Page:Air-ships and Flying-Machines.pdf/2



On my journey from France to America, on board the "Deutschland," I occupied my leisure in reading the interesting book by Mr. H. G. Wells entitled "When the Sleeper Awakes: a Story of the Years to Come," and in putting on paper some reflections suggested by the two chapters which principally claimed my attention: "While the Aëroplanes were Coming" and "The Coming of the Aëroplanes."

That which always strikes me in books of this sort is the effort of imagination put forth by the authors in discerning in the distant future things which to-day lie under the very eyes of men more practical or less near-sighted, who know how to look at the things which are close to them.

Mr. H. G. Wells speaks of aërial navigation as men talked of automobile locomotion about ten years ago, believing that they predicted the future without suspecting that they spoke of the present. They were far from thinking that, at the end of the nineteenth century, carriages propelled by petroleum, by steam, by electricity, comfortable and rapid, would be speeding over all the roads of the world. vol. CLXXIV-NO. 547.