IN MID-AIR.

Rangitikei Advocate and Manawatu Argus, Volume XXXI, Issue 8776, 2 April 1907, Page 4

IN MID-AIR.

Thousands of excited Sydney people are provided with a thrill in Martin Place by an employee of the contractors for the new University building, who steers huge blocks of stone from the ground to tho top of the building. Mr Neilson stands on the stone, grasps the wire leading from the crane, blows his whistle, and is shot up 140 feet in tho air, until the stone looks like a sinker at the cud of a fishing line. At that height ho calmly directs the movement of the crane, while tho crowd below wonders when tho accident will happen. The operation is performed several times a day, and Mr Neilson makes light of it. Ho says it is “dead easy’’ for an old sailor, and that ho is careful to sec that everything is ' right. But "ho admits that if anything goes wrong ho will “hit tho world hard, and never know what happened..” He is a middle-aged man, but says he feels no diminution 1 of nerve. It is all the same whether lie looks up or down and ho minds dangling in the air so little that he can always attend to the balance or the stone, if one end tilts up. Sometimes his experiences are quite sufficient even for his cool head. ‘ ‘ The bolt’s fixed up with a ball-bearing swivel, so that however much tho cable twists the stone’ll always stay the same way. But, somehow, the ball-bearings got jammed, and the two of us were just about 100 feet up when wo began to waltz round like billyoh. The higher they hoisted the stone the faster we spun. Everything went sort of wbizzy, and tho whole of Sydney looked like a wornout biograph. Tho Post Office tower went past ns twenty times a second, and the harbour was running all over the place. Wo just hung on all wo knew until she steadied down, and. it wasn’t too soon, I toll you.” Bat every morning before there are many people in tho streets, Mr Neilson performs a.- more daring act. Tho arm of the crane is lowered till it is horizontal, and he crawls out to the end and oils the joints. Only the tight grasp of his logs keeps him in position, and tho slightest miscalculation would mean certain death. But why should lie get a bump, he asks. Worrying will not save him; besides, there was a friend who was so scared at the spectacle of Ncilseu dangling on p, stone that ho departed. What happened to him? “Why, he went round the corner of George Street and broke his leg on a bauauaskiu. Don’t talk to mo about danger!” Would more of us were so philosopical.