CORRESPONDENCE WITH HIS FAMILY. 155 



quarter after two, and took my last walk along the top of the 

 pound-field, from whence I could discern a long cloud of 

 London smoke, hanging to the N. and N.N.E. This appear- 

 ance, for obvious reasons, encreased my expectation ; yet I 

 came home to dinner, knowing how many were on the watch, 

 but laid my hat and surtout ready on a chair in case of an 

 alarm. At twenty minutes before three there was a cry in 

 the street that the balloon was come. We ran into the 

 orchard, where we found 20 or 30 neighbours assembled, 

 and from the green bank at the S.W. end of my house saw a 

 dark blue speck at a most prodigious height, dropping as it 

 were from the sky, and hanging amidst the regions of the 

 upper air, between the weather-cock of the tower and the top 

 of the may-pole. At first, coming towards us, it did not seem 

 to make any way ; but we soon discovered that its velocity 

 was very considerable ; for in a few minutes it was over the 

 maypole, and then over the Fox on my great parlor-chimney, 

 and in ten minutes more behind my great wall-nut tree. The 

 machine looked mostly of a dark blue colour, but sometimes 

 reflected the rays of the sun and appeared of a bright yellow. 

 With a telescope I could discern the boat, and the ropes that 

 supported it. To my eye this vast balloon appeared no bigger 

 than a large tea-urn. When we saw it first it was north of 

 Farnham, over Farnham heath — and never came, I believe, 

 on this side the Farnham road, but continued to pass on the 

 other side of Bentley, Froyle, Alton, and so for Medstead, 

 Lord Northington's at the Grange, and to y e right of Aires- 

 ford and Winton, and to Rumsey, where the aerial philo- 

 sopher came safe to the ground near the church, at about five 

 in the evening. I was wonderfully struck at first with the 

 phenomenon, and, like Milton's "belated peasant," felt my 

 heart bound with fear and joy at the same time. After a 

 while I surveyed the machine with more composure, without 

 that awe and concern for two of my fellow creatures lost, in 

 appearance, in the boundless depths of the atmosphere ! for 

 we supposed then that two were embarked in this astonishing 

 voyage. At last, seeing with what steady composure they 

 moved, I began to consider them as secure as a group of 



