MB. JOSIAH SMITH'S BALLOON JOURNEY.

Waikato Times, Volume XIX, Issue 1639, 6 January 1883, Page 5

MB. JOSIAH SMITH'S BALLOON JOURNEY.

(Concluded.) Josiah made up his mind upon this point, that if they got safely across in the balloon he would come back by the ordinary boat express. Having once shown his possession of a daring spirit, he would be at liberty to declare his preference for a more prosaic mode of locomotion. How he got down to Dover he did not know. It all seemed a dream. He had a dim recollection of the Captain thundering at his door at six o'clock in the morning. He remembered lighting his Etna, making his cup of coffee, and thinking, as he drank it, it might be his last. Then they must have caught the train. In fact, he remembered the sound of the rushing carriage, the darkness of the tunnel, the glories of the dawning day, and felt around him the bright fresh sunlit air that made all nature glad. They drove out to the balloon, which was down by the gasworks, and was now in process of inflation. Josiah looked upon % the monster, swerving first to the right and then to the left, and threatening every moment to break its bonds and go off on its own account. If it only would, what a happy conclusion of this painful adventure! But he could see there was no such danger. The Captain was as cheerful as a lark, and looked with kindling eye upon what Josiah regarded as his coffin. Still, it was no use complaining. A man must die sometime ; and though there is much to be said against the process being hurried on by unnecessary attempts .to cross the Channel in a balloon, when there are well-ap-pointed packet-boats, it was no use arguing the matter. There settled upon Josiah a certain mood of quiet despair. What must be, must, and it was better to avoid a scene, and imitate as closely as possible the cheerful indifference of the Captain. " Now, old man, in you tumble," said the Captain. " Sit down in the bottom of the car, and keep quiet till we get past this stack of chimneys. If we run into them its all over ; but I reckon I'll take you clear." - This was a cheerful thing to start with. Josiah had pictured all kind of horrors, ending with the certainty of dropping into the sea. That they should begin with a stack of chimneys was an unexpected aggravation. Still it might be better to get it over at once. At least he would fall on land, and the fragments picked up would receive Christian burial. He got in and sat in the bottom of the car, It was, he noticed, something like one of the coracles of which he had made mention in the preface to," Underground England." There was something good in that. The Romans made long journeys in the coracle. If the worst came to the worst, they might float. .< Even ih the anguish of his' mind, he couldn't tielp wondering when Captain Mul.berry would finish coming in. He had neverbefore noticed how tall he was, till he found 'the necessity of getting out of the way of his legs as he crept between the ropes into the car. 1 " Let go all !" cried the Captain, and Josiah felt his last hour had come. He held his 'breath and stack to his hat, being under the impression that the whole affair would shoot up into , the air t like a rocket. He. expected to be deafened with the, noise of .whizzing,, through- thes,sir, and ;to tie half suffocated < with the irtfsb, pf wind, -<> Looking over to get.a last look at the nature of the soil on Aybich the rVpuld presm%HkHf^OHaliH)eheld^ »« ? strange^ sight. As'faras he Ipiewjthe ballbdn) |,was motionless, whUethe,ewth- was jrapidly^fromiiuider ;4hem'V?S -ffie^laWvOfS ;vreret irrevocably ; brpTien,*andathe> l^orld^»rf fftflinglthrdrtfgb: »p«ce. \ * „,r *\\

