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128
Wonderful Balloon Ascents; Or, The Conquest of the Skies
·
Fulgence Marion
117
remarkable,
they
both
preserved
a
brown
or
red
tinge
which
astonished
those
that
had
seen
them
before
they
made
the
ascent.
This
distension
of
the
blood-vessels
would
necessarily
produce
an
inconvenience
and
a
difficulty
in
the
muscular
action.”
Chapter
II.
Ascent
of
M.
Gay-Lussac
Alone--Excursions
of
MM.
Barral
and
Bixio.
Respecting
this
ascent,
Arago
states
that
M.
Gay-Lussac
has
reduced
to
their
proper
value
the
narratives
of
the
physical
pains
which
aeronauts
say
they
suffer
in
lofty
aerial
ascents.
M.
Gay-Lussac
says:--“Having
arrived
at
the
most
elevated
point
of
my
ascent,
21,000
feet
above
sea
level,
my
respiration
was
rendered
sensibly
difficult,
but
I
was
far
from
experiencing
any
illness
of
a
kind
to
make
me
descend.
My
pulse
and
my
breathing
were
very
quick;
breathing
very
frequently
in
an
extremely
dry
atmosphere,
I
should
not
have
been
surprised
if
my
throat
had
been
so
dry
as
to
make
it
painful
to
swallow
bread.”
After
having
finished
his
observations,
which
referred
chiefly
to
the
magnetic
needle,
with
all
the
tranquillity
of
a
doctor
in
his
study,
Gay-Lussac
descended
to
the
earth
between
Rouen
and
Dieppe,
eighty
leagues
from
Paris.
After
the
names
of
Robertson,
Gay-Lussac,
and
Biot,
science
has
registered
those
of
Barral
and
Bixio,
two
men
whose
aeronautic
achievements
have
enriched
meteorology
with
more
important
discoveries,
perhaps,
than
any
we
have
yet
mentioned.
These
gentlemen
had
conceived
the
project
of
rising
by
means
of
a
balloon
to
a
great
height,
in
order
to
study,
with
the
assistance
of
the
very
best
instruments
in
use
in
their
day,
a
multitude
of
phenomena
then
imperfectly
known.
The
subjects
to
which
they
were
specially
to
direct
their
attention,
were
the
law
of
the
decrease
of
temperature
in
progress
upwards,
the
discovery
of
whether
the
chemical
composition
of
the
atmosphere
is
the
same
throughout
all
its
parts,
the
comparison
of
the
strength
of
the
solar
rays
in
the
higher
regions
of
the
atmosphere
and
on
the
surface
of
the
earth,
the
ascertaining
whether
the
light
reflected
and
transmitted
by
the
clouds
is
or
is
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