Page:Wonderful Balloon Ascents, 1870.djvu/14

 viii the gilded globe which Montgolfier had caused to rise from earth amidst the acclamations of a hundred thousand spectators, but one which had before it a somewhat different history to that of the more startling invention. England, when it remembers the story of the steam-engine, has little need to grudge France the honour of discovering the balloon. After all, however, Great Britain had its share in that discovery. The early observations of Francis Bacon and Bishop Wilkins paved the way for the later achievement, whilst it was our own Cavendish who discovered that hydrogen gas was lighter than air; and Dr. Black of Edinburgh, who first employed that gas to raise a globe in which it was contained from the earth. The Scotch professor, we are told, thought that the discovery which he made when he sent his little tissue-paper balloon from his lecture-table to the ceiling of his classroom, was of no use except as affording the means of making an interesting experiment. Possibly our readers, after they have perused this volume, may think that Dr Black was not after all so far wrong as people once imagined. Be this as it may, however, in these pages is the history of the balloon, and of the most memorable balloon voyages, and we comprehend the story to our readers not the less cordially that it comes from the land where the balloon had its birth.