STORY OP EXPERIMENTS IN MECHANICAL FLIGHT. 179 



them a good deal of valuable information was gained as to the number 

 and position of the wings and as to the eifectiveness of different forms 

 and dispositions of them. By the middle of the year a launch took 

 place with a brief flight, where the aerodrome shot down into the 

 water after a little over 50 yards. It was immediately followed by one 

 in which the same aerodrome rose at a considerable incline and fell 

 backward with scarcely any advance after sustaining itself rather less 

 than 10 seconds, and these and subsequent attempts showed that the 

 problem of disposing of the wings so that they would not yield and of 

 obtaining a proper " balance " was not yet solved. 



Briefly it may be said that the year 1895 gave small results for the 

 labor with which it was filled, and that at its close the outlook for 

 further substantial improvement seemed to be almost hopeless, but it 

 was at this time that final success was drawing near. Shortly after its 

 close I became convinced that substantial rigidity had been secured for 

 the wings; that the frame had been made stronger Avithout prohibitive 

 weight, and that a degree of accuracy in the balance had been obtained 

 which had not been hoped for. Still there had been such a long succes- 

 sion of disasters and accidents in the launching that hope was low 

 when success finally came. 



I have not spoken here of the aid which I received from others, and 

 particularly from Dr. Garl Barus and Mr. J. E. Watkins, who have been 

 at different times associated with me in the work. Mr. R. L. Eeed's 

 mechanical skill has helped me everywhere, and the lightness and eifi- 

 ciency of the engines are in a large part due to Mr. L. G. Maltby. 



The Aerodromes in FLiaHT.^ 



The successfal flights of Dr. Langley's aerodrome were witnessed by 

 Dr. Bell, and described by him as follows : ^ 



"Through the courtesy of Dr. S. P. Langley, Secretary of the Smith- 

 sonian Institution, I have had, on various occasions, the privilege of 

 witnessing his experiments with aerodromes, and especially the remark- 

 able success attained by him in experiments made upon the Potomac 

 Eiver on Wednesday, May 6, 1896, which led me to urge him to make 

 public some of these results. 



" I had the pleasure of witnessing the successful flight of some of 

 these aerodromes more than a year ago, but Dr. Langley's reluctance to 

 make the results public at that time prevented me from asking him, as 

 I have done since, to let me give an account of what I saw. 



"On the date named two ascensions were made by the aerodrome, or 

 so-called 'flying machine,' which I will not describe here further than to 

 say that it appeared to me to be built almost entirely of metal, and 

 driven by a steam engine which I have understood was carrying fuel 

 and a water supply for a very brief period, and which was of extraor- 

 dinary lightness. 



"The absolute weight of the aerodrome, including that of the engine 

 and all appurtenances, was, as I was told, about 25 pounds, and the 



' The following descriptions follow Dr. Langley's article in The Aeronautical 

 Annual, 1897. 

 2 Nature, London, May 28, 1896. 



