ontact with the earth.
It was carefully received by a country-woman, who promptly sold it to
a gentleman on the other side of the hedge, who had been pursuing the
balloon.

The first ascent of a balloon in England was deserving of some record,
and an account alike circumstantial and picturesque is forthcoming. The
novel and astonishing sight was witnessed by a Hertfordshire farmer,
whose testimony, published by Lunardi in the same year, runs as
follows:--

This deponent on his oath sayeth that, being on Wednesday, the 15th
day of September instant, between the hours of three and four in the
afternoon, in a certain field called Etna, in the parish of North Mimms
aforesaid, he perceived a large machine sailing in the air, near the
place where he was on horseback; that the machine continuing to approach
the earth, the part of it in which this deponent perceived a gentleman
standing came to the ground and dragged a short way on the ground in
a slanting direction; that the time when this machine thus touched the
earth was, as near as this deponent could judge, about a quarter before
four in the afternoon. That this deponent being on horseback, and his
horse restive, he could not approach nearer to the machine than about
four poles, but that he could plainly perceive therein gentleman dressed
in light coloured cloaths, holding in his hand a trumpet, which had the
appearance of silver or bright tin. That by this time several harvest
men coming up from the other part of the field, to the number of twelve
men and thirteen women, this deponent called to them to endeavour to
stop the machine, which the men attempted, but the gentleman in
the machine desiring them to desist, and the machine moving with
considerable rapidity, and clearing the earth, went off in a north
direction and continued in sight at a very great height for near an hour
afterwards. And this deponent further saith that the part of the machine
in the which the gentleman stood did not actually touch the ground for
more than half a minute, during which time the gentleman threw out a
parcel of what appeared to this deponent as dry sand. That after the
machine had ascended again from the earth this deponent perceived a
grapple with four hooks, which hung from the bottom of the machine,
dragging along the ground, which carried up with it into the air a small
parcel of loose oats, which the women were raking in the field. And
this deponent further on his oath sayeth t