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Vol. LVI
The London Chronicle.
No. 4364.
From TUESDAY, October 19, to THURSDAY, October 21, 1784.
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To the PRINTER of the LONDON CHRONICLE.
SIR, 
A [[surrounded by a square decorative design]]s balloons are now the current subject of discussion, give me leave to enter a little into the merits of them; for all that has hitherto been done, amounts to no more than meer holiday pastime! They are driven wherever the wind lifts. Mr. Lunardi, who I believe hoped to return to the Artillery-ground, was landed at Ware; and Mr. Blanchard, at Rumsey in Hampshire: of course, nothing has been effected, but to enable particular men to boast that they have been up with a balloon; and to furnish idle people with exhibitions, raree-shews, and ridiculous processions! Mr. Blanchard in his advertisement fixed an early hour for setting off; adding that he should be punctual to his time, because, after certain manoeuvres, he proposed to go as far as the length of the day would allow. These manoeuvres, by report, were to make a complete circuit round the metropolis; which would have distinguished him as the first governor of the machine. But when the hour came, and the balloon rose, no manoeuvre whatever was performed but by the wind, which, without the least ceremony, carried off this bold rival in a direct steady course into 

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this proportion inverted! A balloon will indeed float without wings; but this advantage is much more than meerly lost, when we attempt to give an additional weight to the balloon, and direct its course by wings; owing to the vast size of the body opposed to the resistance of the air, which must be powerfully counteracted by those wings. It must also have a rudder corresponding with the tail of a bird; and whoever has noted the flight of large birds, will perhaps conceive the head and neck of a bird to be no less useful in directing its course before, than the tail behind. When art therefore is employed to imitate nature in like circumstances, no advantage whatever is to be overlooked. A loose scheme of what I mean, may greatly assist the Reader in conceiving my ideas, save a multitude of words, and facilitate his own reflections.
[[Image - part sketch of balloon shape]]
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Mr. Blanchard came down in Lord Palmerstone's park; his Lordship was absent, and he was elegantly entertained by the Rev. Mr. Penton, brother to Mr. Penton the Member. They made their first descent near Sunbury on perceiving that they lost their air, which they discovered by finding that a bit of silk which they threw out ascended instead of sinking. When at their highest elevation Mr. Blanchard dispatched a pigeon with a message; the bird flew out, but the medium of the air was too thin and light to support its weight, and the animal fluttered in great pain, and with great labour and difficulty made its way back to the vessel, and shrunk under the seat where Mr. Sheldon had sat. But when the machine came near the earth, the pigeon, when again thrown out, darted along, and brought the message to Oxford-street all the way from Hampshire. His Majesty had sent a message to Mr. Blanchard, the morning of the experiment, to express his desire that he might if possible direct his flight towards Windsor. Mr. Blanchard, with the gallantry of a Frenchman, was exceedingly desirous to obey the Monarch, and when he came over Winchester he conceived that the Castle could be no other than that of Windsor, the residence of the Monarch, and he wrote a letter, which he fastened to a bladder, and sent down, directed - Au Monsieur le Roi. It was in so highly a rarified atmosphere that the bladder burst and made a loud report. - At their highest elevation the wind made no sound whatever. At Rumsey Mr. Blanchard saw himself very near the sea, and the new forest just before him, which induced him to come down where he did; but he was very much distressed from not being understood by the people who came up to him, and he was on the eve of launching himself again into the air.
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proper degree of depression, the cord being let slip, the wings will spring back to their horizontal extension: a mechanical head will easily apprehend my meaning, without my labouring at minute explanation. Thus, by the help of a rudder, I conceive the possibility of steering a direct course, of turning that course into another direction, or of making a circular sweep like a pigeon; and by elevating or depressing the head or front of the gallery, of soaring or tending toward the earth, without carrying a load of ballast to be parted with, or unnecessarily diminishing the more valuable contents of the balloon. If these loose thoughts should be convertible to any practical use, my purpose will be answered; for until some actual improvement is attempted, going up with balloons is meer philosophical trifling, and ought always to be met by Englishmen with the interrogation
CUI BONO?
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[[image - A netted striped balloon in low flight over a field with a single passenger in the basket and ropes hanging down]]
Le Balon. Baloon.

