The cross-Channel prize, above mentioned, was a cash sum of one thousand pounds, offered by the _London Daily Mail_ for the first successful flight from France to England. Many would fain have it, though the voyage seemed dangerous, if not foolhardy. Of the various aviators who coveted the prize, Latham and Blériot were the most strenuous in competing for it. The bold boy tried first. Housing his aëroplane on the high cliff facing the Channel near Calais, Latham looked toward England, impatiently waiting for placid weather, and a chance to soar. The venture was hazardous. By some it was deemed rash, owing to the uncertainty of having to alight upon the water, if the motor should fail. But the brave youth was less alarmed than the old aviators, who had no intention of competing with him. So, with a boy’s confidence, he brought forth his huge-winged _Antoinette_, on July 19th, skimmed along the ground, soared grandly above the high cliffs, and sped over the waters at a great elevation, as usual in his aërial voyages. Latham’s flight was magnificent, but brief. Owing to spark failure and the stoppage of his motor six miles from the French shore, he settled promptly, but skillfully, down upon the sea. When found by the accompanying torpedo boat destroyer, detailed to follow him from Calais, he was seated on the aëroplane, serenely smoking, buoyed up by the great hollow wings. He was quickly brought to shore, undaunted and eager for another trial; but in the rescue his frail flyer was roughly handled and very much wrecked. Louis Blériot now hurried to Calais eager to attempt the cross-Channel flight. Placing his little monoplane, _No. XI_, in a tent on a farm near Calais, he waited an opportune moment to sail. On Sunday, July 25th, he was routed from bed very early by his friend, Alfred LeBlanc, and taken forth all reluctant to the field, for preliminary practice before sunrise; for the weather was favorable and he should sail as soon as the sun arose. Though suffering from a foot burned in a recent accident, he discarded his crutches and mounted his winged machine with eager courage, remarking: “If I cannot walk I will show the world that I can fly.” For some minutes he circled about the ground where, even at that early hour, many scores of people were assembling. All was now in readiness; the flyer was in excellent trim, the pilot in buoyant spirits, and the torpedo boat destroyer, _Escopette_, well out at sea to escort her swift aërial charge as well as might be.