BALLOON 



560 



BALLOT 



tary operations, but the captive or anchored 

 balloon. It is attached to a cable, by means 

 of which its movements are controlled, and it 

 floats above the field just high enough to make 

 clear observation possible. The great useful- 

 of balloons in such operations was further 



BASKET OF BALLOON 



The weights on the sides are sand-bags, re- 

 ferred to in the text. 



demonstrated in the War of the Nations, which 

 began in 1914; each nation used them as sta- 

 tionary observation stations, leaving them in 

 the air but a few moments at a time, then 

 hauling them down to positions of safety. 

 For most uses of observation and scouting, 

 however, aeroplanes have proved far more ef- 

 fective, for they can mount to great heights 

 with observers and move with incredible swift- 



Balloon Records. For half a century the 

 altitude record for balloon ascents was that of 

 Coxwell and Glaisher, who, in 1862, reached a 

 height of almost six miles. In the rarefied 

 upper air one of the aeronauts became uncon- 

 scious, and the other nearly so; thirteen years 

 later two men died in mid-air during ascensions 

 in France. When two German aeronauts made 

 an ascent in 1901 to a height of 35,600 feet 

 (nearly seven miles), they carried with them 



oxygen for inhaling, and so reached earth in 

 safety. Their record has not yet been broken. 

 In 1895 Salomon August Andre, a Swedish 

 scientist, attempted to reach the North Pole 

 in a balloon. Had he been successful he would 

 have established the world's record not only in 

 ballooning but in polar exploration and discov- 

 ery. However, his fate is unknown, for no 

 word ever came from the expedition (see 

 ANDRE, S. A.). 



In long-distance balloon traveling the record 

 was established in 1913, when one of the con- 

 testants for the James Gordon Bennett cup 

 race sailed from Stuttgart, Germany, to the 

 neighborhood of Moscow, a distance of 1,361% 

 miles. Every year competitions for this cup 

 are held, the race starting in the country 

 which won the cup the year before. Air-navi- 

 gation by means of balloons has thus become a 

 sport rather than a serious pursuit, and it seems 

 unlikely that new uses for unguided balloons 

 will ever be evolved. C.H.H. 



BALLOT, bal' ut, a device employed for the 

 expression of preferences in secret voting. The 

 word is derived from the French ballotte, mean- 

 ing a little ball; voting by ballot takes its 

 name from the ancient custom of using colored 

 balls in secret voting. Even to-day applicants 

 for membership in clubs, lodges, etc., are voted 

 on by means of balls, and a person rejected is 

 said to be blackballed. Debating and literary- 

 societies and similar organizations usually elect 

 their officers by writing names of candidates 

 on small slips of paper. 



The form of ballot most widely used in mod- 

 ern political elections is the written or printed 

 ticket. Such ballots were in use in nearly all 

 of the original thirteen American states when 

 the Constitution was ratified, and were adopted 

 gradually by the states that later came into the 

 Union. Certain grave defects were character- 

 istic of early methods of voting. It became the 

 general custom for the political committees of 

 the various parties to prepare and distribute 

 the ballots, and the tickets were arranged in 

 such a way that it was very difficult for a voter 

 to express individual preferences for candidates 

 outside his own party. Moreover, the voter 

 received his ballot within a few feet of the 

 polls, and coercion and bribery were common. 



To correct these evils, the adoption of the 

 Australian ballot system was seriously urged 

 about 1885 (for details see AUSTRALIAN BALLOT). 

 This system, which provides for an official 

 printed ballot supplied by state or local author- 

 ities and insures the voter absolute secrecy in his 



