Your correspondent C.B.M. (Vol. ii., p 199.) will find a long article on
_AÎrostation_ in Rees' _CyclopÊdia_; but his inquiry reminds me of a
conversation I had with the late Sir Anthony Carlisle, about a year
before his death. He wished to consult me on the subject of flying by
mechanical means, and that I should assist him in some of his
arrangements. He had devoted many years of his life to the consideration
of this subject, and made numerous experiments at great cost, which
induced him to believe in the possibility of enabling man to fly by
means of artificial wings. However visionary this idea might be, he had
collected innumerable and extremely interesting data, having examined
the anatomical structure of almost every winged thing in the creation,
and compared the weight of the body with the area of the wings when
expanded in the act of volitation as well as the natural habits of
birds, insects, bats, and fishes, with reference to their powers of
flying and duration of flight.
These notes would form a valuable addition to natural history, whatever
might be thought of the purpose for which they were collected, during a
period of thirty years; and it is much to be regretted they were never
published. His own opinion was, that the publication, during his life
would injure his practice as a physician. It would be impossible without
the aid of diagrams, and I do not remember sufficient, to explain his
mechanical contrivances; but the general principle was, to suspend the
man under a kind of flat parachute of extremely thin _feather-edge_
boards, with a power of adjusting the angle at which it was placed, and
allowing the man the full use of his arms and legs to work any machinery
placed beneath; the area of the parachute being proportioned, as in
birds to the weight of the man, who was to start from the top of a high
tower, or some elevated position, flying against the wind.