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Fall ten times treble on that cursed head, Whose wicked deed thy most ingenious sense Deprived thee of !"

Only "when they shall meet at compt" will even Hamlet know the grief he has brought upon, the wrong he has done to, this deep and guileless spirit. So far as we see, he has indeed blotted her from his mind as a "trivial fond record." He is so self-cenrred, so wrapped up in his own suffering, that he has no thought to waste on the delicate girl whom he had wooed with such a "fire of love," and had taught to listen to his most honeyed vows. He casts her from him like a worthless weed, without a word of explanation or a quiver of remorse. Let us hope that when he sees her grave his conscience stings him; but beyond ranting louder than Laertes about what he would do for her sake-and she dead!there is not much sign of his love being worthy, at any time, of the sweet life lost for it.

Perhaps you will think that, in the fulness of my sympathy for Ophelia, I feel too little for Hamlet. But this is not really so. One cannot judge Hainlet's actions by ordinary rules. He is involved in the meshes of a ruthless destiny, from which by nature and temperament he is powerless to extricate himself. In the infirmity of a character which

expends its force in words and shrinks from resolute action, he drags down Ophelia unconsciously with him. They are the victims of the same inexorable fate. I could find much to say in explanation and in extenuation of the shortcomings of one on whom a task was laid which he of all men, by the essential elements of his character, seemed least fitted to accomplish.

But you see, I only touch upon his character, so far as it bears upon Ophelia, on what he is and has been to her. Before the story begins, he has offered her his love "in honorable fashion." Then we hear from her of the silent interview which so affrights her. After this, when for the first time we see them together, he treats her as only a madman could, and in a way which not even his affectation of madness can excuse. Again, in the play-scene which follows, the same wilfulness, even insolence, of manner is shown to her. Now, whatever his own troubles, perplexities, heartbreaks, might be, it is hard to find an apology for such usage of one whose heart he could not but know he had won. He is even tenderer, more considerate, to his mother, whom he thinks so wanton and so guilty, than to this young girl, whom he has "importuned with love," and "given countenance to his speech with almost all the holy vows of heaven."

I cannot, therefore, think that Hamlet comes out well in his relations with Ophelia. I do not forget what he says at her grave :

'I loved Ophelia; forty thousand brothers Could not, with all their quantity of love, Make up my sum !"

But I weigh his actions against his words, and find them wanting. The very language of his letter to Ophelia, which Polonius reads to the king and queen, has not the true ring in it. It comes from the head, and not from the heart-it is a string of euphuisms, which almost justifies Laertes' warning to his sister, that the "trifling of Hamlet's favor" is but "the perfume and suppliance of a minute.' Hamlet loves, I have always felt, only in a dreamy, imaginative way, with a love as deep, perhaps, as can be felt by a nature fuller of thought and contemplation than of sympathy and passion. Ophelia dues not

sway his whole being, perhaps no woman could, as he sways hers. Had she done so, not even the task imposed upon him by his father's spirit could have made him blot her love from his mind as "a trivial fond record," for it would have been interwoven inseparably with his soul once and forever.

When Ophelia comes before us for the last time, with her lap full of flowers, to pay all honor and reverence, as she thinks, in country fashion, to her father's grave, the brother is by her side, of whom she had said before, most significantly, that he should know of it." "I cannot choose but weep, to think they should lay him i' the cold ground." Then he can lavish in her heedless ears the kind phrases, the words of love, of which in her past days he had been too sparing. "O rose of May! dear maid, kind sister, sweet Ophelia!" But the smiles are gone which would once have greeted these kind words. He has passed out of her memory, even as she had passed out of his, when he was "treading the primrose path of dalliance' in sunny France. She has no thought but to bury the dead-her dead love-her old father taking the outward form of it. Even the flowers she has gathered have little beauty or sweetness

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rosemary for remembrance; pray you, love, remember'-he has said he never gave her aught! "I loved you not”—“rue," for desolation; fennel, and columbines-a daisy, the only pleasant flower-with pansies for thoughts. Violets she would give, but cannot. "They withered all" with her dead love. To Ophelia's treatment of her brother in this scene I ventured to give a character which I cannot well describe, but which, as I took care it should not be obtrusive, and only as a part of the business of the scene, I felt sure that my great master, the actor-author, would not have objected. I tried to give not only his words, but, by a sympathetic interpretation, his deeper meaning--a meaning to be apprehended only by that sympathy which arises in, and is the imagination of, the heart.

