Andrée’s Cooking-stove 
to him that coiling down his drag-ropes outside 
the balloon shed, as he was compelled to do, 
owing to the ground being covered with rocks, 
was a very weak point. 
I understand that when the start was made 
early in the next year the front of the shed was 
pulled out, and the drag-ropes in some way or 
other fouled in the débris, as I imagined might 
be the case. This brought the balloon down 
almost into the water, to avoid which Andrée was 
compelled to free one set of his drag-ropes in 
order to loose the balloon. He would then, with 
at least a ton less to lift, have shot into the air 
some thousands of feet high. He would not 
open his valves to approach the surface again, 
for it was important that he should reserve his 
supply of gas, trusting to the natural escape 
from diffusion to accomplish this object. When 
last seen he was travelling due north, but at a 
great height. Now, to soliloquize as to what 
happened to him. My idea is that he remained, 
so long as he could travel, in this satisfactory 
direction. He would have put out his spare set 
of drag-ropes so soon as possible, in order that 
the weight of them should, on reaching the ice, 
ease his descent owing to waste of gas. I think 
that these ropes may have proved his undoing; 
they probably got caught up in a crevasse, acting 
as an anchor. If the wind had been blowing 
fresh to strong the balloon would inevitably 
167 
