Jacques Étienne Montgolfier

“ Polite and gallant as any cavalier, Münchausen carries in him the soul of a professor; he is minute, he kills no two score beasts, but exactly forty-one; every little thing counts for him, as if he were a student: Montgolfier and his balloon, architecture, and the amazing etymology for which 'Vide Otrckocsus de Orig-Hung.' A swordsman and a scholar he recalls those reiters who fled from kings into monasteries, there to labour as Benedictines. ”

“ Whilst pensions and honours and popular applause were being showered upon the inventors of the balloon, Watt was labouring unnoticed at his improvements of the steam-engine—a very prosaic affair compared with the gilded globe which Montgolfier had caused to rise from earth amidst the acclamations of a hundred thousand spectators, but one which had before it a somewhat different history to that of the more startling invention. ”

“ Imagination, intoxicated with past successes, could descry no limit to human power; the gates of the infinite seemed to be swinging back before man’s advancing step, and the last was believed to be the greatest of his achievements.
In order to comprehend the frenzy of the enthusiasm which the first aeronautic triumphs called forth, it is necessary to recall the appearance of Montgolfier at Versailles, on the 19th of September, 1783, before Louis XVI, or of the earliest aeronauts at the Tuileries. ”

“ For these reasons, and a hundred others, I consider that my air-ship's home, like my own, is in Paris. As a boy, in Brazil, my heart turned to the City of Light, above which in 1783 the first Montgolfier had been sent up; where the first of the world's aeronauts had made his first ascension; where the first hydrogen balloon had been set loose; where first an air-ship had been made to navigate the air with its steam-engine, screw propeller, and rudder. ”

“ From the year 1783, in which aerostation had its birth, and in which it was carried to a degree of perfection, beside which the progress of aeronauts in our days seems small, a new route was opened up for travellers. The science of Montgolfier, the practical art of Professor Charles, and the courage of Roziers, subdued the scepticism of those who had not yet given in their adhesion to the possible value of the great discovery, and throughout the whole of France a feverish degree of enthusiasm in the art manifested itself. ”

“ From the earliest ballooning times, men have sought to combat condensation by means of heat. Montgolfier's first balloon was filled with nothing but hot air, which is lighter than the cool air of the atmosphere ; and it has always been known than an adequate heating of one's gas would be equivalent to saving so much ballast. ”

“ Montgomery went a lot out of his way to persuade him to stop, but it was no use; he was like a hen on a hot griddle till he got away. Decent chap, too; and, by gosh! can't he sing and play! We found afterward that he had given his books to the station library, with the message that we were to think kindly of him when he was gone. I felt sort of melancholy to see him drifting away to beggary, with his fiddle-case across the front of his saddle, and his spare horse in his hand. He knew no more where he was going than the man in the moon. ”

“ Montgomery is not the sort of man one would naturally associate with his energetic and self-reliant helpmate. There is a lack of shrewdness and an utter want of that keen discriminating power, which can give at first glance the full numerical value of all exterior objects. The owner of "Gladswood" belonged to that "come-easy-go-easy" class, who, unless circumstances come to their relief, are ever being duped or made a prey to the avaricious. But Mr. Montgomery had a source of never-failing strength in his wife. ”

“ Sir Guy de Montgomeri stood for a while like a man distraught; this resurrection—for such it seemed—had quite overpowered him. "A husband ofttimes makes the best physician," says the proverb; he was a living personification of its truth. Still it was whispered he had been content with Doctor Butts; but his lady was restored to bless him for many years.—Heavens, what a life he led!
The Lady Rohesia mended apace; her quinsy was cured; the bell was stopped; and little Hubert, the sacristan, kicked out of the chapelry. St. Peter opened his wicket, and looked out;—there was nobody there ”

“ Jims isn't much bother in the daytime now, and I'll always be home at night."
"Do you think you'll like weighing out sugar and beans, and trafficking in butter and eggs?" said the doctor, twinkling.
"Probably not. That isn't the question. It's just one way of doing my bit." So Rilla went behind Mr. Flagg's counter for a month; and Susan went into Albert Crawford's oat-fields.
"I am as good as any of them yet," she said proudly. "Not a man of them can beat me when it comes to building a stack. When I offered to help Albert looked doubtful. ”

“ Scotland has no reason to be ashamed of James Montgomery. Of all her poets, there is not one of equal power, whose strain has been so uninterruptedly pure, or whose objects have been so invariably excellent. The child of the Christian missionary has been the poet of Christian missions. The parents laid down their lives in behalf of the enslaved and perishing negro; the son, in strains the most vigorous and impassioned, has raised his generous appeal to public justice in his behalf. ”

