1879*] Ballooning in Arctic Exploration . 167 
Mr. Simmons’s opinion, be the keeping of the water in the 
retort from freezing whilst charging or after being charged 
with water, until the vitriol is poured in. The process of 
making pure hydrogen gas by means of furnaces would 
necessitate the employment of exceedingly cumbersome 
apparatus. 
Mr. Reece, alluding to the formation of hydrogen, remarked 
that, according to Sir George Nares, the average temperature 
during the Expedition in the Ardtic Regions was 30° F. 
That would not have the slightest effedt on a composition of 
1 part sulphuric acid and 4 parts water. When poured on 
zinc the temperature would rise to 180 0 . If anyone tried 
that in a glass vessel he could not keep his hand on it, so 
that any fear of not generating the gas must be entirely 
visionary. Air expands only one 480th part for each degree, 
so that great heat would be required for an air balloon. 
A fire balloon had enormous power, but nothing like one 
filled with hydrogen gas. 
Mr. Simmons remarked that the heat generated in a hot- 
air balloon would be 120°. The weight of a balloon and all 
its paraphernalia might be 1200 lbs., the diameter 70 feet, 
and it would carry a man into the air if the average heat 
were 120°. 
Mr. Glaisher, in thanking Mr. Brearey for his paper, ob- 
served that in the late Ardlic Expedition everything was 
excluded that was possible to be excluded on account of the 
want of room. If a balloon of 70 feet diameter had to be 
taken out, a very large space would be required. Again, it 
could only be used in summer time, when there is wind in 
the Ardtic Regions. In Russia and Sweden in winter time, 
when the temperature approaches zero, it is nearly always 
calm. To realise the intensity of the cold one must move 
the hand against the cold air or run against the air. No 
person standing in an atmosphere 70° below zero would feel 
that the cold was so intense. It might be far more painful 
when the temperature was above zero if the air were in 
motion ; but the winter was not the time when these expe- 
riments would be made : they would take place in the 
summer, when the temperature would be 40°, and in the sun 
very much hotter. He (Mr. Glaisher) saw no reason, how- 
ever, why the balloon should not be made available in 
various ways in Ardtic Exploration, and he hoped that if 
there was another Expedition the balloon would be tried and 
the question settled. It would certainly, if used in connec- 
tion with a sledge, enable the distance that could be traversed 
in the day to be increased. With regard to the view that 