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1784.
For the London Chronicle.
On the Direction of AIR BALLOONS.
It will be allowed to be a thing impossible to direct the balloon in the manner of a ship, by employing sails, if the following circumstances are attended to: - That a ship under sail, going upon a different direction from the wind, receives a motion which is generated between two elements; for every seaman knows, that a ship will not lye up to the wind, as it is termed, without having a proper hold of water; hence it is, that a flat-bottomed Dutch vessel must let down her lee-boards to prevent the wind driving her to leeward. Therefore, as a Balloon moves but in one element, it must be obvious that sails cannot alter its course.
   Whilst there is no wind, oars may be employed to some advantage; but as they bear no proportion to the size of the Balloon, they can have as little power over it, as a small boat dragging through the water a large ship; and as every thing respecting the two elements are analogous, it must appear a thing impossible for a Balloon to move against a current of air, going at the rate of 20 miles in the hour. Oars may, however, be employed in raising or lowering a Balloon; for, as it floats nearly upon an equilibrium, little force is required to raise or depress it. The power most effectual to steer the Balloon in any direction, would be to make use of wings; but these, it is to be apprehended, cannot be employed upon a great scale, without using such machinery as will be found too weighty for a balloon to take up. However, though an aerostatical machine cannot be employed as a vehicle for travelling through the air, yet it is probable it may be found useful in extending science. Great light, perhaps may be thrown upon that sublime part of physics, the doctrine of attraction, by a strict attention at different heights in the atmosphere, to the barometer, and the oscillations of the pendulum, and the cause of the various phenomena in the upper regions, it is probable, will be explained upon more clear principles than has yet been offered.
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[[image - a balloon attached to a winged man carrying a sack in each hand who in turn is being ridden by another man wearing a large hat and carrying a whip.]]

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PLAN for directing an AIR BALLOON.
^[[Jan: 1785.]] [[handwritten in ink]]
   In order to give a horizontal direction to an Air Balloon, it seems absolutely necessary that some force should be found, which may act on the Balloon in the same plane with the wind; and from reflecting on this necessity, the thought occurred or applying to this purpose the repulsive force of gunpowder. That it should be adequate to the desired effect, can scarcely be doubted by any body, who considers the violence with which a cannon recoils, or the rapidity with which a sky-rocket mounts in so short a time to so prodigious a height. The velocity of the rocket's flight, and the weight of the cannon, shew this force to be immense. What then should be its effect on a Balloon, which, notwithstanding all the absolute weight of its appendages, being still relatively lighter than a feather in the air, would not oppose any the least weight whatever to be overcome? It may be said, perhaps, that it would be dangerous in the application; but besides that the Balloon might be easily fortified against all risque, it must be recollected that this force being repulsive, would be constantly and rapidly driving the Balloon from the parks, and out of the reach of danger. In order to procure a constant succession of force, one might avail oneself of an imitation of either of the machines below-described.
   There is in the arsenal at Brussels the model (or perhaps it may be the original) of a piece of artillery, which belonged formerly to the Emperor Charles V. It consists of one solid piece, but has seven touch holes, and as many bores, which are so contrived that you may discharge each separately, at what intervals you please, or, by applying the match at one particular touch hole, let them off all together.
   The other piece was invented in the time of Lewis the Fourteenth, for the purpose of bombarding St. Maloes, and the model of it is now shewn at the Palais Royal at Paris. It consists of a considerable number of cannon, (as well as bombs) which diverge from a point in which all their butts meet: the match being once applied, they all go off in succession, and by means of the machinery on which they are placed, each cannon, before it is discharged, is brought into the direction of the one which preceded it.
   It is now more than a year since this thought was first conceived, and it has been communicated from time to time to a few individuals only; but as yet it has never yet been tried.
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