When Laertes approaches Ophelia, something in his voice and look brings back a dim flitting remembrance; she gives him of her flowers, and motions

him to share in the obsequies she is paying. When her eyes next fall upon him, she associates him somehow with the "tricks i' the world." A faint remembrance comes over her of his warning words, of the shock they gave her, and of the misery which came so soon afterward. These she pieces together with her "half sense," and thinks he is the cause of all. She looks upon him with doubt, even aversion; and, when he would approach her, shrinks away with threatening gestures and angry looks. All this was shown only at intervals, and with pauses between-mostly by looks and slight action-a fitful vagueness being indicated throughout. The soul of sense being gone, the sweet mind had. become "such stuff as dreams are made of.". The body bore some resemblance to the rose of May; but it was only as the casket without the jewel. Nothing was left there of the thoughtful, reticent, gentle Ophelia. The unobtrusive calm which had formerly marked her demeanor had changed to waywardness. The forcing her way into the presence of the queen, where she had been used to go only when called, clamoring for her will, and with her winks, nods, and gestures, strewing dangerous conjectures in illbreeding minds,' tells with a terrible emphasis how all is changed, and how her reason too has become "like sweet bells jangled, out of tune and harsh."

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Poor rose of May! Who does not give a sigh, a sob of grief, at miserable Gertrude's beautiful account of the watery death of this fragile bud, cut down by a cold spring storm, before her true midsummer had arrived? She sings her own requiem, and carries the flowers of her innocence along with her to the end. Like the fabled swan, with her death-song on her lips, she floats unconsciously among the water-lilies, till the kindly stream embraces and takes her to itself, and to "that blessed last of deaths, where death is dead."

Dear friend, these are little better than rough notes. I have written much, yet seem to have said nothing. "Piece out my imperfections with your thoughts." Yours always affectionately,

HELENA FAUCIT MARTIN. To MISS GERALDINE E. JEWSBury.

Blackwood's Magazine.

AERIAL NAVIGATION.

BY DR. WILLIAM POLE, F.R.S.

CONSIDERING the vast development of mechanical invention and enterprise that has taken place in the last century, it is singular that so little serious attention should have been bestowed on the balloon. The brilliant invention of Montgolfier and Charles, from which so much was expected on its first appearance, has been hitherto little more than a toy; the attempts to take advantage of it for any useful object have been but few, and of very limited scope. Balloons have been used to provide elevated posts of observation for military purposes, and they have also served to aid the investigation of meteorological phenomena; but otherwise little or nothing has been done with them. It would seem that the most obvious function of a balloon is to afford a means of transport through the air, just as the most obvious function of a boat is to provide transport on the water; yet, strange to say, this function has been, so far as any general application of it is concerned, entirely ignored. The aëronaut who usually accompanies a balloon is content simply to go wherever the wind may carry him; the idea that he should exercise any volition as to his course or his goal is one that is scarcely ever entertained.

We cannot have a better proof of this than by referring to the scheme lately discussed for a new voyage of Arctic discovery. It is believed that the North Pole is surrounded by a tract of rough hummocky ice, which can neither be penetrated by boats nor traversed by sledges; and it has been proposed, reasonably enough, to explore it by the aid of balloons. There has been much discussion as to the best mode of using these, but no one appears to have contemplated the possibility of exercising any mechanical control over their movements, a resource which, it is hardly necessary to say, would, under the circumstances, be of the greatest value. We hear from time to time of aëronautical societies, and even of aërostatic competitions, but we look in vain for any attempts to convert balloons into useful locomotive machines; and it is a fair in

ference from this fact that such an idea has been generally considered too chimerical to deserve serious study. There cannot be two opinions as to the extreme interest that would attach to the use of balloons for aërial locomotion, if such an object could be brought about. Man has obtained a command over the means of transport by land and by water; why should he not exercise a similar dominion over the regions of the air? I propose to inquire into the state of this question. It can be shown that the problem is one perfectly amenable to mechanical investigation; that it has already received some careful study from very competent men; and that practical attempts have been made at its solution, which have not only given favorable results, but have furnished valuable data for carrying the investigation further. It will be instructive, therefore, to endeavor to ascertain, in the first place, what prospect of success is offered by reasoning, theoretically, on these data, and secondly, what is the nature of the practical difficulties that lie in the way.

