We rise to a ticklish situation; there are tall trees, factory-chimneys, and protruding roofs all waiting calm and invisible in the night, to be crashed into and collided with. But all these obstacles we may miss if we have only sufficient preparatory lift. We are all silent and cowed, trying to make out each other’s faces. There is a sudden tearing sound. The craft lurches like a drunken man and we are thrown a struggling breathless mass into a corner. But the suspense is only momentary. By a miracle of grace, she frees herself from the branches of a tree, and soars rapidly heavenwards. Eagerly we watch the glimmering, winding streak of gray that is the river, and our only visible landmark; apparently we are making off in a north and west direction. Once out of the shelter of the houses and the trees, the breeze is stiffish: in fact, considerably more so than was expected. What is this sensation like? Dark to the left of us, dark to the right of us, dark on top of us, and darker below us; in a frail uncontrollable craft, that drifts aimlessly and helplessly before every varying wind of the heavens. Unlike the aeroplane the passage is easy and pleasant, free from noise and we know we are flying. North and west, but the first change of the wind, and we will be bowling along merrily in quite another direction. It is quiet, intensely quiet, no motion of any kind to be felt. But where are we? Occasionally we discover a small patch of light that may be a village, again a larger patch, evidently of a town. We watch the altimeter with as much loving care, as a mother would her child, for it is our sole deliverer from destruction. How it varies: now it is 8000 feet, now 2500. If possible, we try to keep above the latter level. The surface of the country is unfortunately not too level, and as the altimeter registers height above sea and not land level, allowance must be made. Ballast is ready to hand for emergency uses. At last the depressing silence is broken; one youth, wiser than his years, has remembered to provide himself with food. It is handed round, and over beef sandwiches we get communicative. It gives us fresh life and inspires one of the party with a humorous turn of mind, to recite with great vividness and vivacity all the alarming accidents that have befallen night-balloonists, concluding with an impious hope, “that we likewise may have some fun.” We get it! Happily, as we are wallowing in the throes of this most dismal expectancy, the conversation is turned by an eager and heated discussion between two younger members of the party, as to the merits and demerits of their respective musical-comedy idols (female). The argument grows in intensity. But we have neglected to watch the altimeter. Out of the inky darkness below there rushes a volcano of spark and flame. It is a railway-train speeding on through the night. Sheepishly we discover that we are only 800 feet, and wonder unpleasantly what might have been.