CRITICAL NOTICES OF NEW PUBLICATIONS. 129 



this moment ; insomuch that we can scarcely visit a nobleman or gentle- 

 man's gardens without observing very extensive improvements and altera- 

 tions proceeding in every direction. And this we cannot but regard as an 

 indication of application and attachment to rural improvements highly 

 honourable to our nobility and gentry, as superseding many of those pur- 

 suits that used to prevail to a great extent with gentlemen residing in the 

 country, which had but little tendency to the improvement of their grounds 

 or estates." — p. 145. 



We have only to add that another nobleman has followed the ex- 

 cellent example of the Duke of Bedford, in sending out his gardener 

 to foreign parts on a horticultural tour ; and that we hope to see the 

 plan, ere long, extensively adopted. 



Account of the late Aeronautical expedition from London to Weil- 

 burg, accomplished by Robert Hollond, Esq., Monck Mason, Esq., 

 and Charles Green, Aeronaut. London, 1836. 8vo., pp. 52. 



Mr. Monck Mason inscribes his account, in testimony of sincere 

 regard and friendship, to Robert Hollond, his fellow-voyager, to whose 

 liberal and enterprising spirit their expedition owed its origin and suc- 

 cess. He then states, introductively, the principal obstacles to the 

 practice of Aerostation, and their removal by the happy exercise of 

 Mr. Green's ingenuity and heroic perseverance. 



These impediments, Mr. M. says, consisted in the uncertainty and 

 expense attending the process of inflation of the balloon with hydro- 

 gen gas ; the dangers considered inseparable from the practice of 

 aerial navigation ; the difficulties which hitherto had baffled all at- 

 tempts to give a direction to the machine ; and the impossibility which 

 every previous aeronaut had experienced, of remaining in the air a 

 sufficient time to ensure the attainment of a sufficient distance. To 

 remove these obstacles, and to reduce the aerial vehicle to a more 

 certain issue, a vast extent of actual experience, united to an intellect 

 capable of turning it to account, was absolutely required ; and he em- 

 phatically declares that to the combination of both these high requi- 

 sites, in the person of Mr. Charles Green, we are indebted for the 

 entire results of all that is beneficial in the practice, or novel in the 

 theory, of Aerostation — the most delightful and subUme of all sub- 

 lunary enjoyments. 



The first of the fore-mentioned impediments was surmounted by 

 Mr. Green's discovery of the applicability of coal-gas to the purposes 

 of inflation. Among other important advantages gained by this dis- 

 covery, Mr. Monck Mason distinguishes the diminution of expense 

 and risk, and the superior facility wherewith the coal-gas is retained 

 in the balloon, owing to the greater subtilty of the particles of hydro- 

 gen, and the strong affinity they exhibit for those of the surrounding 

 atmosphere. In a balloon sufficiently perfect to retain its contents of 

 coal-gas unaltered in quality or amount for the space of six months, 

 an equal (piantity of hydrogen gas could not be niainiained in equal 

 purity for an equal number of weeks. 



VOL. VII.. NO. XXI. B 



