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I first discovered 20 years ago, that, within a three
miles' elevation, balloons could be directed eastward, devisting from that line and soon thereafter demonstrated
the fact by doing the thing a number of times, 
once from Carlisle to Lancaster, Penn., twice from 
York to Lancaster, once from Springfield to Columbus, 
O., once from Auburn to Seracuse N.Y., and once 
from Bradford, Vt., to Great Falls, N.H., in all these cases by premeditation, I had never then read the detailed theory of trade winds, but, was simply learned by facts--always good instructors. Since that time, 
Maury has collaborated a system of wind and current charts that promise much more for the uses of aerial navigation than the most sanguine devotee of the art 
could have hoped for. Since deducing from his long 
and studious observations and researches the cours 
of the trade winds, their currents and counter currents, all the prominent balloon voyages have verified
those deductions. 
   Maury says: "As for the general system of atmos-
"pheric circulation which I have been so long endeav-
"oring to describe, the Bible tells it in a single sen-
"tence--Eccl. i. 6: 'The wind goeth toward the
"'south, and turneth about unto the south; it wheeleth
"'about continually, and the wind returneth again ac-
"'cording to his circuit.'" This is certainly a terse explanation of the trade wind system. 
   This truthful observer thinks there is apparent a grand design in the ordination of the atmospheric motion. And so will every intelligent observer conclude who will take the trouble of its investigation! It has 
many offices to perform, he says. "To distribute
"moisture over the surface, and temper the climate of 
"different latitudes, it would seem, are two great 
"offices assigned by the Creator to the ocean of air."
   Maury's explanations to his wind and current charts, 
published by the Federal Government last year, 
and of which Lieut. Lynch kindly funished be a copy
a few weeks ago, substantiate every point of my theory
of the wind currents as means through which ballooning 
can be systematically and profitably established. 
Maury says: "Have I not, therefore, very
"good grounds for the opinion that the 'wind in his 
"circuit,' though apparently to us never so wayward, 
"is as obedient to law, and as subservient to order, as
"were the morning stars when they 'say together.'"
To this I can sincerely say, yes, you have! And permit 
me to add a third use of its design--sailing to and for the heavens with balloons for the purposes of commmerce, intelligence, science, appiness, and refinement, 
and to christianize all the ends of the earth. 
The Creator cna have no objection to this, if he has 
not specially so arranged it for our uses. 
   Herein is the grand basis for a system of plain sailing. All we want is good balloons, and a little more energetic experience. Good balloons can be made of 
silk, diagonally braced and strengthened, and coated 
with my invented preparation of decomposed oil, as 
laid down in my directions for balloon-making.
   But somebody demurs to one's not knowing where
we are sailing to, nor in what direciton we are going 
when we get above the clouds Mr. Haddock thinks
we are compelled to "go it blind" in such cases, because
he and his friend got into a wilderness; and hence
infers that ballooning is not advanced beyond what 
their experienced troubles in their late trip would speak for it. Let me explain. Before we ascend, and when we are rising, we can see which way the clouds are 
moving, and when we become involved with the clouds
we know we are moving with them. Now, when we 
rise above them and they appear quiescent beneath
us, we are still moving in their direction, and with their velocity. Should the current above move faster or 
slower, there will be a relative diverse motion apparent in them. And should we enter a current moving
at an angle with the clouds, we have again the course
and velocity of our air-ship pointed out. The experienced aeronaut, like the experienced seaman, will, by intuitive reasoning, tell the course and speed of his
vessel by these observations. 
   My good friend Haddock will thus see that a quarter century of experience has learned me something 
in the art, and something hopeful enough to write letters for the public information about. I have also invented the "collapsing cord," a device which enables the aeronaut to render his balloon powerless in an instant--a very necessary contrivance in bringing a balloon to in stormy weather. This would have been put 
into the "Atlantic" before we sailed her from St. Louis 
had there been sufficient time left for doing it before 
her time of starting. I mention the matter to Mr. 
Gager the evening before we left. I have used the 
collapsing cord to explode my balloon when 12,000 feet
high, and within three miles of Philadelphia, where thousands of spectators looked at it as the time. Some 
of the newspapers predicted it as certain destruction if 
attempted. I did this to show that balloons would 
inevitably become parachutes in case of their rupture when aloft. I have authentic records of thirteen balloons which have bursted or collapsed when aloft, and in no single instance were the aeronauts damaged in 
the least. Claytonn encountered one, so did Miss Lucretia Bradley, and McCoe, and I had two collapses 
when aloft; the others happened in Europe. 
   "The vast untraversed fields of space which sur-
"round the earth" are now within the reach of aeronautic skill but the world is slow in adopting and using 
the means. It has ever been so. The pioneers of all
important achievements get more sensure than encouragement in their pursuits. Much of this, however, is caused by the counterfeits practiced upon the public.