" Done it 1" lie heard the Captain cry in a voice that sounded curiously remote. " Done what ?" said Josiah, anxiously looking up. 41 Why, the chimney-stack. Just cleared it by half a foot. I didn't like to say much about it, but it was a pretty near touch-and-go affair. That's the worst of filling a balloon. You must do it near a gasworks, and there's sure to be a stack of chimneys at hand. It seemed but a moment since Josiah had heard the Captain call out "Let go all," and there they were in space a thousand feet above the level of the land, sailing calmly along in bright warm sunlight, and with no more motion perceptible than if they were still sitting in the room in King street — that cherished apartment which Josiah felt his eye would never light on more. " This won't do," said the Captain, sternly ; " we've got into a wrong current, and instead of going out to sea are going inland. In half-an-hour we'll be at Canterbury." " I've heard Canterbury's a nice old town," said Josiah. "It wouldn't be a bad place to stop at 1 and if the wind's contrary to-day, it might be right to-morrow." The Captain said nothing, and Josiah, looking up to see what effect his suggestion might have, noticed for the first time that on a face usually smiling there were possibilities of a fixed hard look which it evidently didn't beseem him to trifle with. The balloon slowly rose, till the aneroid marked a height of 1,500 feet, and still the current drove it steadily north-west. Looking southward, Josiah beheld a sight, which, if it were the last he was ever to look upon, was at least, a glorious glimpse of earth, and sky, and sea. There lay the Channel gleaming in the sun, a broad belt of silver. Beyond it, like a cloud , was France. Dover had vanished even to the crest of the castle on the hill. But Jcsiah knew where it was, by the mist that lay over it, and shone white in the rays of the sun. Save for this patch of mist, which seemed to drift with the voyagers far below the car, there was nothing to obscure the range of vision. Josiah could not at any time make out forms of people. The white highways that ran like threads among the fields, and the tiny openings in the towns and villages which he guessed were streets, seemed to belong to a dead world, for nowhere was there trace of living person. The strange stillnesss that brooded over the earth was made more uncanny, by cries that occasionally seemed to float in the air around them, behind, before, to the right, or to the left, but never exactly beneath the car. They could hear people calling, and the Captain said that they were running after the balloon and cheering. But Josiah could distinguish no moving thing. Yes ; once he saw some pheasants running across a field below, and pointed them out to the Captain. The Captain laughed, a strange resonant laugh it seemed in this upper stillness, and said they were " a lot of chestnut horses capering about in the field." A flock of sheep in another field huddled together, looked like a heap of limestone chippings, As for the fields, stretched out in illimitable extent, far as the eye could reach, they seemed to form a gigantic carpet, with patterns chiefly diamond-shaped, and in colour shaded from bright emerald to russet brown. " This won't do," the Captain said again, and seizing a bag of ballast, he emptied it. The balloon swiftly rose, and the aneroid marked 2,500 feet. The villages seemed mere spots, the pattern of the carpet grew blurred, Nothing was distinguishable— nor horse, nor sheep, nor any living thing. "Hurrah!" cried the Captain, "we're off

