down again after it went up, for the first time it was borne in the air by a variety of strong-winged birds, but as the birds were not all of a feather they refused to flock, as the proverb says they should, and where they all went to

BIRDS NOT OF A
FEATHER.

nobody knows.

The butterfly balloon took too long to start, and when it was fairly off only made about ten miles an hour, so it was not of much use.

The watch-spring balloon was also of little avail, because of the incessant trouble of winding up fifty thousand watches,-too much trouble for any six people, and that was all it could carry; still I must say, that I look upon the balloon as capable of superseding steam; indeed, I take it, that aërial machines may at some future time make the world itself quite useless for any but secondary purposes, as that of growing silkworms for balloon construction, and osiers THE WORLD OF NO wherewith to weave the cars;-perhaps a little coal, to distil gas, may be required, and always the earth

FURTHER USE.

must be preserved as a place to fall upon.

But be that as it may, one thing at least is certain, that the purposes to which balloons may be applied are almost innumerable.

DRAG NETTING.

I once went " drag netting" for Federals in America. We "rose " a balloon with double grapnels and wide-meshed net attached; hovering over the enemy, we watched our opportunity, and threw out our net on to the 97th Massachusetts Tiger Cats, capturing the whole regiment. My recurved bellows blew us back to the Confederate camp, and we dragged in, triumphantly, the whole of our prisoners.

People talk about disabling iron-clad ships with Sir William Armstrong's 900-pounder, but what necessity can there be for cannon, when by plumbing your balloon ten miles above anything, fort, ship, house, or palace, you may just quietly drop over the edge of the car a missile-an explosive shell-that will put an end to it at once.

AN END TO ARMSTRONG.

But among the purposes to which balloons may be turned, there is none more useful than that of irrigation. You see, in consequence of my having pulled the earth so far out of its beaten track, we have had not only a hot but a dry summer; the earth has been parched, cattle dying, crops perishing, while a few hundred of my PATENT AERIAL WATER CARS would have altered all that. Balloon goes up with a condensing apparatus, by which moisture is gathered at a high elevation; and it is then and there discharged upon the surface of the land in a series of gentle showers. By this

RAIN AT WILL

means the sky is kept clear of mists, the earth is benefited by the showers, and as it is always possible to discharge the water after dark, the man of business can go about without his umbrella; the family can enjoy the sunshine at the sea-side, while the farmer has the means of forwarding or checking his crops ready to his hand.

Can anything be better?

But I will not trouble you any more with my stories about balloons; only, for the benefit of my friend Coxwell, I should like to set before him a few of the benefits of ballooning as I intend to carry them out. A balloon to light all England, by fixing it at such an elevation as to enable a strong and piercing light to illuminate the country round, from Land's End

A FEW HINTS FOR
COXWELL.

to John o' Groat's House.

A balloon with which to discover new countries, by passing over hitherto inaccessible barriers.

A balloon with a large reflector and burning-glass, to bring a little summer heat round at Christmas time.

A balloon for delicate constitutions, to change its position according to the exact climate required.

A balloon to distribute advertisements all over the world.

A balloon for the Pre-Raphaelite artists, by which they may travel up close to the wonderful effects they are so fond of.

A balloon for people who want to keep out of the way; and

A detective balloon, by which the policemen can look down other people's chimneys, and through other people's skylights, and so find out "all about it."

I will not mention the thousand and one other and better purposes to which I purpose putting balloons, but I think that while they give artificial sunshine and artificial rain, house without property tax, and travelling without steam-engines, perhaps I have told you enough for the present.

At all events, if Coxwell will allow me, I mean to take Mr. Glaisher up to the moon in December, just when the " man is getting his crop in, which will give Glaisher something else than wet bulbs, zeros, and short breath, to talk about to the British Association when they meet.

A TRIP TO THE MOUNTAINS AND VINEYARDS OF THE DOURO.

WITH SKETCHES OF LEGENDARY LORE, FROM A TRAVELLER'S

WHEN

CHAPTER 1.

HEN I quitted England I had intended spending two or at the utmost three months away from my native land; yet mark the uncertainty of human affairs; the following spring, or rather the end of the short winter of the south, saw me still a denizen of the Lusitanian soil. What chains bound me there I need not tell; whether supposed symptoms of incipient consumption, or as Theodore Hook observed, "a complaint in the chest ;" or a desire to become better acquainted with the language of Camoens, of the enlightened Henry, of the great Albuquerque; with the manners and customs of a people little known, yet worthy to be known, for their primitive simplicity and honesty, their wit and amiability, it matters not to the reader to know. Facts speak for themselves. I was still there. Numberless adventures had in the meantime happened to me, with which I purpose to delight the world, but as this present time, when I hold my pen in hand, is the anniversary of certain amusing events in my career, I cannot resist the temptation of describing them.

After making several excursions into the interior, I returned to the house of my friend, and spent a very pleasant winter in Oporto.