That has always a tendency to depreciate the genuine
investigations, but that will not deter the earnest investigator from his hobby. I know I could make more money by taking up elephants, horses, and bulls than 
I can in purely scientific explorations, but as that would militate against the diginity of science, I have 
thus far abstained, but I am not sure that I will not 
resort to it in order to raise the necessary means to my 
circummundane outfit. If I do, the exhibitions shall be 
made classical, at least, and fit for the educated and 
elite of society to look at. 
   Mr. Haddock wants to know how we are to tell when 
we get into the easterly current. If my experience
and barometrical notings of fifteen years are worth anything, I can confidently say always when your 
barometer falls to 17 inches. Out of over one hundred

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trials this holds good. But any experienced air traveler
can tell when he is going east without a barometer. 
The cummulus and nimbus clouds are the only kind that compose strata so dense that you cannot see the earth 
through them, and these clouds are never two miles 
high, and, as stated above, when you are over the 
cloud stratum you can readily tell whether you are 
moving with them or making an angle to their course. 
There are clouds above the great current, seven adn eight miles high but they are so attenuated that you 
can see through them as you can through the tail fo a comet. Experienced aeronauts become as familiar 
with clouds, as do old marines with gulf streams, fogs, and sea weeds. 
   We are just about learning these things, and once
generally understood, they will serve us to sail through
the ocean of air above us with much more comfort and pleasure, and far greater speed, than we can on the oceans of water. 
   I shall never enter into a controversy upon the scientific merits and uses of aerial navigation; yet I am never displeased in being touched up a little as to its progress in the hands of those from whom the public
have a right to expect something. My nature is never 
to say anything concerning it but what is matter of 
fact, or that which is self evident scientific truth. 
   Lancaster, Pa., Oct. 1859.                 JOHN WISE.
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A SABBATH DAY IN NEW YORK.
Correspondence of the Daily Evening Express. 
                            New York, May 11, 1859.
   After attendance to divine service in the morning
and listening to a sermon and prayers, all well calculated to make one think of the salvation of that
better part of our nature for which we must ever feel 
a deep concern, my Boston friend gave me an invitation 
after tea to take a walk with him up the 
Bowery, to attend, or at least look , at the undivine
services carried on in that quarter of the city, on
Sunday evening. The first thing that drew my attention 
was the display of merchandise, in open shops 
and stores, as though the Sabbath was over--or 
rather, the great and busy throng wending their 
way along the crowded thoroughfare, made it look 
like a gala day; and such too the sequel revealed it 
to be. The open stores, however, I took for granted 
were owned by Jews; and since we have unrestrained
toleration of religion in this country, it is but
charitable to suppose that these merchants observe
some other day of the seven. 
    After having passed some distance up the Bowery,
my friend took me into the Folks Garten. This is
really a theatre. After procuring tickets we passed through the vestibule into a well appointed circular 
theatre, with a pit, proscenium, gallery, orchestra, choir and saloons. In some of the saloons were 
games of chance, where you might invest from three
cents to a dollar a chance; and these games, entirely 
new to me, were in active operation. The circular 
area below was filled with tables, around which 
were seated men, women and children, supplied with 
lager beer. The gallery was supplied by the same 
kind of goods and people. At times the brass band 
would strike up a lively hymn, indeed--the "Star
Spangled Banner" or some other national air. In 
the orchestra the music was ever accompanied by a 
dancing girl--occasionally dressed in male attire;
and all these things were going on with as much
decorum as did the proceedings in the Episcopal 
Church wherein we attended the morning serivce. 
The people in the Folks Garten all appeared to 
enjoy themselves in the fullest measure of happiness.
From the inside of the dome of this building was
suspended a balloon, handsomely embellished and 
of about ten feet diameter. 
   From this we wandered up some distance further 
in the Bowery and entered the Atlantic Garden;
and here there was truly an ocean of people drinking
lager beer and weis. This latter drink is a kind of 
beer that is drank out of glass tubes precisely of the 
shape of the glass chimney of an argand lamp. It is 
said to have no intoxicating qualities, and it tastes like Stiller's sotz. From this we went up further and entered a gymnasium, where lager beer was the 
institution, and the performance feats of strength, 
diversified with songs in English by German singers,
so that we heard a practical demonstration of the 
"sweet German accent" in the "rich Irish" song
of Larry O'Brien; but as the singer called it "Larry 
O'Pryan," this was ludicrous enough and entirely 
upset our gravity, Sunday evening as it was. The 
gymnast displayed some extraordinary feats of 
strength with a bar of railroad iron ten feet long, 
weighing 250 pounds. He twirled it around as fascile
and dexterous as a Tipperary man would a cudgel. 
All these feats were accompanied by music and 
lager--the latter served by six American girls, who
were kept constantly on the go.
