192 THE PKOGRESS OF AERONAUTICS. 



It nuist, however, be confessed that aeronautics has not, generally 

 speaking-, been endowed and encouraged hy the power.s that 1)C as it 

 should have been in order to attract to it all the varied orders of capa- 

 bility which it demands and to furnish the resources necessary for its 

 researches and indispensalile for its experiments. Let us not deceive 

 ourselves. Some nation will ha\'e the wisdom to make a great advance 

 in this direction, and will thereby acquire a power and advantages of 

 which the results can not to-day be foreseen. Thus, in the ancient 

 world certain great minds felt beforehand the vast importance of the 

 part which the liquid element was destined to play in the relations 

 between peoples. Themistocles said, " He who .shall make himself mas- 

 ter of the sea is destined to become master of the land." This flash of 

 genius, true already e\'en then, has by this time attained such a degree 

 of truth as to be obvious. What supremacy has not our neighbor been 

 able to gain from her fleets, which dominate the seas which are tied 

 round the continents, and which are mistresses of almost all the tele- 

 graphic comiections of the globe? Now, if the ocean has given this 

 power to the nation that has been wise enough to seize it, Avhat will be 

 the power of the coming mistress of the atmosphere? The sea has its 

 limits and its frontiers; the atmosphere knows no such thing. The 

 sea offers a mere surface to the navigator; the aeronaut can protit by 

 the whole depth of the atmosphere. The sea severs the continents; 

 the air luiites everything and dominates everything. [That the sea 

 separates, while the air unites, is a proposition the sense of which may 

 easily escape the reader. The sea renders it difficult to pass, for exam- 

 ple, between an island and the mainland, and a num])er of vessels sail- 

 ing round and round the island could cut oft' any attempt to make the 

 passage. Through the air, on the other hand, there will always be a 

 path from any one point on the earth's surface to any other, and no 

 matter how vigilant a patrol were instituted there would be plenty of 

 room to pass v/ith impunity.] When that mistress, whatever nation 

 she may be, accedes, in what sense will the frontiers between one State 

 and another any longer exist, while aerial ffeets sail over them with 

 complete impunity' ? True, the day of the realization of all that seems 

 remote enough; yet it is probable, in the light of experience, that it is 

 less remote than it seems. It is quite cei'tain that come it eventually 

 will, and that man will not give over his ambition before having made 

 a complete confjuest of the atmosphere. It is the part of good sense 

 to consider l^eforehand what are destined to be the consequences of 

 that revolution upon the economic conditions of life and upon the 

 relations between nations. Let us hope that that conquest, which 

 supposes an all-powerful industry and a transcendent scitMice, will 

 come when civilization has reached such an elevation that it will recog- 

 nize justice, right, and peace as alone concordant with the welfare of 

 mankind. It may l>e that this wish is vain, ])ut at an}' rate the discov- 



