Last Saturday morning Mr. Walter Wellman, five com- panions, and
a cat started from Atlantic City on an astonishing attempt to cross the Atlantic in an airship. The airship was supplied with a lifeboat and with wireless telegraphy. Its feature was a long tail or " stabilisator," which trailed in the sea. This was composed of reserve tanks of gasoline for the engine. After travelling for a few hours the airship was caught in a northerly wind, and was driven to the south over five hundred miles out of its course. Early on Tuesday morning it was sighted by the Royal Mail steamer Trent' two hundred and fifty miles north-west of Bermuda. The crew of the airship telegraphed for help. and the 'Trent' lay to while they launched their lifeboat with great difficulty. All the crew, including the cat, were thus saved, but the airship was carried away, and has no doubt become a total loss. We have written elsewhere of Mr. Wellman's attempt. It seems to us that quite insufficient precautions were taken. The design of the airship was practically untested. But of course we cannot expect an inventor not to believe in his invention. It was for Mr. Well. man's friends to hold him back. Mr. Wellman himself has given us an example of courage which will not soon be forgotten.
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