In order to comprehend the frenzy of the enthusiasm which the first aeronautic triumphs called forth, it is necessary to recall the appearance of Montgolfier at Versailles, on the 19th of September, 1783, before Louis XVI, or of the earliest aeronauts at the Tuileries. Paris hailed the first of these men with the greatest acclaim, “and then, as now,” says a French writer, “the voice of Paris gave the cue to France, and France to the world!” Nobles and artisans, scientific men and badauds, great and small, were moved with one universal impulse. In the streets the praises of the balloon were sung; in the libraries models of it abounded; and in the salons the one universal topic was the great “machine.” In anticipation, the poet delighted himself with bird’s-eye views of the scenery of strange countries; the prisoner mused on what might be a new way of escape; the physicist visited the laboratory in which the lightning and the meteors were manufactured; the geometrician beheld the plans of cities and the outlines of kingdoms; the general discovered the position of the enemy or rained shells on the besieged town; the police beheld a new mode in which to carry on the secret service; Hope heralded a new conquest from the domain of nature, and the historian registered a new chapter in the annals of human knowledge. “Scientific discoveries in general,” says Arago, “even those from which men expect the most advantage, like those of the compass and the steam-engine, were greeted at first with contempt, or at the best with indifference. Political events, and the fortunes of armies monopolised almost entirely the attention of the people. But to this rule there are two exceptions--the discoveries of America and of aerostatics, the advents of Columbus and of Montgolfier.” It is not here our duty to inquire how it happened that the discoveries made by these two personages are classed together. Air-travelling may be as unproductive of actual good to society as filling the belly with the “east wind” is to the body, while every one knows something of the extent to which the discovery of Columbus has influenced the character, the civilisation, the destinies, in short, of the human race. We are speaking at present of the known and well-attested fact, that the discovery of America and the discovery of the method of traversing space by means of balloons--however they may differ in respect of results to man--rank equally in this, that of all other discoveries these two have attracted the greatest amount of attention, and given, in their respective eras, the greatest impulse to popular feeling. Let the reader recall the marks of enthusiasm which the discovery of the islands on the east coast of America excited in Andalusia, in Catalonia, in Aragon and Castile--let him read the narrative of the honours paid by town and village, not only to the hero of the enterprise, but even to his commonest sailors, and