face downward, and
the invisibility of all the machinery gave an extraordinary effect of
independent levitation. Only by looking up, as it were, and turning my
head back could I see the flat aeroplane bottom of the balloon and
the rapid successive passages, swish, swish, swish of the vans of the
propeller. I made a wide circle over Lady Grove and Duffield and
out towards Effingham and came back quite successfully to the
starting-point.

Down below in the October sunlight were my sheds and the little group
that had been summoned to witness the start, their faces craned upward
and most of them scrutinising my expression through field-glasses. I
could see Carnaby and Beatrice on horseback, and two girls I did not
know with them; Cothope and three or four workmen I employed; my aunt
and Mrs. Levinstein, who was staying with her, on foot, and Dimmock, the
veterinary surgeon, and one or two others. My shadow moved a little to
the north of them like the shadow of a fish. At Lady Grove the servants
were out on the lawn, and the Duffield school playground swarmed with
children too indifferent to aeronautics to cease their playing. But in
the Crest Hill direction--the place looked extraordinarily squat
and ugly from above--there were knots and strings of staring workmen
everywhere--not one of them working, but all agape. (But now I write it,
it occurs to me that perhaps it was their dinner hour; it was certainly
near twelve.) I hung for a moment or so enjoying the soar, then turned
about to face a clear stretch of open down, let the engine out to full
speed and set my rollers at work rolling in the net, and so tightening
the gas-bags. Instantly the pace quickened with the diminished
resistance...

In that moment before the bang I think I must have been really flying.
Before the net ripped, just in the instant when my balloon was at its
systole, the whole apparatus was, I am convinced, heavier than air.
That, however, is a claim that has been disputed, and in any case this
sort of priority is a very trivial thing.

Then came a sudden retardation, instantly followed by an inexpressibly
disconcerting tilt downward of the machine. That I still recall with
horror. I couldn't see what was happening at all and I couldn't imagine.
It was a mysterious, inexplicable dive. The thing, it seemed, without
rhyme or reason, was kicking up its heels in the air. The bang followed
immediately, and I perceived I was falling rapidly.

I was too