    The next place we reconnoitered was a rather 
subterranean hall, going downward a flight of six
steps; and upon entering, I took it for granted we 
were on the descending grade, and so it proved to 
be, inasmuch as here a number of the customers were
asleep, and some half asleep, and a few whose eyes
looked as though they had ballast on the lids. Here
was singing by women and by men, some of them 
playing instruments that looked to me like banjos, 
though my friend informed me they were Mexican 
guitars. The performers looked rather seedy, and 

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the other amusements of shooting mark with spring 
guns, and the playing on an instrument for money,
which looked like a huge griddle filled with hackle
teeth, through which a ball was rolled towards figures, 
was rather too much for my onot over much fastidious nerves, and I thought enough had transpired
for one Sunday evening's observation and contemplation. 
   I am not prepared to speak for or against this 
thing. Many well meaning people approve of it 
because it is peculiar to the people who enjoy it; and
true it is, I did not see in all these places any disturbance--but nevertheless to my unaccustomed eyes
and ears it looked like all disorder, and it did appear 
to me that too much liberty led to licentiousness. 
While contemplating these things I was forcibly 
impressed with the maxim, that "there is a sufficient
reason for every thing." The great mass of these
people belonged to the hardy sons and daughters of 
toil, who are cooped up in their narrow cells of houses
during the week, and therefore enjoy the recreation 
of music and other amusements tempered with that 
world-wide popular beverage. Lager, as much as the 
grandees possibly can the pleasures of the parlor and
piano, tempered with imperial tea and heidsic champagne. 
With my friend--and he a strict church 
member--I was willing to agree that there was no 
more harm in it than there was in the recreation of
the "higher" classes of society.          QUAERE.
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PICTURED out upon the pages of HARPER'S
Weekly, of the current week, is Lowe's mammoth
balloon, which now seeks a starting-place from our 
city, and the proprietor of which asks the temporary
use of the old Crystal Palace site, for that purpose. 
Its dimensions, some 300 feet in height and 130 feet
in diameter, were given in an account which we published 
some days since. If it needed anything more 
than the conviction of a reflective mind, to assure
one of the impotency of present steam 
power in propelling such enormous hulks, it
would be found in looking at the plan drawn upon
paper. A metallic life boat, 30 feet long, provided
with paddle wheels about three feet in diameter, is
represented attached below the balloon, and steaming
through the atmosphere at a fair rate of speed, 
an umbrella machine sticking out of the bow, and a 
huge oar steering the concern at the stern. This is
to be propelled by an ericcsson caloric engine of four
horse power, fed with fine coal and alcohol. 
   When it is considered that the huge balloon
above it is to rise nearly one hundred 
feet higher than the top of Trinity Church steeple, 
and that its diameter and surface exposed to the 
wind will far exceed the whole size of this enormous
structure, the utter insignificance of a paltry row
boat steamer, towards its control, is at once recognized. The balloon itself will be a curiosity, and if it succeeds in taking up and down safely its ten or a 
dozen passengers, (including a New York editor,)
who are to accompany it, its reputaion will be made 
and it can make successful ascensions all over the 
country. But the less said about its propulsion with
a pair of three foot pin wheels, the better. 
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   MR. WISE'S BALLOON--Mr. Wise's balloon in 
Hamilton Park was so badly injured by his attempt 
to keep the gas in her during the gale of Wednesday
night that she ws rendered unserviceable. A considerable 
number of people went up to the Park yesterday
in spite of the threatening weather to see and 
to go up in the balloon. Why they were disappointed
his card below explains:
To the Editor of The N. Y. Tribune.
    SIR: The very high wind last night injured the balloon Jupiter to such an extent that it has been impossible to make use of her to-day. She was well ballasted down when I placed her in charge of the watchman yesterday evening, but during the night so great was the force of the wind that she moved the sand-bags which were attached to netting--some 1,500 pounds 
weight--so that they did not draw evenly. The result was that the netting was torn near the top, allowing 
a considerable portion of the globe to protrude from it. 
A hole was also made in the globe itself through which
the gas was slowly escaping. This morning I had the 
balloon taken into one of the large halls over the Third
avenue Railroad Depot, kindly placed at my service 
by Mr. Darling, the President of the Company, and 
the day has been spent in thoroughly repairing the 
damage. On Saturday I hope to commence inflating 
her at 8 o'clock in the morining. If the wind is not too 
strong I will make ascensions attached to a rope until
4 p.m. At that hour I will make a clear ascension, 
taking two passengers. 
Girard House, Sept. 29, 1859.          CHAS. E. WISE.

MR. WISE'S BALLOON COLLAPSED.--Owing to the accident to Mr. Wise's balloon on Wednesday, the silk becoming torn by collision with the trees, the contemplated excursion was not made yesterday. Early in the morning the aerial monster was exhausted, hauled off for repairs, and the proprietor expected to have all in readiness for several voyages to-day. Hamilton Park presented a lively appearance, with the numbers of visiters called out by the fine day, and stragglers from the National Guard troop, and one of our infantry regiments drilling on the square. Should the ascension come off to-day a large crowd may be expected, and prudence would dictate some better arrangements for keeping the space near the balloon clear, and securing the windlass, so that it will not be so liable to be drawn up with the voyageurs.