauts ascended to the height of 24,000 feet a height which 

 had never been attained before in France. At this altitude, 

 Spinelli was able to study spectroscopically the composition of 

 the atmosphere of the sun. In the United States, Mr. S. A. 

 King has made some very long voyages in pursuance of mete- 

 orologfical studies. M. Durnof and his wife ascended from 

 Calais on a day of public festival, and Avere caught by a wind 



