A BALLOON-TRIP BY NIGHT
Imagine a great bare meadow-land, lonely, wind-swept, and dark with
inky blackness, out of which there plunges an occasional hurrying
figure, that misses one by inches and passes on with a muttered oath.
In the background, tall and sinister, two large gasometers. In the
center of the field a wide tarpaulin laid along the ground, and edged
by a circle of sand-bags, from the midst of which there rises a great
round shape, like a mammoth tomato.
It is the balloon not yet fully inflated, fed by two curling rubber
tubes, that disappear in the direction of the gasworks. We are waiting,
waiting patiently until she fills. Blackened, distorted shapes, that
stand around in eerie circle, and at the sudden gruff command of a
hoarse voice that booms ever and anon out of the voids of darkness,
seize each a heavy sandbag and slowly and clumsily lower it mesh by
mesh in the netting that covers the balloon.
At last she is filled. The car is attached below, as rapidly and
securely as the faint and flickering light of a stable lamp will allow
of. The crew tumble in, one on top of another. She is let up only to be
pulled down again with a nerve-racking bump. The gruff voice decides
that she is now ready to get off; there is a slight slackening of
ropes, an almost imperceptible lift, the figures on the ground recede
rapidly, grotesque shadows in the darkness, and the lights begin to
disappear one by one.
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.
On and on through the night. Now we are getting tired; there are
suggestions that we should land, but they are overruled. Coming down
again to 800 feet, we catch sight of a wide glimmering sheet of water.
Maps are seized in a hasty impulse to guess our whereabouts. The
argument grows heated, for similar stretches of water there are, alike
in Essex, Kent, Surrey, Middlesex and Berkshire: in fact, in every one
of the Home Counties, and for the matter of that in the Midlands, and
likewise in every county in England, Scotland, Ireland and Wales.
The argument abates, our eyes grow weary and more weary. It seems a
life-time since we last saw the pleasant and undulating lines of the
earth. One or two heads are already nodding, when there is a sudden
shout of “the dawn.” Instantly all are wide awake. There sure enough,
are the first few streaks of gray creeping slowly across the eastern
sky; without even that, it would be an obvious matter, by reason of
that intense cold, which, in the air, always precedes the hour of
daybreak and freezes us to the bone.
It would be an inadequate expression to say that dawn in the air is
beautiful. It is more than beautiful, it is wonderful. It is more than
wonderful, it is unusual; a view only to be enjoyed by the minority,
and that of the smallest. Gradually earth and sky begin to dissemble.
In tint the picture is white, black, gray, blue, crimson, golden,
purple, green and every other color--now like a painter’s canvas
smudged with regular irregularities, edged with red and gray, now an
animated panorama stirring with resuscitated life. The sun rises, a
ball of flame above the horizon, lighting up the rotund shape of the
balloon with an unearthly hue.
We say nothing, but look and marvel; a word would be out of place in
this sacred and awesome stillness. Suddenly we are roused by a cry,
more, much more, alarming than the last.
The sea! We are almost on top of it. In shimmering, level surface it
stretches on into obscurity. We are lost. We cannot avoid it, yet less
can we land thereon. One of the crew loses his head. He snatches the
thin red tape that hangs down from the envelope. There is a tearing,
rending sound.
He has ripped the balloon at 2000 feet. Pious prayers and curses
intermingle. Down she sinks, with a great hole rent in her side--down
and down, faster and faster. Over go the bags of ballast, one after
another. Now all have been dropped. She slackens speed; but only
momentarily. Down she goes again, the upward current of air whistles
unpleasantly through the rigging. In a last feverish effort boots are
unlaced and hurled overboard, together with coats and every portable
object to hand.
Too late. We hit the edge of a cliff; bounce back several feet into
the air, then sink down on to the beach below. Another crash, again we
are bundled and bounced about in the confined space of the car. The
sand gets in our ears and eyes and mouths. The balloon lies along the
sand a woebegotten shape, as flat as a pancake. When we eventually
sort ourselves out, we find luckily, that there is but one casualty:
a broken wrist, sustained by the foolish idiot that ripped! Just
retribution!
And to end the adventure, a stolid British policeman, ponderous
official-looking note-book in hand, approaches and demands our names
and addresses, and asks if we are of British nationality!