14 EXPERIMENTS IN AERODYNAMICS. 



to consequences which may appear almost paradoxical, such as that in horizontal 

 frictionless flight, the greater the speed, the less the- power required to maintain it. 

 I do not mean that this illustration as here given, otters a satisfactory demonstration 

 of this last consequence, but that any one who has really always possessed the 

 idea that the experiment suggests, in its full import, must have been inclined to 

 admit the possibility that machine flight grows more and more economical of 

 power as higher speeds are attained — and this is not self-evident. 



This preliminary apparatus can indeed, with little modification, be used to 

 demonstrate this fact, but it is actually presented here, it will be noticed, not as 

 demonstrative, but as illustrative, of the possibility suggested ; a possibility whose 

 fundamental importance justifies, and indeed demands, the fullest demonstration, 

 which can be better supplied by apparatus designed to give data of precision for 

 computing the actual work done in flight at different speeds; data which will be 

 furnished here subsequently from quite other experiments. 



