Mr. Hampton was the next person who attempted the experiment, and made three descents in a Parachute in succession without injury. Undeterred by the awful fate of his predecessor, this gentleman determined on making a Parachute descent which should prove the correctness of the theory, and the Montpellier Gardens at Cheltenham were selected as the scene of the exploit. Owing to the censure which was attached to the proprietors of the Vauxhall Gardens, for permitting docking's ascent, the owners of the Gardens at Cheltenham would not suffer the experiment to be made, and Mr. Hampton was obliged to have recourse to stratagem. As he was permitted to display his Parachute in the manner he intended to use it, the idea suddenly flashed across his mind that, he could carry out his long-nursed wishes. He suddenly cut the rope which kept him down, and went off, to the astonishment of the spectators: the last cheering sound that reached him being--"He will be killed to a dead certainty!" After attaining an altitude of nearly two miles, Mr. Hampton proceeded to cut the rope that held him attached to the balloon. He paused for a second or two, as he remembered that it would soon be life or death with him, but at length drew his knife across the rope. The first feelings he experienced were both unpleasant and alarming; his eyes and the top of his head appeared to be forced upwards, but this passed off in a few seconds, and his feelings subsequently became pleasant, rather than disagreeable. So steady and slow was the descent that the Parachute appeared to be stationary. Mr. Hampton remembered that a bag of ballast was fastened beneath the car, he stooped over and upset the sand, he also noted by his watch the time he occupied in descending. The earth seemed coming up to him rapidly; the Parachute indicated its approach to _terra, firma_ by a slight oscillation, and he presently struck the ground in the centre of a field, where he was first welcomed by a sheep, which stared at this visitor from the clouds in utter amazement. Mr. Hampton repeated the experiment twice in London, though on both occasions with considerable danger to himself, the first time falling on a tree in Kensington Gardens, the second on a house, which threw him out of the basket. After this experiment there was a lull in the Parachute folly until some twenty years ago, when Madame Poitevin startled the Metropolis from its propriety by her perilous escapes both in life and limb. Although considerable ingenuity was displayed in the plan of expanding the Parachute by the sudden discharge of gas from the balloon; still the very fact of a woman being exposed to such danger by her husband, will, we trust, hereafter prevent Englishmen from countenancing such an exhibition by their presence. CHAPTER V. UMBRELLA STORIES.