Nearer and nearer came the belt of silver, which seemed to girdle continent and island. They were close to Dover, and could make out the town. Josiah, knowing well the irregular plan on which the streets are laid out, was struck by the manner in which, as looked down upon from this height, they formed themselves into beautifully denned curves, straight lines, and . other highly respectable geometrical shapes. They saw the castle and the pier, with what seemed to be ants crawling on it. A little patch of colour, that to Josiah looked like a ball of scarlet worsted, was,' the Captain said, a sentry on duty. "There's Shakespeare's Cliff," said the Captain. "The Earl Gloucester should be with us now : — How fearful And dizzy 'tis, to cast one's eyes so low I The crows and choughs that wing the midway air Show scarce so gross as beetles ; half-way down Hangs one that gathers samphire, dreadful trade 1 Methinks he seems no bigger than his head : The fishermen that walk upon the beach Appear like mico ; and yon tall anchoring bark, Diminish'd to her cock ; her cock a buoy Almost too small for sight." " I'll look no more, said JosJnh, who also knew his Shakespeare, " Lest my brain turn, and the deficient sight Topple down headlong." It was passing strange, and at first dreadful, this intense silence, and this strangeness of the familiar earth. But after a while everything like terror passed away from Josiah's mind. He began to feel the fascination of the thing. His spirits rose as he breathed the delicious air, and when the Captain said, "We are over the water now," and Josiah, looking down, discerned the sea gleaming below, he could have clapped his hands for joy"This is splendid," said the Captain. " We'll be across in half an hour. We'll catch the train to Paris, and you shall dance at the Closerie to-night." Josiah didn't dance, and didn't know what the Closerie might be. But he was not without susceptibility to the allurement of a quiet dinner in Paris, and began to feel the exhilaration of having accomplished a perilous feat, to which he would certainly drag in some reference in his great work. It would be difficult, as he was as far as possible remote from Underground England. But it. might be worked in, in some antithetical sentence. After they had sailed for the space of ten minutes, the Captain, who had been throwing out bits of paper, which they left far behind, suddenly said a bad word. " We are becalmed," he continued, and truly the bits of paper flung out, floated idly round the balloon. "We must get out of this." He cast out the ballast, bag after bag, and higher still they soared. Nevertheless, whenever they flung out the bit 3 of paper, they floated here and there^" some dropping back into the car. "There goes our last bag of ballast," said the Captain, " and may luck go with it. We are lost men unless it takes us into another current, which, let us hope, won't be ooming from the East, and carry us out into the Atlantic." i Up again they mounted, how many feefc Josiah didn't know, but he was sensible of a pudden iciness in the atmosphere, a tingling of the blood at his finger ends, and a strong disposition to, bleed at the nose. The captain threw out- some niore bits of paper. Still they circled round and round, dropping into \ the car or falling to the distent earth now utterly out of sight. They bad % passed through the cloud; -and had' above them a chilly sun and ! ah intensely blue ' sky.' Below them were the clouds, on one of s which ! was' cle*rly caught ihe "shadows of the balloon, .Josiah, when he moved his head, could, see an ( answering motion on th 6' cloud,, and recognised the reflection of . the i Captain's; figure, sitting stern and erec^withhia teeth set , and 9. jobk of his Jbrpw. , ( r. Thisyfrightened' tfosiah* » .jgteat deal more, s tKan;the^Gapt4in's%ords. >He felt*tbjrt /they* #e^B, .lost' ihaspswei' »nd|th%t the end/«Mtet

>pe^aly conic. That teniblo look on the Captain's face made him sick at 'heart. 41 Mr. Smith," said the Captain, speaking scarcely above a whisper, but his voice sounding as if he were shouting from the housetops, "You told me you were not a married man." •i Yes," said Josiah, " I have never been married/ , " That is so, or I should not have asked you to come ( with me. And you have not many relations?" "No," said Josiah, " there are not many that would miss me." " Very well," said the Captain, " I have ; but your life is as valuable as mine, and I would hold you at no disadvantage. The fact is, we are becalmed, and there is no prospect of any wind reaching us here till night, when we shan't know which way we are drifting, and may as well give up all hope. There is wind overhead, I know, and it is going straight for France. If we could get up another thousand feet or so, we should catch the current and be overland in ten minutes. But all the ballast has gone, and there's only one thing to be done." " What's that?" asked Josiah, faintly. " One of us must go overboard," said the Captain. Josiah felt his heart sink within him. " I am not sure that it would be much use my going over," the Captain continued, discussing the matter as quietly as if he werejarranging what they should have for dinner. " I'm such a thundering weight, you'd shoot up till you bumped your head against Jupiter ; and besides, you would not know what to do with the balloon if I was gone. Still, I think we should have equal chances. Now, I'll give you the first chance. You get hold of me and try to push me over. If I go, you will find the balloon shoot up ; but don't be frightened, you'll be all right in a bit, and can let out a few feet of gas. If you can't get me over — well, I must try to get you over — hold on a bit till 1 light a cigar." In the calm still air the Captain struck a light, bending low in the car to avoid contact of flame and gas, bit the end of a cigar, and lit it. Josiah, shaking with terror, could see in the shadow of the balloon on the cloud the smoke curling up from the cigar, and lazily spreading itself out. " Now, old chappie," said the Captain, " I'm ready. Heave hard, and over 1, g0." What was the use of disputing with a man like this ? Josiah never had been inclined to fight with men of strong will. He was certain he could not move the Captain, but he was able to try, and try he did. He got one foot over the car, the Captain encouraging him and cheerfully Bmoking. " Very well done, old man. A few more tugs and over we go. I'll just have time to finish my cigar before I get to the bottom. Josiah tugged and tugged till he felt the warm blood rushing throngh his veins and his breath came short. But though he might move one of the Captain's collossal legs, which seemed to his disordered fancy to be the size of the Monument, he could do no more. The Captain sat passive, encouraging him by every kindly phrase he could think of. But it was of no use, and after ten minutes' violent strugglingJosiah jthrew himself back in the car. " Very sorry old man," said the Captain, with a tone of unmistakeable sincerity, " Thought once you'd have done it ; but I've got a little out of training lately and run up half a stun. Now I must Bee what I can do with you." First of all he tore off some slips of paper and threw them out. Josiah looked at them with hungry eyes. Bound and round they spun, falling back into the car or dropping to the world beyond the clouds. There was no hope of movement for the balloon. " Well, Mr. Smith, it's your turn now. I must see what I can do. It's not nice for either of us, but it would be no nicer to stay here and be starved to death or blown out to sea. You won't feel anything after the first rush. Good-bye. I am sorry there will be no opportunity of my communicating with you as to the result of this interesting experiment. I don't suppose," the Captain added, his love of scientific research increasing his unfeigned regret for the inconvenience Josiah was about to suffer, "that ever before ten stun was dropped out of a car in a lump. I reckon I'll get as high as most people have been. Now, if you've any message, just hand it over. If I ' can do anything for you in King Street or anywhere else, you may depend upon

