336 CHILDREN'S BOOK FOR SABBATH HOURS.

 Many experiments were made, and the This was the case in our late war, and
 next year some men in France made an also more extensively in the late war be-
 air-tight bag of silk, and filled it with a tween France and Germany.
 light gas called hydrogen, of which water There are scientific men who are con-
 is mostly composed. This experiment stantly making experiments on this sub-
 was successful. ject, and perhaps it would be no more
 The large balloons which carry people strange if they should so perfect this mode
 up are very expensive, and only a few of travel that it may become very useful,
 can afford to have them. But many than is our present mode of traveling by
 bright and ingenious boys have con- railroads and steamboats, and our send-
 structed small balloons from the crops ing messages by lightning over the tele-
 of turkeys, cleaned and carefully pre- graph wires, would have seemed fifty
 pared, and filled with gas, which have years ago.
 afforded much pleasure, and their ex- It is interesting to think that all these
 periments have also been useful, discoveries in regard to traveling are
 There are many ways in which the helping to fulfill some of the predictions
young can, by various chemical and of the Bible. It is said Many shall run
other experiments, amuse themselves, to and fro, and knowledge shall be in-
and at the same time derive much im- creased. Every valley shall be exalted,
provement. and every mountain and hill shall be
 Fire-balloons are made of tissue-paper, made low; and the crooked shall be made
constructed in the form of a globe, with straight, and the rough places plain."
wires across the mouth, to which is at- This is especially the case with our rail-
tached a sponge saturated with spirits, roads.
and set on fire. The burning spirits fill As yet there is a good deal of danger
the balloon with light, or rarified air, and connected with traveling in the air. We
the balloon will ascend and float away have seen the picture of a balloon in a
among the clouds for a long time, till the thunder-storm. There are three men in
spirits are consumed and the air in the it. The wind from the fearful looking
balloon becomes cold, and then it falls, cloud has just struck the balloon, and
 At first, many learned men thought tossed it like a feather, and the lightning
balloons would become very useful in is flashing in every direction. The men
traveling from one place to another. But are throwing out ballast so as to ascend
as yet no important general use has been above the storm. If the lightning should
effected. In times of war they have been strike and rend the balloon, the gas
used somewhat in examining the situa- would escape, and all would be precipi-
tion of the enemy from a high position tated to the earth. It is a most fearful
in the air; and to some extent in con- scene.
veying dispatches across the country. We have also seen a picture of a sad-