Marie Madeleine Blanchard, despite her natural timidity, resolved to adopt her husband's perilous profession. Pride and necessity combined do wonders; and not only did she succeed in maintaining perfect composure while in the air, but she also displayed wonderful presence of mind during the time of danger. On one occasion she ascended in her balloon from Nantes, intending to come down at about four leagues from that town, in what she believed to be a large meadow. While rapidly descending, the cordage of the balloon became entangled in the branches of a tree, and she found herself suspended over a vast green marsh, whose treacherous mud would infallibly ingulf her. Drawn to the spot by her cries, several peasants came to her assistance, and with considerable difficulty and danger succeeded in placing her on terra firma. On the day following the one on which she dined with M. and Mme. Bilderdyk, Mme. Blanchard left Paris, promising her two friends, as she bade them farewell, that she would soon return. Time passed on, however, and they heard nothing of her. They were preparing to return to Holland, when some of Bilderdyk's countrymen residing in Paris resolved to give him a banquet on the eve of his departure. The entertainment took place at a celebrated restaurant, situated at the angle formed by the Rue Cauchat and the Rue de Provence. While enjoying themselves at table, the guests suddenly perceived the windows darkened by the passing of some large black object. With one accord they rose and ran out: a woman lay on the pavement, pale, crushed, and dead. Bilderdyk gave a cry--it was Mme. Blanchard! In what a guise to meet her again! Encouraged by the constant impunity of her perilous ascensions, the unhappy aëronaut (the word I believe has no feminine), finding a formidable rival in Mlle. Garnerin, resolved to surpass her in daring by augmenting the risk of her aërial voyages. For this purpose she lighted up her balloon car with colored lamps, and carried with her a supply of fireworks. On the sixth of July, 1819, she rose from amid a vast concourse of spectators. The balloon caught in one of the trees in the Champs-Elysées, but without regarding the augury, Mme. Blanchard threw out ballast, and as she rose rapidly in the air she spilled a quantity of lighting spirits of wine, and then sent off rockets and Roman candles. Suddenly, with horror, the mass of upturned eyes beheld the balloon take fire. One piercing shriek from above mingled with the affrighted cries of the crowd below, and then some object was seen to detach itself from the fiery globe. As it came near the earth, it was recognized as the body of the ill-fated Mme. Blanchard.