362 KIRWAN. or eight hours, landed about thirty miles from London, and returned next morning to the metropolis in triumph, with his empty balloon attached to his carriage. He was now hailed by the multitude as a supernatural being. He engaged the Lyceum in the Strand, as a place to exhibit his aerial vehicle, which for several days attracted an innumerable crowd of spectators at half a crown per head, and soon convinced the aeronaut that the curiosity of John Bull was a much more productive source of emolu ment than his official situation in the suite of the Neapo litan ambassador. A speculating bookseller, well skilled in the attraction of popular curiosity, and who had largely profited by that ruling passion, soon cultivated the ac quaintance of the aeronaut, and induced him not only to publish an account of his voyage in the clouds, out of a l l terrestrial view, but procured him a literary gentle man, a person n o less celebrated than the late speculative philosopher David Williams, t o prepare for publication a n account o f the wonders o f his hegira. This account, clothed i n the solemnity o f philosophic language, and well stored with descriptions o f thunder clouds, bail storms, and other meteoric wonders which h e experienced i n the course o f his aquiline tour, was introduced t o John Bull b y Mr. John Bell, o f the Strand, adorned with a well graven portrait o f Signor Lunardi, mottoed with the words, “Sicitur a d astra,” and accompanied by a picturesque view o f the balloon, and the cat and little dog who accom panied his flight. This morceau was admirably calculated t o lure the insatiable curiosity o f the Bull family. I t was sold a t the moderate price o f five shillings, and passed rapidly through many succesive editions, t o the number o f fifty thousand copies, i n a few weeks. . A region never till then explored, save b y eagles, cranes, o r halcyons, became quite a new object for British curiosity; and i t was scarcely possible, with a l l the industry o f the press, t o meet the eagerness o f demand, for some months. The Pantheon i n Oxford-street was, for some reason, deemed a more eligible and lucrative theatre for exhibit