As soon as I had mastered the language, my great amusement was to wander into the country, and to make the acquaintance of any one, priest or peasant, rich or poor, whom I chanced to meet. Among the friends I thus formed, was an ex-friar, a worthy soul, whose wish was to be in amity with all the world, if the said world, whether Christian, pagan, or heretic, would allow him to end his days in peace. One day I had wandered to Leça, a small town on the seacoast, about four miles from Oporto, and from thence I strolled on till I found myself in front

of a large building, which I learned was the ancient convent of the Conception. The walls were cracked in many places, the roof had in parts fallen in, and there was in every direction an air of desolation and decay, now the characteristic of all the edifices once inhabited by the monastic orders in Portugal. Those communities were, it must be remembered, abolished throughout the country by the Emperor Don Pedro. As I was looking at the ruin with feelings in which pity but little regret existed, heavy spots of rain beginning to fall, I was driven by them for shelter under an arch which stood conveniently near. I then continued my reflections: "Alas!" I thought, "what has become of the once jovial friars, who formerly inhabited this noble pile; wanderers and outcasts, you starve where once you feasted, or exist on the charity of those whom you once supported; the halls which knew you know you no more; your place is empty; you are gone and vanished from the earth !”

I had got thus far in my cogitations, when I saw projected from® a neighbouring casement a venerable head with a good-natured smiling face, and I heard a voice summoning me in courteous tones to enter the building. Following the directions of the speaker, I soon found myself ascending a broad flight of stone steps, at the top of which the old man stood ready to receive me. He apologised for not descending to welcome me to his abode, on account of the difficulty he experienced in getting up again; his figure, as he observed, laughing and stroking his paunch, not being well suited for locomotion. At a glance I saw that he was one of the now scattered fraternity of the convent, and although, like the rest of his brethren in Portugal, he had been compelled to lay aside. the frock and cowl of the monk, he wore the black, close-fitting habit of an ecclesiastic. He took my hand and pressed it cordially, as with the grace and dignity of a noble in his paternal halls he ushered me into his little sanctum sanctorum, which served him for parlour, library, and bedroom. "Rest here, my friend, till the shower is over," he said; . "my house, it must be confessed, is not in the best repair, but here at least we are sheltered from the rain, and the storms which rage in the political world without. Ah! ah Tempora mutantur et nos mutamur in illis. A few years ago I could have offered you a very different reception. Here you find me the sole survivor of my band-Monachus et Monos--and when I shuffle off the stage, not a sign will remain to tell that once we were." After a few minutes' conversation he brought out a plate of sweet cakes and a bottle of light wine, of which he insisted on my partaking; so that what with nibbling at the cakes, sipping the wine, and listening to his jokes and stories, a couple of hours

case you

passed away rapidly and agreeably. "You have visited the Church below here, in Matozintros?" he observed. I answered in the affirmative. "And you observed the wonderful image over the altar?" I believed that I had. "I am glad of it, for it is worth seeing, and its history is miraculous; at least every one about here believes it to be so, though I am afraid you Englishmen are too often incredulous respecting such matters." I assured him that I was no infidel, and prepared to receive with respect any story he might have to tell. 'Well, in that shall have it," he replied. The story is as follows :— "You have heard of Nicodemus, of course. He is said by the common people, with whom he is a great favourite, to have been a carpenter; I know not upon what authority. They have likewise discovered that his Christian name was Joseph-José Nicodemo, carpenteiro. There exists a Gospel under his name, but the Church has declared it to be apocryphal; but if his writings are rejected, the statues which he is said to have carved are almost universally accepted as genuine. While residing at a country-seat of his uncle, Gamaliel, whither he had retired to avoid the persecution of the Pharisees, a sect to which he had belonged before his conversion, Nicodemus made in the most perfect manner rarely to be seen, four wooden crucifixes. One is at Beirout, in Syria, another in Lucca; Burgos possesses the third; and the last, but not the least, sanctifies the favoured village of Matozintros. These figures, it is conjectured by some learned theologians, were meant to typify and adorn the four parts of the world, but how they came to be so unequally divided, we are not informed. The good people of Orense in Galicia pretend that they have a figure by Nicodemus too. uncertainty about the proofs which they adduced in claim, but since the discovery of a fifth part of the world they have invincibly settled the question in their favour; of the fourth, however, I am now speaking. To avoid the irreverence to which it was exposed on the land, this image was thrown into the sea at Joppa, the very port from which the disciples sailed with the body of St. James, and where the prophet Jonah embarked for Tarshish. It floated safely through the Mediterranean, but met with an accident in the Straits of Gibraltar. Being violently thrown against the Moorish coast of Abyla, it lost the left arm in the shock. Five days after this casualty, on the 3rd of May, in the year of our Lord, 117, at six o'clock in the morning, the heaven-directed visitor landed quietly at Matozintros, at the very spot where an altar now stands to commemorate the joyful event, and never since that period has there been such a thing as a shipwreck there."

There was some support of their