Airships, Past and Present. By A. Hildebrandt. Traislated by W.
H. Story. (A. Constable and Co. 10s. 6d. net.)—After four preliminary chapters, highly interesting in their way, we come to the dirigible balloon. One early idea was to utilise the traction power of eagles ; less than ten years ago a patent was taken out in Germany for a balloon which was to be drawn by pigeons. The matter, however, is sufficiently serious. Progress has been made, not without losses—in 1902 four eminent aeronauts met with their deaths—but with the result that success is in sight. "The problem is not so much how to build the balloon as how to raise the money." It is well, indeed, that machines which might do so much mischief should be costly. Then we come to "Flying Machines," and after these to a highly interesting account of " Military Ballooning." There are details of instruments, &c., and then, by way of variety, comes a very readable chapter on "Ballooning as a Sport." Captain Hildebrandt has a story of his own to tell of an ascent made in 1899 in company with two friends. They started from Berlin, and reached Breslau in two hours, and finally came to earth in the Carpathians, where a local Magistrate put them under arrest. Not the least entertaining part of the narrative is the author's experi- ence in the house of a peasant who had acted as his guide. He thought that his hosts had designs on him, and they thought the same about him. Why had he gone to bed with his sword if he did not mean to massacre the whole family ? After this we come to " Scientific Ballooning," and then to various details about photography, &c.—We may mention along with this a book dealing with another of the victories which man has won over the powers of Nature,—Wireless Telegraphy, by Ernst Ruhmer, Translated from the German by James Erskine-Murray, D.Sc. (Crosby Lockwood and Sons, 10s. 6d. net).
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