Among the expedients to which Astley occasionally had recourse for the purpose of drawing a great concourse of people to the Surrey side of the Thames was a balloon ascent, an attraction frequently had recourse to in after times at Vauxhall, the Surrey Gardens, Cremorne, the Crystal Palace, and other places of popular resort. The balloon was despatched from St George’s Fields on the 12th of March, 1784, ‘in the presence,’ says a writer in the _Gentleman’s Magazine_, ‘of a greater number of spectators than were, perhaps, ever assembled together on any occasion;’ and he adds that, ‘many of the spectators will have reason to remember it; for a more ample harvest for the pickpockets never was presented. Some noblemen and gentlemen lost their watches, and many their purses. The balloon, launched about half-past one in the afternoon, was found at Faversham.’ This ascent took place within two months after that of the Montgolfiere balloon at Lyons, and was, therefore, probably the first ever attempted in this country; while, by a strange coincidence, the first aerostatic experiment ever made in Scotland was made on the same day that Astley’s ascended, but about an hour later, from Heriot’s Gardens, Edinburgh. Horace Walpole writes, in allusion to a subsequent balloon ascent, and the excitement which it created in the public mind,— ‘I doubt it has put young Astley’s nose out of joint, who went to Paris lately under their Queen’s protection, and expected to be Prime Minister, though he only ventured his neck by dancing a minuet on three horses at full gallop, and really in that attitude has as much grace as the Apollo Belvedere.’ The fame of the Astleys receives further illustration from a remark of Johnson’s, that ‘Whitfield never drew as much attention as a mountebank does: he did not draw attention by doing better than others, but by doing what was strange. Were Astley to preach a sermon standing on his head, or on a horse’s back, he would collect a multitude to hear him; but no wise man would say he had made a better sermon for that.’ The earliest displayed advertisement of Astley’s which I have been able to discover, is as follows, which appeared in 1788: ASTLEY’S AMPHITHEATRE, WESTMINSTER BRIDGE. YOUNG ASTLEY’S SURPRISING EQUESTRIAN EXERCISES. _In the intervals_ A NEW WAR ENTERTAINMENT, In which will be introduced a SINGLE COMBAT with the BROADSWORD between YOUNG ASTLEY, as a British Sailor, and MR J. TAYLOR, as a Savage Chief; after which a General Engagement between British Sailors and Savages. The Scenery, Machinery, Songs, Dances, and Dresses, adapted to the manners of the different Countries. TUMBLING By a most capital Group. A NEW COMIC DANCE, CALLED THE GERMAN CHASSEURS,