NATURE 



217 



THURSDAY, JANUARY 9, 1908. 



THE HISTORY OF AERONAUTICS. 



Hislcire de la Navigation airienne. By W. de 

 Fonvlelle. Pp. 271. (Paris : Libraire Hachette et 

 Cie., 1907.) 



THE subject of aerial navigation is steadily develop- 

 ing into one of importance. Invention in this line 

 is progressing so rapidly that the expert who wishes 

 to be up to date must perforce be busy with much 

 new literature. The work before us, by so well- 

 known an aeronaut as M. de Fonvielle, will, then, 

 be eagerly sought for. The student who expects to 

 receive full information on all the recent develop- 

 ments may, however, feel some disappointment when 

 he has looked through the book, since, out of its 

 270 pages, only some forty are devoted to the very im- 

 portant work which has been accomplished during 

 the last ten years. The rest of the book is historical, 

 throwing, no doubt, much new light on certain points, 

 but, as a whole, containing nothing of importance 

 that is not to be found in older works. 



The first chapter deals with the soap bubbles of 

 Tiberius Cavallo, a story well known to English- 

 men who have read that savant's most interesting 

 book, " The History and Practice of Aerostation," 

 which was published in London .so long ago as 1785. 

 In June, 1782, Mr. Cavallo read a paper before the 

 Royal Society in which he described how he had 

 attempted to fill a light paper bag with hydrogen, in 

 order to make it float in the air, but found it impos- 

 sible to retain the "inflammable air," and how he 

 then managed to blow out soap bubbles with hydrogen 

 which rose in the air. In the following year both 

 hot-air balloons and gas balloons were invented in 

 France, and the accounts of them are described by 

 M. de Fonvielle in following chapters. Elongated 

 " dirigible " balloons, worked by hand, were designed 

 very soon after the first ascents, but, of course, proved 

 of little practical use. 



The chapters on the first scientific ascents refer 

 to those of Robertson, Gay-Lussac, Barral, and 

 Green, but the better-known and more complete work 

 of Glaisher and Coxwell is not more than touched 

 upon in a following chapter. 



The chapter on " Les Ballons-sondes " contains 

 much that may be of interest to modern meteorologists, 

 since this means of studying the atmosphere is now 

 so much employed. 



Three chapters are devoted to ascents during the 

 siege of Paris, and one to aeronautical photography, 

 but perhaps the most complete and interesting ac- 

 counts in the book are those of the Lebaudy and other 

 dirigible airships. It was in November, 1902, that 

 the first free ascent was made with that vessel, which 

 has now proved itself to be the first reallv practical 

 aerial machine. Many more trials are described, in- 

 cluding one on July 24, when 98 kilometres 

 were covered; on November 12, when the airship 

 travelled 60 kilometres to Paris; and on July 3, 

 1905, when a journey of 96 kilometres was performed 

 in 3 hours 21 minutes. 



NO. 1993. VOL. 77] 



The last chapter, on the development of aerial 

 navigation, is somewhat disappointing, for after 

 referring to the Patrie and the Ville de Paris, 

 the two most recent practical airships in France, it 

 recounts shortly what has been attempted in this 

 line in other countries, but makes no reference to 

 the important experiments recently made with the 

 " heavier-than-air " type of machine. 



As a history the work is not very satisfactory, 

 since it jumps to and fro from period to period, and 

 anecdotes are frequently narrated without specifying 

 the dates. 



The book is fully illustrated, but though they in- 

 clude some reproductions of photographs of recent 

 events, by far the greater number of the illustrations 

 are from woodcuts which have already done service 

 in " Travels in the Air " (published in 1871) and other 

 older works. We must take strong objection to some 

 of these old blocks being reproduced with new titles, 

 such, for instance, as that on p. 185, entitled " Les 

 Concours de Vincennes en 1000," and that on p. 201, 

 " Ballon convert de neige .... ascension de I'A^ro 

 Club," both of which appeared in the above-named 

 book; and especially that on p. 139, " Descente de 

 Lhoste en Angleterre," which appears in "Travels in 

 the Air," p. 307, as " Descent of the Neptuiie at Cape 

 Griznez." As this picture is a landscape with cliffs 

 and a lighthouse, it cannot faithfully represent a scene 

 on the English coast as well as one on the other side 

 of the Channel ! 



TREATMENT OF HOME-WOODS. 

 The Garden Beautiful: Home-woods and Home 

 Landscape. By William Robinson. Pp. xii 4- 170. 

 (London : John Murray, 1907.) Price ys. 6d. net. 



THE author's expressed object in writing this book 

 was to induce people fortunate enough to possess 

 woodlands to make them attractive and accessible. 

 Having already written the " English Flower 

 Garden " and the " Wild Garden," he is careful in 

 this case to point out that just as in the latter book 

 his purpose was not to destroy the flower garden, so 

 in the present instance the arguments in favour of 

 beautifying the home-woods are intended to persuade 

 proprietors " after thought of the needs of a true 

 garden, to think more of their woods from aesthetic 

 and other points of view." 



We are quite in sympathy with Mr. Robinson when 

 he states that there are hundreds of acres of beautiful 

 woods in his district never seen by anyone but the 

 gamekeeper. Yet how delightful the effects that may 

 be obtained by opening up such woods, in a manner 

 that paths are made available for foot visitors at all 

 seasons of the year ! On most estates no such thing 

 is done, but we have in our mind several instances 

 that afford striking testimony to the deprivations 

 voluntarily or ignorantly suffered by those who main- 

 tain the woodlands as a closed book, so to speak, to 

 all but sportsmen. One of these is at Keele Hall, in 

 Staffordshire, the present residence of the Grand Duke 

 Michael of Russia, where the woods, extending for 

 a mile or more beyond the pleasure grounds, were 



