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IN my two previous experiments I had kept fairly within the wind-protected limits of the bay of Monaco, whose broad expanse afforded ample room both for guide-roping and practice in steering. Furthermore, a hundred friends and thousands of friendly spectators stood around it from the terraces of Monte Carlo to the shore of La Condamine and up the other side to the heights of Old Monaco. As I circled round and round the bay, mounted obliquely and swooped down, fetched a straight course, and then stopped abruptly to turn and begin again, their applause came up to me agreeably. Now, on my third flight, I steered for the open sea.

Out into the open Mediterranean I sped. The guide rope held me at a steady altitude of about 50 metres above the waves, as if in some mysterious way its lower end were attached to them.