Page:Wonderful Balloon Ascents, 1870.djvu/190

174 "But now the dawn is breaking. We can almost distinguish each other's features on the platform of the car, and still continue to advance in the direction of the light, which gets clearer and clearer every minute. Large, blood-red streaks appear on the sky in front of us; then follow those of a yellowish or orange tint, which naturally combine and harmonise with the darker shades of green and red. Behind them the sun is preparing to disperse in a moment its forerunners of light. Suddenly, as with a burst of joy, a flash of light darts through the azure vault. It is the signal, re-echoed from the most distant horizons, of the ushering in of day in all its splendours. . . . We glide now over an infinite panorama of plains, woods, towns, lakes, and rivers. A most entrancing sight is spread out for the eye to feast on. The fields are resplendent with a soft pale green, only seen in the early morning. Fairy wreaths of smoke curl upwards from brick chimneys, showing that already breakfast is being prepared. Flocks, herds, houses—in fact, everything visible in its microscopic state of neatness and regularity—seem to smile, or rather to rejoice, under the benign influence of the sun's rays."

We should never reach the end of our tale if we followed step by step the adventures of the strange and colossal traveller. Suffice it, then, to say that the drama soon became more exciting, for this immense inflated monster, which held the lives of nine passengers in its claws, threatened to burst its fragile covering. The safety-valve is hastily opened, and, unheedful of the ballast, the gas is allowed to escape. The balloon immediately falls, and its descent is so rapid as to cause the hair of the passengers' heads to stand on end, and the wind to whistle in their ears.

The narrator of this voyage says, respecting this