The desire expressed by the poetical aspiration, "Oh, that I had wings like a dove," must have been one of the earliest known to man ; and the perception that flying was a purely mechanical operation must always have prevented the desire being entirely hopeless. But the difficulties were enormous until the invention of the balloon did away with the most formidable of them by counteracting the gravity of the flying body. This was so great a step that the first result of the invention was to produce a general impression that aërial locomotion was at once about to become universal. Indeed, the unreasoning enthusiasm of the multitude went so far as even to anticipate the possibility of visiting the moon and the planets, or of exploring the realms of infinite space among the fixed stars.

Sensible men, though they did not indulge in such fancies, still set themselves to work to cultivate the newly-acquired power; for no sooner had the buoyancy of the balloon been established than at-.

tempts were made to gain a control over the direction of its flight. As early as December, 1783-i.e., only six months after Montgolfier's first public experiment-the great philosopher Lavoisier gave before the French Academy* an admirable résumé of the conditions which should be fulfilled in aërostatic machines, and which are as perfectly applicable now as they were then. In studying the subject he saw clearly that a control might be obtained over the movement of the balloon by reaction against the air, on the principle of wings or oars; and accordingly the last of his conditions runs thus:

"Enfin, en employant la force des hommes, il paraît constant qu'on pourra l'écarter de la direction du vent sous un angle de plusieurs degrés."

This, as we shall see, exactly describes what was practically done a century later; and thus we find that (to use a word that has been coined for the purpose) the idea of a dirigible balloon is as old as the balloon itself.

Lavoisier's idea was discussed by the Montgolfiers, who proposed to adapt oars to their machines; and other early aëronauts from time to time made experiments with apparatus of the same kind. But although the general principle was incontestably sound, the conditions of the problem had not been sufficiently studied, and none of these attempts had any practical result. Hence arose an impression that aërial navigation was unattainable, and this impression appears to have prevailed down to the present day. People have made up their minds that a balloon can only float in the atmosphere, being carried passively along by any current that may happen to prevail.

It was only a few years ago that two clever and enterprising individuals undertook to reinvestigate the question, and to try whether the principle of reaction against the air might not, when more favorably applied, be made really to influence the path of the balloon. The problem, they perceived, was one largely analogous to that of aquatic navigation. In ships the steering is done by means of that very simple and elegant

* Reprinted in the "Comptes Rendus," vol. lxxi. p. 608.

contrivance the rudder; but to make the rudder act the vessel must have "way" through the fluid in which she floats; and it was seen that if the balloon could only be given some independent velocity through the fluid, instead of moving helplessly with it, the rudder could be brought into action, and the whole. machine might be efficiently steered.

The first person who did this was a M. Henri Giffard, a young French engineer, who, though then unknown, has since made his name famous by other brilliant mechanical inventions; and it will be instructive to note the way in which he set about his work, as it will give a fair idea of the conditions of the problem.

He saw, in the first place, that the form of the balloon must be changed. If a balloon has only to float passively in the air, the globular shape is the most proper, as giving the greatest ascending power with the smallest surface of envelope; but if it has to move through the air, this shape is objectionable, as offering too great a resistance to motion. This is the same principle that obtains in water navigation; a globular shape would be proper enough for a buoy, but is quite unsuitable for a boat, which must be elongated, diminishing at the bow and stern, so as to reduce as low as possible the proportion of resistance to capacity. A dirigible balloon must be similarly formed, and, though it will lose in floating power, the loss must be submitted to as a necessity if any speed worth having is to be attained. To complete the analogy of water navigation, this elongated vessel must have a keel, to preserve its general linear motion, and a rudder, to allow of lateral deviations when desired.