" No," said Josiah, gulping down a rising sob ; "if you will only say I went off bravely and didn't flinch, that will be all. Perhaps you might write a few lines by way of preface to i "Underground England," pointing out that I died in the interest of science." " Certainly, my dear fellow, it shall be done," said the Captain, with quite a glow of honest energy. "If you'd like a little monument or anything of that sort, I'll see it's run up. Now, over you go. Time's getting on, and I don't want to miss the Paris train. Give us a shake of your paw, then shut your eyes, for I fancy I shan't have much difficulty with you. Heave your watch over or take it with you?" "If you wouldn't mind accepting it," said Josiah, pulling out his fine old turnip-shaped time-piece, "as a memento of our friendship which, though brief, has, I trust, been sincere — it would give me great pleasure." " Certainly," said the Captain, weighing it in his hand critically, and thinking to himself that it might serve as ballast in a last emergency. " I'll hang it over my bed, and will think of you whenever it ticks. Nothing more to say ?" " No," said Josiah; " only,' please to drop me feet first." The Captain took him up in his arms as if he were a child, held him for a moment over the side of the car, and with a;cheery farewell dropped him. Josiah felt his hat go, and could see the balloon shoot up with tremendous rapidity, though, as be reckoned, the rate of velocity would need to be divided by about half, as he was simultaneously descending rapidly. He felt the rush of air, and shrank from the moment, coming nearer and nearer, when he should strike the earth. He seemed an unconscionably long time falling. Still, through the clouds he went, and, as it seemed to him at the end of five minutes, began to get glimpses of the earth. Down he went like a shot. The rushing noise in his ears grew more intolerable. There was a swift upgrowth of the hedgerows, a sudden vision of cows and horses, and of people running across fields. Then a heavy bump, and Josiah, opening his eyes, found hitnself lying on the floor in the room in King Street. On the table were an empty claret bottle and two tumblers. The room was full of the smoke, now growing stale, of cigars. Josiah was shivering with cold, and the room was dark save from what light flickered in from the lamp down the street. He struck a light and there in its accustomed place on the mantelpiece was his watch, the hands pointing to three o'clock. Dazed and shivering he crept into bed, where he thought the matter over, and amid much that was bewildering groped his way to the conclusion that Captain • Mulberry really had come into his room, had spent- an hour with him, smoked*' cigars, .{trunk claret, and then gone off. He remember standing at the head of the stairs shaking hands withliim,<and promising to dine with' him at his dub one day in thtffollowing week* • Then he had gone back and lain on the coucb n where, v overcome Tilth . the unaccustomed" tumbler 6f cltoel *nd dazed with the tobadccn •smoke^rhehad fallen asleep, dreamed, and^ IP^^ntytheflodr, - '„ •)%•■ ■£>■•*