MODEL AIRSHIPS.

Taranaki Daily News, Volume L, Issue 60, 18 June 1907, Page 4

MODEL AIRSHIPS.

WONDERFUL EXHIBITION AT ISLINGTON. FANTASTIC DESIGNS. THE DAILY MAIL £IO,OOO PRIZE. 'lo tho boy who had read hits. Jules Verne, the gallery of the Agricultural Hall on a ro.ent Saturday was one of the most wonderful and delightful plates on earth, for here were gathered all sorts and conditions of tho.se romantic craft which, when enlarged, were to flit hither aJid thitner through the air like swallows on the wing. It was the opening day of the exhibition of "model flying machines and aeroplanes" organised by the Aero Club, and those taking part were competing for prizes of £l5O, £75, and £25 respectively offered by the Daily Mail in connection with tho £IO,OOO prize for ihu fu':;l aerial to make the voyage between London ai;J Man-h-sLer. About one hundred models oi vnrioiw designs nnuli a deeply interesting exhibition.

"To the visitor the exhibits divided themselves into three classes—firs;:, the aeroplanes; second, the machines with bird-like wings; and third, those remotely resembliilg ships with fails. Marvels oi delicate construction arc the aeroplanes of Mr A. V. Roe—two long, fiat white wings one above the other, with short, flap white wings in front, all knit together by a tenacious, a-lmost invisible, framework. Directly opposite the visitor can see the great white bird of Mr Jose Weiss, with outstretched wings, the pattern of an albatross. It is, in the words of the catalogue, "a glider' s —"steered," says the official guide, "by raising outside forward edge of left or right wing." A neighbor of the great albatrofs is what may be called the flying fish of Mr Cochrane, made of shining corrugated aluminium. The body in shape is something between that of a bird and a fish, inside of which is the driving mechanism, ana over which float the aeroplanes.

Major Moore's machine, with wings like those of a flying fox, reminds one irresistibly of weird, unearthly animals from Mars as depicted by Mr H. G. Wells. Delicate, spreading wings, pointed at. the tips, are outstretched alx>ve a small, intricate mechanism of coils and wires suspended like a body beneath. In | reality fVey iure clockwork springs, Mii- ! mating 'he but the c-iiect of the apparatus at the fiT:.t glance is uetidedly uncanny.

Next to Major Moore's exhibit ia o-ne yrith s-iall black wings, and it looked for di the world like a hat. Cloec at hand are Major Baden-Powell's model acTOp.anee and a flapping wind machine, each worked with elastic motive power. Boxkites are everywhere. At the lowct end ot the hall a small metal airship, shaped ii.'.e a beat, is suspended by a cord from the ceiling, and from time to time its inventor set it going, and with i-t-a prop triors at full speed it describes a circle through the air for several minutes.