-
Image 10181
4 visits
-
In a little garden summer-house behind a Paris street, Le Sage sat at his desk, dipped through Spanish books, and wrote with a light heart of the people that he knew, disguised in foreign clothes, and moving in places he had never seen.
63 visits
-
Image 9146
191 visits
-
The ascent of this, the first hydrogen balloon, was a popular and a memorable event. The field was lined with troops. The curious spectators had thronged every thoroughfare and darkened every housetop. It was an all day festival, inaugurating a peculiarly French science, with French animation. The booming of cannon announced to all Paris the impending flight of the balloon. At five o’clock, in the presence of 50,000 spectators, and in a shower of rain, the balloon rose more than half a mile and entered the clouds. The people overwhelmed with surprise and enthusiasm, stood gazing upward, despite the rain, observing every maneuver till the vessel had ascended and faded from view.
204 visits
-
The public inauguration of aëronautics occurred on June 5, 1783, at Annonay, the home of the Montgolfier family, 36 miles from Lyons. The states of Vivarais being assembled at that place, were invited to witness the ascension. The Deputies and many spectators found in the public square an enormous bag which, with its frame, weighed 300 pounds, and would inflate to a ball 35 feet in diameter. When told that this huge mass would rise to the clouds they were astonished and incredulous. The Montgolfiers, however, lit a fire beneath and let the bag speak for itself. It gradually distended, assuming a beautiful form, and struggling to free itself from the men who were holding it. At a given signal it was released; it ascended rapidly, and in ten minutes attained a height of 6,000 feet. It drifted a mile and a half and sank gently to the ground.
186 visits
-
Stephen Montgolfier now wishing to send up human passengers, made a balloon of 100,000 cubic feet capacity. It was shaped like a full lemon pointing upward, with a cylindrical neck below, 16 feet in diameter. Around this neck was a wicker balcony three feet wide, to carry the aëronauts, bundles of straw for fuel, pails of water and sponges to extinguish incipient conflagrations, here and there in the balloon, during a journey. Through stokeholes in the side of the neck sheaves of straw could be forked to the grate suspended centrally below by radial chains. During inflation the base of the balloon rested on a platform, and its top was supported by a rope stretched between two poles. The vessel when completed, in a garden of the Faubourg St. Antoine, was 85 feet high by 48 feet across, and weighed 1,600 pounds. About its zone, painted in oil, were elegant decorations; portraits, cyphers of the king’s name, fleur-de-lis, with fancy borders below and above; while higher still, on the arching dome of the bag, were all the signs of the celestial zodiac.
221 visits
-
A still more elaborate and colossal air ship was the Geant, constructed in 1863, for A. Nadar of Paris. It was made of a double layer of white silk, had a volume of 215,000 cubic feet and a buoyancy of 4½ tons. The car was a wicker cabin 13 feet wide by 7 feet high, with a wicker balcony round the top so that the roof could be used as an observation deck—a delightful place to loll in the starlight, or watch the morning sun “flatter the mountain tops with sovereign eye.” The closed car comprised two main rooms with a hallway between them, one containing the captain’s bed and baggage, the other having three superposed berths for passengers. Minor divisions of the car were reserved for provisions, a lavatory, photography and a printing press, the latter to be used for the dissemination of news from the sky, as the navigators floated from state to state. A compensator balloon of 3,500 cubic feet, just below the main bag and connected with it, received the escaping gas during expansion with increase of tempera61ture or altitude, and gave it back on contraction.
183 visits
-
The first attempts at balloon propulsion could not be seriously regarded by trained engineers, even at the inception of aëronautics; but still, as infantile steps in the new art, they may deserve passing notice.
Blanchard, on March 2, 1784, made the first real effort to steer a balloon, using for that purpose a spherical gas bag and car provided with aërial oars and a rudder. As he was about to ascend, however, from the Champs de Mars, a young officer with drawn sword persisted in accompanying the pilot, thus compelling Blanchard to leave his wings on earth to allow sufficient buoyancy for himself and his obtrusive guest. His first trial was, therefore, frustrated; but subsequent ones made with that inadequate contrivance also proved futile under the best circumstances; for the scheme was evidently puerile, though tried by various grown-up men besides M. Blanchard.
176 visits
-
engraved by W. Greatbach from a Print by Masson, after P. Mignard
137 visits
-
Engraved by Bourgeois.
133 visits
-
Engraved by Rouargue from the Original by Rouillard.
138 visits
-
Image 8434
138 visits
-
Image 8433
158 visits
-
Engraved by Gouttière from the Original by Alaux.
142 visits
-
A French Court Ballet In The Early Seventeenth Century
169 visits
-
Image 8430
258 visits
-
Image 8429
227 visits
-
Image 8428
234 visits
-
Image 8427
262 visits
-
Image 8426
235 visits
-
Image 8425
242 visits
-
Image 8424
219 visits
-
Image 8423
225 visits
-
Image 8422
220 visits
-
Image 8421
174 visits
-
Image 8420
168 visits
-
Image 8419
217 visits
-
Image 8418
236 visits
-
Image 8417
231 visits
-
Image 8416
172 visits
-
Image 8415
211 visits
-
Image 8414
212 visits
-
Image 8413
144 visits
-
Image 8412
205 visits
-
Image 8411
222 visits
-
Image 8409
167 visits
-
Image 8408
151 visits
-
Image 8407
145 visits
-
Image 8406
177 visits
-
1798
145 visits
-
Image 8404
158 visits
-
Image 8403
157 visits
-
Image 8401
154 visits
-
Image 8402
188 visits
-
Image 8400
147 visits
-
Image 8399
137 visits
-
Image 8398
165 visits
-
On this date Lord Howe achieved a victory over the French which was considered so important that on the return of the fleet to Spithead the King presented Howe with a gold chain and a sword valued at 3000 guineas.
211 visits
-
Observe the heavy breeching-rope attaching the gun to the ship's side; the tackle and block for running in and out; the wooden wheels, and the "quoins" or wedges for elevating the gun.
157 visits
-
Image 7312
146 visits
-
Image 7313
146 visits
-
Image 7314
149 visits
-
Image 7310
138 visits
-
Image 7309
136 visits
-
Image 7311
136 visits
-
Image 7306
146 visits
-
Image 7307
123 visits
-
Image 7308
155 visits
-
Image 7303
139 visits
-
Image 7304
137 visits
-
Image 7305
131 visits
-
Image 7300
117 visits
-
Image 7301
46 visits
-
Image 7302
63 visits
-
Image 7297
79 visits
-
Image 7298
88 visits
-
Image 7299
59 visits
-
Image 7294
57 visits
-
Image 7295
64 visits
-
Image 7296
67 visits
-
Image 7291
51 visits
-
Image 7292
71 visits
-
Image 7293
78 visits
-
Image 7289
65 visits
-
Image 7290
70 visits
-
Image 7288
87 visits
-
Image 7285
53 visits
-
Image 7286
53 visits
-
Image 7287
71 visits
-
Image 7282
54 visits
