THE "FLIGHTS" OF GYMNASTS.

Daily Telegraph (Napier), Issue 3677, 27 April 1883, Page 4

THE "FLIGHTS" OF GYMNASTS.

The following is the explanation given by Lulu, the famous gymnast, of the way in which he made his perpendicular leap : —

" It was done," he said, " by means of a mechanical device. I stood in full view of the spectators on an iron plate about a foot in diameter, which was attached to a spindle running down through a framework. This spindle was thrown up a distance of seven feet above the stage by means of rubber springs, carrying the plate with it. The springs were powerful enough to send my body though the air like a shot. Another"set of rubber bands jerked the spindle back as quickly as it shot out, so that the motion both ways was too quick for sight. On reaching my distance I caught hold of ropes. It was necessary to pose my body so that it would be exactly in Hue with the "medial line of the spindle. One night at Dublin the machine was imperfect, and the spring became released before I was ready, throwing me on my head aud shoulders in the orchestra circle. AVhen sh>t out I feel as if the earth had suddenly fallen fromudner me. But there is really no time for 1 bought. I am at the ropes iv an instant. I gave up this performance because I grew too stout. One day my body was almost telescoped by the shock. I then set to work to devise a machine that would enable me to distribute the force over my whole body. The result was the catapult, after several months spent in making experiments. This machine is very simple in its construction. An iron plane about 15ft long is suspended on an axle at a right angle. Rubber springs are made to act so as to throw the plane forward suddenly into position nearly perpendicular. This movement throws my body, which is lying at full length at the upper end of the plane, so that I describe an arc and alight in a net about GOl't from the machine. I was nearly killed two or three times. Tho first time I was thrown I lost all sense of •what I was doing or where I was going. I was utterly helpless, and came down into the net mi my head and face. My head was so i-iil and bruised that my hair came out in bunches. In London I made the experiment of using a machine much the same as tho catapult, but suspended in mid-air. The springs were so adjusted that the iron beam on which I lay, when released, described almost a semicircle, so that when my body left it it was underneath instead of on top of it. This machine threw me a distance of 200 ft in almost a straight line. My movement was so straight and so swift that it was almost impossible for me to turn my body, even once. In fact, I did not recover consciousness until my force was nearly spent, The principle of the cannon from which gymnasts arc sometimes hurled is the same, the only difference being that the body is sent iv an oblique line upward, instead of perpendicularly into the air. As the performer can get his position with perfect safety, this feat is not attended with much danger. The spring is released in this instrument by means of v trigger set off by the explosion of powder. "