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172
Wonderful Balloon Ascents; Or, The Conquest of the Skies
·
Fulgence Marion
13
Roger
Bacon,
in
the
thirteenth
century,
inaugurated
a
more
scientific
era.
In
his
“Treaty
of
the
Admirable
Power
of
Art
and
Nature,”
he
puts
forth
the
idea
that
it
is
possible
“to
make
flying-machines
in
which
the
man,
being
seated
or
suspended
in
the
middle,
might
turn
some
winch
or
crank,
which
would
put
in
motion
a
suit
of
wings
made
to
strike
the
air
like
those
of
a
bird.”
In
the
same
treatise
he
sketches
a
flying-machine,
to
which
that
of
Blanchard,
who
lived
in
the
eighteenth
century,
bears
a
certain
resemblance.
The
monk,
Roger
Bacon,
was
worthy
of
entering
the
temple
of
fame
before
his
great
namesake
the
Lord
Chancellor,
who
in
the
seventeenth
century
inaugurated
the
era
of
experimental
science.
Jean
Baptiste
Dante,
a
mathematician
of
Perugia,
who
lived
in
the
latter
part
of
the
fifteenth
century,
constructed
artificial
wings,
by
means
of
which,
when
applied
to
thin
bodies,
men
might
raise
themselves
off
the
ground
into
the
air.
It
is
recorded
that
on
many
occasions
he
experimented
with
his
wings
on
the
Lake
Thrasymenus.
These
experiments,
however,
had
a
sad
end.
At
a
fete,
given
for
the
celebration
of
the
marriage
of
Bartholomew
d’Alvani,
Dante,
who
must
not
be
confounded
with
the
poet,
whose
flights
were
of
quite
another
kind--offered
to
exhibit
the
wonder
of
his
wings
to
the
people
of
Perugia.
He
managed
to
raise
himself
to
a
great
height,
and
flew
above
the
square;
but
the
iron
with
which
he
moved
one
of
his
wings
having
been
bent,
he
fell
upon
the
church
of
the
Virgin,
and
broke
his
thigh.
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