SCIENCE AND INVENTION 233 



made in man's mastery of his environment. These 

 are associated with the names of Marconi, Becquerel, 

 and Langley. It was in this year that the last-named, 

 long known to the scientific world for his discoveries 

 in solar physics, demonstrated in the judgment of 

 competent witnesses the practicability of mechanical 

 flight. This was the result of nine years 1 experimen- 

 tation. It was followed by several more years of 

 fruitful investigation, leading to that ultimate tri- 

 umph which it was given to Samuel Pierpont Lang- 

 ley to see only with the eye of faith. 



The English language has need of a new word 

 (" plane") to signify the floating of a bird upon the 

 wing with slight, or no, apparent motion of the 

 wings (planer, schweberi). To hover has other con- 

 notations, while to soar is properly to fly upward, 

 and not to hang poised upon the air. The miracle of 

 a bird's flight, that steady and almost effortless mo- 

 tion, had interested Langley intensely as had also 

 the sun's radiation from the years of his childhood. 

 The phenomenon (the way of an eagle in the air) 

 has always, indeed, fascinated the human imagina- 

 tion and at the same time baffled the comprehension. 

 The skater on smooth ice, the ship riding at sea, 

 or even the fish floating in water, offers only an 

 incomplete analogy ; for the fish has approximately 

 the same weight as the water it displaces, while a 

 turkey buzzard of two or three pounds' weight will 

 circle by the half-hour on motionless wing upheld 

 only by the thin medium of the air. 



In 1887, prior to his removal to Washington as 

 Secretary of the Smithsonian Institution, Langley 

 began his experiments in aerodynamics at the old 



