46 
BIRD-FLYING. 
century, refers to birds in all that he fays in his “ difcourfes 
on flying ; ” and “ the alleged invention of the Portuguefe 
friar, Bartholomew Laurence de Gufman, made in 1709, 
was a veflel fomewhat in the fhape of a bird." 
But though all the attempts at flying recorded in 
hiftory, or which we know anything about of later 
times and recent years, have been utter failures, the bird 
continues to be the ideal flying model of mankind; and 
c< kites ” and “ inclined planes ” are fpoken of by inventors 
in all lands as confidently to-day as though the experiment 
had not been a demonftrated failure through all the ages. 
With the exception of fome few ardent balloonifts 
who ftill appear determined to be original beyond Nature, 
the world in general have agreed that travelling through 
the air in balloons can never rank with ordinary loco¬ 
motion on the land and water, and is therefore practically 
of no account to mankind as a mode of travel. 
The next error to be got rid of is the notion of flying; 
of courfe I mean bird-flying; for the eflence of bird-flying 
is projeElile force and live wings, two elements or con¬ 
ditions utterly impoflible for man ; conditions that directly 
relate to the tremendous atmofpheric forces of Nature, to 
meet which the bird is fpecially organized, and with 
which it is able to cope; energies and forces in the midft 
of which, floated and wafted upon dead planes only, men 
would be as helplefs and hopelefs as a loft wretch in the 
rapids that lead to Niagara’s thunders of waters. 