The next requisite was to provide the propelling surfaces to act against the surrounding air. There are many models of these of different kinds; there are the natural provisions of wings and fins, and there are also the artificial arrangements adopted by human ingenuity for aquatic motion, such as oars, paddlewheels, and the screw propeller. Of these a mechanic would clearly choose the last as by far the most convenient. And it is worthy of remark that this is already applied to aërial purposes, although conversely, in the common windmill. A current of air blowing on

the sails turns the axis with a certain force. It is easy to suppose the action reversed-i.e., to suppose a power applied to the axis inside the mill, which, turning the sails, would create a current of air, or by reaction against it would give propulsion to the whole building if it were free to move.

Finally, M. Giffard wanted a power to work his screw, and for this he resolved to follow directly the model of modern marine navigation by employing a steamengine.

Having duly settled his design, he made his balloon. It was of elongated shape, pointed at the ends, nearly 40 feet diameter in the middle and 144 feet long. The car was suspended by a net in the usual way, and there was a large movable triangular sail attached to the stern, serving as keel and rudder. The car contained a small steam-engine of three horse-power. It was a bold measure to put a roaring fiery furnace within a few feet of an immense reservoir of inflammable gas; but he took effective precautions for safety, among which was the ingenious expedient of turning the funnel downward, and producing the draught by a steam blast, as in the railway locomotive. The engine turned a screw I feet diameter, which could be given 110 revolutions per minute.

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M. Giffard ascended from the Hippodrome, in Paris, on the 24th of September, 1852. Having arrived at a convenient height, he started his engine; and what was his delight, on pulling one of the cords of the rudder, to see the horizon begin to turn round like the moving picture in a diorama! The machine was really under way;" it was being steered like a ship at sea. In short, the balloon was " dirigible," and the problem of aërial navigation was practically solved. The wind was too high for him to hope to move against it, but he performed with perfect success several manœuvres of circular movement and lateral deviation. He descended safely, and he found, when he came to calculate his course, that his engine and screw had impressed on the balloon an inde

pendent velocity through the air of from 2 to 3 metres per second, or 4 to 6 miles per hour.

Reviewing his results, he says that, in the absence of all previous experience, he had conceived some doubts about the stability of the new form, but he adds:

"L'expérience est venue pleinement rassurer à cet égard, et prouver que l'emploi d'un aérostat allongé, le seul que l'on puisse espérer diriger convenablement, était, sous tous les autres rapports, aussi avantageux que possible, et que le danger résultant de la réunion du feu et d'un gaz inflammable pouvait être complètement illusoire. . . . Si l'on réfléchit aux difficultés de toute nature qui doivent entourer ces premières expériences avec les moyens d'exécution excessivement restreints, et à l'aide de matériaux imparfaits, on sera convaincu que les résultats obtenus, quelque incomplets qu'ils soient encore, doivent conduire, dans un avenir prochain, à quelque chose de positif et de pratique."

His experiment made a great sensation, and he was called the Fulton of aërial navigation. Victor Hugo, some years later, having, no doubt, this experiment in view, wrote as follows to Gaston Tissandier:

"I believe in all kinds of progress. The navigation of the air must follow that of the ocean. Man will penetrate into every part of the creation where respiration is possible to him. Our sole limit is life. At that point where we cease to find a column of air of sufficient pressure to prevent our machine from tursting, man should stop. But he can go, ought to go, and will go thus far. The future is for aërial navigation, and the duty of the present is to work for the future.”

The other attempt at aërial navigation was not, like M. Giffard's, one of mere scientific experiment, but was dictated by an important need. During the siege of Paris by the Germans in 1870, balloons were used to a large extent, as is matter of history, in order to get dispatches out of the city. They were unfortunately not available for communication in the opposite direction, but it occurred to the authorities that if it were possible to give them even a slight guiding power they might be made so. was accordingly taken up by M. Dupuy de Lôme, the chief naval architect of this great maritime power, and certainly a more competent person could not have * His description of the balloon and its voy- been chosen. He was allowed a grant age was published in La Presse of the 25th of September, and was reprinted eighteen years periments, and he proceeded at once to of money by the Government for the exlater in the " Comptes Rendus,' vol. lxxi. p. 683.

The subject

design a balloon. His proceedings were

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