Page:Ainsworth's Magazine - Volume 1.djvu/45

A FLIGHT UPON FLYING. 23 surely they might in reason have enlarged the composite into an even more sesquipedalian epithet, so as to have included its swathing surface of Air ; for, (to glance for an instant at the charter of man's monarchy,) this whole invested orb, as well its height of atmosphere as its depth of ocean, has been made man's own for his dwelling and dominion. We can ride with Arion on dol- phins,—why not fly with Ganymede on eagles ? We can swim down the Port Royal shark in his own blue water, why not go a-hawking after storks in their clear element, and float, in playful conquest, on the billows of the air ? The monarch is mocked by every petty fowl that can skim the tree-tops ; woodcocks are amenable to no law ; and swallows, gathering on the cloud, speed to where science cannot follow them. The lark, quivering upward from its clod, basks its merry head in the warmer sunbeam; while a king of the creation watches it with aching sight, and envies the poor flutterer its wings!

When Lord Worcester—shrewd fellow,—hinted at steam and gas, he was scouted by the gossips as presumptuous; yea, and so were Lord Liverpool and Mr. Winsor ; Socrates and Galileo were most flameworthy heretics, for having seen certain truths too soon ; and poor Dr. Faustus is to this day regarded as a gentleman of most suspicious character, lodging in some red- hot cave Vesuvian, for having had the hardihood to doubt the blessedness of ignorance. Even so, to sundry obtuse intellects, shall our desultory disquisi- tions upon flying savour not a little of presumption. So be it, an' you will, my noodle ; we in these railroad times cannot pace it equally with snails; therefore will we leave your dulness to take lessons of Hogarth's steward, in lifting up hands and eyes, astonished ; the while, having done with meta- physicals, we ramble, half in earnest, o'er the physicals of Flying ;—and high time, too, quotha. It was either Prussian Frederick or Russian Alexander,—no matter which,—that once upon a time offered a prize to the man who should make a speaking machine. Accordingly, the pundits of mechanism and the savants of science were all on the alert to produce one. How to make wood and leather talk,—that was the problem ; and they solved it slowly thus :—It was first found necessary to provide bellows for a rush of air ; then, an elastic clapper to break the stream into puffs, or syllables ; after this, a double tube behind to make the sounds distinct ; and next, a moveable port-hole in front to modulate the wished-for words. When, therefore, with all their scientific architecture, they had succeeded in building up a wooden box capable of enunciating pa-pa, and ma-ma, their doctorships began to discover that this miracle of ingenuity was just the clumsiest possible imitation of man's mouth with its appurtenants ; they had blundered, at length, upon lungs, tongue, lips, and nostrils ; and the discomfited sages, who had, perchance, been half disposed to have taught dame Nature upon Voltaire's principles, were obliged to hide their heads as the awkwardest of plagiarists. Now, in that episode lurketh wisdom, of a kind well fitted to our purpose: if we want to fly, let us imitate a bird, and not go blindly beating à priori bushes. Let us be content to know that Nature's way is best, perfect, and not to be improved upon ; and let our humility be sure that the closer we copy her, the more likely are we to succeed. When we swim, our aim is to become as fishified, at least as froggified, as possible ; when we fly, in shape, in buoy- ancy, and motion, our fashions must be those of the painted people that natu- rally float upon the air. First, then, for shape :—away with the intractable clumsiness of sail-rud- ders, expanding wheels, and oars like the nets of entomologists : away with