THE TRIUMPH OF THE AEROPLANE 



ALTHOUGH the dirigible baUoon in the hands 

 of Santos-Dumont gained a decisive victory 

 over all mechanical methods of flight there- 

 tofore discovered, even the inventor himself considered 

 it rather as a means to an end, than the end itself. That 

 end, it would seem, must be a flying-machine, many 

 times heavier than the atmosphere, but able by mechan- 

 ical means to lift and propel itself through the air. 

 The natural representative of this kind of flying-ma- 

 chine, the bird, is something like a thousand times as 

 heavy as the air which its bulk displaces. The balloon, 

 on the other hand, with its equipments and occupants, 

 must necessarily be lighter than air; and as the ordi- 

 nary gas used for inflating is only about seven times 

 lighter than the atmosphere, it can be readily under- 

 stood that for a balloon to acquire any great amount of 

 lifting power it must be of enormous proportions. 

 To attempt to force this great, fragile bulk of light 

 material through the atmosphere at any great rate of 

 speed is obviously impossible on account of the resist- 

 ance offered by its surfaces. On the other hand, any 

 such structure strong enough to resist the enormous 

 pressure at high speed would be too heavy to float. 

 These facts are so patent that it is but natural to 

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