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It is, however, but recently that ballooning as a sport for women has become at all popular and the cause is traced to the fact that with the advance of science it is becoming more generally known that when proper precautions are observed as to equipment and meteorology the actual danger is slight and the pleasure almost incalculable. 
The wife of Colonel J.E. Capper, commandant of the school of ballooning in England, when asked, for instance, her opinion of ballooning said:
"As regards ballooning for ladies, undertaken with a good balloon and with all proper and necessary precautions, I should say it is equal in safety to any pastime and a great deal safer than many others; that it is undoubtedly most healthy as well as being quite the most delightful."
Hazards of the Aeronaut. 
Ballooning becomes hazardous only when certain precautions, applicable in a varying degree to all forms of locomotion, are neglected. The aeronaut who ascends in the fact of a rapidly falling barometer is comparable to the engine driver who passes a danger signal. People are not deterred from riding on railroads because of a few isolated cases of carelessness on the part of engineers. Similarly, those who know what ballooning is are not kept from enjoying it because of the carelessness of a few aeronauts in the past. 
Many persons who contemplate ballooning find another bugbear in the fear that the balloon will burst in midair. 
"Of course," says a well-known aeronaut, "if the balloonist is insane enough to tie up the neck of the bag it is sure to burst when the increasing altitude expands the gas just as a boiler will burst if there is no safety valve. But if the balloonist uses horse sense and the balloon is properly constructed it can not burst.  It is the net and not the envelope that bears the strain, and a paper bag if it were gastight would serve just as well as a fabric, although naturally it would not last so long."
The sensation experienced while ballooning is one of the most pleasant imaginable. Contrary to common opinion, "seasickness" is a thing unknown. Captain Coningham, a well-known British army aeronaut, said recently speaking of this:
"Let it be understood that there is not and can not be anything like mal de mer in a free balloon. The aeronaut becomes, for the time being, part and parcel of immediate surroundings, which are, for all practical purposes, independent of the laws of gravitation. If the atmosphere is moving he moves with it at the same rate and vice versa. But the wind, unlike disturbed water, does not travel with a perceptible wave motion, which is the cause of seasickness."
No Dizziness in Balloon. 
Another bogy which frequently alarms the novice is a "fear of giddiness." This, as a matter of fact, is a sensation seldom known to balloonists and actually those who are most addicted to dizziness when looking down from heights on land appear to be the most level-headed in a balloon. 
Henry Coxwell is one of the world's veteran aeronauts, with more than 2,000 ascents to his credit. Discussing dizziness he said: "I can not stand great heights on land at all. I grow sick and dizzy, but I was never so affected in a balloon, even when climbing down a rope ladder suspended from the car. The only reason I can assign for this is the inability [[?]] compare relative heights."