386 : REPORT—1862, 
and it fell downwards as a stone. A fourth was thrown out at four miles on 
descending ; it flew in a circle, and shortly alighted on the top of the balloon. 
The two remaining pigeons were brought down to the ground. One was found 
to be dead; and the other, a “ carrier,’’ was still living, but would not leave 
the hand when I attempted to throw it off, till after a quarter of an hour it 
began to peck a piece of ribbon which encircled its neck, and was then jerked 
off the finger, and flew with some vigour towards Wolverhampton. One of 
the pigeons returned to Wolverhampton on Sunday the 7th, and is the only 
one that has been heard of. 
Ascent from the Crystal Palace, September 8.—The sky was for the most 
part obscured by clouds; the ascent took place at 4" 47™ 285 p.m, the tempe- 
rature on the ground being 67°; at 4" 52™ we were half a mile high, with a 
temperature of 59°, and dew-point 54°; at 4" 55™ we reached the clouds, with 
a temperature of 514°, dew-point 49°, at the height of 4300 feet ; we rose to 
4800 feet, were still in the cloud, and then fell, passing out of the cloud 
downwards at 5° 1™, with a temperature of 49°, and dew-point 46°; we de- 
scended to 3300 feet by 5" 7", where the temperature was 52°, dew-point 
50°; we then ascended and again reached the cloud at a little over.4200 feet, 
and with the same temperature as before, viz. 514°; we passed out of the 
cloud at a little over 4500 feet, into a basin, with blue sky above, and the 
sun shone beautifully ; the balloon rose quickly, and the temperature in- 
creased from 51° on leaving the cloud to 57° at a mile in height, and to 59° 
and dew-point 40° at 5400 feet; we then descended, met with the cloud 
again at 5" 25™, at the height of 5000 feet nearly, and experienced a tempe- 
rature of 51°, dew-point 45°, whilst passing through it; we left the cloud at 
4400 feet high, and the temperature rose from 51° to 61°, dew-point to 59°, 
at the height of 800 feet, and to 62° at the height of 700 feet, where we were 
at 5" 55™; at this time we were crossing the River Thames near to Graves- 
end, and we passed from bank to bank in 121 seeonds ; we then rose to nearly 
half a mile, and passed Tilbury Fort at the distance of 2 miles, and with a tele- 
scope I examined the fort, and could have drawn its plan and counted any 
guns within it. We fell at about 4 miles from the Fort, at 6" 10™ p.m. 
In this ascent Mr. W. C. Nash, of the Magnetical and Meteorological De- 
partment of the Royal Observatory, Greenwich, took the observations of the 
barometer and Daniell’s hygrometer. 
§ 3. Description oF THE TABLE OF OBSERVATIONS. 
All the meteorological observations taken during the ascents are contained 
in Table I, 
Column 1 contains the times at which the observations were made. 
Column 2 contains observations of the siphon barometer corrected for tempe- 
rature and index error. Column 3 contains the readings of the thermometer 
attached to the barometer. Column 4 contains the readings of an aneroid 
barometer. Column 5 contains the height above the level of the sea, as de- 
duced from the barometric observations in column 2, by the formula of Baily, 
checked at intervals by that of Laplace, which is as follows :— 
a ef t+¢—64 n9 2452251 
Z= tos(F) x 60159(1 nd 4.0:002837 cos L\(1 eRe a3) 
where Z is the height required, and h, h’, ¢ and?’ the height of the barometer 
corrected for temperature, and the temperature of the air at the lower and 
‘upper stations respectively, L the latitude. The temperature of the air for the 
