of three miles, a pull of seven hundred pounds.  However great the pull, it is essential to successful flying that the man in control be able to let out or reel in the main line with great rapidity, and it is evident that a dozen men could not by hand alone accomplish this if the kites were sent as high as might be.  It is likely, therefore, that, as the importance of scientific kite-flying becomes more widely understood, some simple dummy engine will be devised for rapidly turning the windlass on which the main line is wound.

Mr. Eddy has made frequent experiments with rain-kites, which he used for the first time in November, 1893.  It is true that Franklin sent up a flyer during a shower, but in his case the rain was merely an accident accompanying the electric storm, which was his only concern.  Mr. Eddy, however, has sent up kites in the rain for the purpose of studying cloud altitudes and other meteorological phenomena; and by this means he has discovered what was not previously believed to be true:  that clouds sometimes sink to within six hundred feet of the earth’s surface without actually coming down to it.  In fact, Mr. Eddy has had kites disappear in a cloud at a height of only five hundred and sixty-eight feet.  It has sometimes happened that clouds settling toward the earth have obscured the kites gradually, the top one becoming invisible first, and then the others in succession.  Mr. Eddy has found that by such indications he is able to foretell the approach of fog four or five hours before it reaches the earth’s surface, so slowly do the clouds settle through the air strata.

[Illustration:  DIRIGIBLE KITE-DRAWN BUOY.

This is the buoy invented by Prof.  J. Woodbridge Davis for conveying messages, food, or life-lines between disabled vessels and the shore.  The buoy is drawn over the water by the kite-line, like the one shown above, but the setting of the keel and the three guy-ropes give it whatever direction is desired.]

[Illustration:  THE KITE-BUOY IN SERVICE.]

It is best to make rain-kites of oil-skin or paraffine paper, as the ordinary paper or cloth becomes saturated with the dampness and very heavy, thus lessening the buoyancy of the line.  So penetrating is the dampness of clouds, even without a rain-storm, that the wooden frames sometimes become warped and the paste seams soak open.

DRAWING DOWN ELECTRICITY BY A KITE-STRING.

The scientific kite-flyer will find much to tempt him into the field of electricity; and will be able, not only to duplicate Dr. Franklin’s historic experiment of bringing down sparks from the heavens, but may go far beyond this, taking advantage of the greater knowledge of electricity at his disposal and the superior apparatus.  In the summer of 1885, Alexander McAdie, at the Blue Hills Observatory, got strong sparks at the earth’s surface from a wire connected with a kite whose surface had been