Apr. 20.
Few will be able to escape the fascination attaching to the aerial developments described in the telegrams of recent days. They start with the ten-mile flight of M. Barbot; the French airman, who with a low-powered engine and in a machine weighing less than 500 Ib. opened up the prospect of cross-Channel flights for all, at any rate for the class of man who to-day is able to afford a motor-cycle or small car. Then came the news of the "'Wren,'' a machine constructed for the British Government weighing just over 200 lb., and propelled at a speed of forty-eight miles an hour by an engine of only seven horsepower. M. Bar-bot aptly likens this new development to aerial motor-cycling, and even the most sceptical must admit that at length flying promises at no distant date to be within the-reach of the masses. Emphasis, it will be recalled, is laid by M. Barbot on the safety which will attend flying in the future, and this is a point which must make a strong appeal to those with actual knowledge of aerial work. Those who have studied the question have expressed fear that these new small machines will prove mere' toys, able to provide sport for the man who has already been trained in flying, but little more. The fact, however, that the British Ministry is seriously experimenting with this class of aeroplane seems to negative that view.
When flying first became practicable the greatest attention was concentrated on securing lightness in the propelling machinery, power being sacrificed to this quality. As the science advanced still further, lightness was no-longer so vital, and ultimately there may almost
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.