The Balloon (Paperback)

This historic book may have numerous typos and missing text. Purchasers can download a free scanned copy of the original book (without typos) from the publisher. Not indexed. Not illustrated. 1879 Excerpt: ...it would not be easy to sketch on canvas a correct view of the city as seen from above, similarly difficult must be the undertaking when essayed on paper. From a general appearance of squattiness--the word may not be very elegant, but it is the only one suggesting itself which conveys the idea--objects gradually became less clearly defined. The smoke from the foundries disappeared in the sky; streets grew narrower and darker, until they seemed like thin lines; and finally the city faded into a spot. By this time the barometer had fallen four inches, and the balloon commanded an extended view of the Mississippi, the Missouri and the Illinois rivers. Leaving the noblest of streams to the left, I had an opportunity to realize, as much as possible to a practical person, the meaning of poetic dreams when attempting to portray the silvery glittering sheen of the waters produced by the rays of the declining sun. Nothing could be imagined more gorgeously beautiful. We cracked a bottle of Heidsick on behalf of the silvery glittering sheen. The strips of iimber land and fields of newly harvesjed grain of that portion of Illinois over which our silktn globe was gliding were not grotesquely mingled as they might be supposed to be when viewed from the distance, but lay like a floor of mosaic masonry, regular and' square. To our vision there were no hills nor valleys, every object appearing set upon a level surface. At 7.10 the barometer stood at twenty-four and the thermometer indicated fifty-five degrees. I had now the singular sensation about the ears which has been described as the experience cf all aeronauts on their first voyage. It was unpleasant and annoying, but by no means painful; very much such a feeling as one has when, while bathing, these organs become sto...