“ In personal appearance Montgomery is described as of medium height, ruddy complexioned, with curly reddish hair and a quick grey eye. He was twice married: first, in December 1648, to Mary, eldest daughter of Charles, second viscount Moore, by whom he had two sons Hugh and Henry, who were successively second and third earls of Mount Alexander and a daughter, Jean, who died unmarried in 1673; secondly, in 1660, to Catherine Jones, daughter of Arthur, second viscount Ranelagh, and widow of Sir William Parsons of Bellamont. ”

“ Few men have ever fallen in battle so much regretted on both sides as General Richard Montgomery. His many amiable qualities had procured him an uncommon share of private affection; and his great abilities an equal proportion of public esteem. Being a sincere lover of liberty, he had engaged in the American cause from principle, and quitted the enjoyment of an easy fortune, and the highest domestic felicity, to take an active share in the fatigues and dangers of a war instituted for the defense of the community of which he was an adopted member. ”

“ Thomas Montgomery, father of the above, had three sons, Alexander, John, and Richard. Alexander commanded a grenadier company in Wolfe’s army, and was also present at the capture of Quebec. He many years represented the county of Donegal in the Irish parliament. John, the second son, lived and died in Portugal; and Richard, after receiving a liberal education at Trinity College, Dublin, entered the British army at the age of eighteen, under General Monckton. ”

“ Gilmore and Joe Montgomery were distantly related, and while the latter never presumed on the score of this remote connection, the gambler himself tacitly admitted it by the help he now and then extended him, for Montgomery's means of subsistence were at the best precarious. If he had been called on to do so, he would have described himself as a handy-man, since he lived by the doing of odd jobs. He cleaned carpets in the spring; he cut lawns in the summer; in the fall he carried coal into the cellars of Mount Hope, and in the winter he shoveled the snow off Mount Hope's pavements ”

“ Strictly speaking, Montgomery was more of a rhetorician than a poet, but his imagination was bold, ardent, and fertile, and more than one of his greater contemporaries owed occasional debts to his vigorous invention and even to his casual felicities of diction, while some passages from his poems keep a place in the literature that is universally read and quoted. At the close of his career as a journalist, when all parties agreed in paying him respect, he claimed for his poetry that it was at least not imitative, and the claim was just as regarded conception and choice of subjects ”

“ Nobody could have predicted beforehand that Montgomery was the man to act upon this girl so miraculously—nobody could tell, seeing the two together, what it was in him which specially excited her—nobody who has made men and women, his study would have wasted much time in the inquiry, knowing that the affinities, attractions, and repulsions of men and women are beyond all our science. ”

“ John Newman King, Judge Walters, Captain Joshua Wilson, the veteran recorder, former-Sheriff Whittlesey and others, and is included merely to satisfy those citizens of Montgomery who think this entire history should be devoted to Phil, to the exclusion of her friends and relations. The historian hopes he is an open-minded person, and he would rather please Montgomery than any other center of thought and industry he knows; but the laws of proportion (as Phil would be the first to point out) may not lightly be ignored. ”

“ We have no enmity to Mr. Robert Montgomery. We know nothing whatever about him, except what we have learned from his books, and from the portrait prefixed to one of them, in which he appears to be doing his very best to look like a man of genius and sensibility, though with less success than his strenuous exertions deserve. We select him, because his works have received more enthusiastic praise, and have deserved more unmixed contempt, than any which, as far as our knowledge extends, have appeared within the last three or four years. ”

“ Many of the best men in the island have received their earlier education at this institution, which, however, they frequently supplement by a course at other seats of learning in the Dominion, the United States and Great Britain. In 1878, Mr. Montgomery embarked in politics, and on the 20th September in that year was elected to a seat in the local legislature for his native district of Belfast. This was a bye-election caused by the resignation of William Welsh. At the general election, Mr. Montgomery again offered, and was re-elected in April, 1879. He was a moderate Conservative. ”

“ He is connected with the Presbyterian denomination. He married, on 10th August, 1887, Mary Isabella, daughter of William McPhail, of Orwell. His residence is situated on Prince street, in Charlottetown. A man in the very prime of life and usefulness, Mr. Montgomery occupies a position of the highest importance.
Rivard, Antoine Majorique, M.D., Sheriff for the district of Joliette, was born on the 24th September, 1838, at St. Leon, district of Three Rivers, province of Quebec. He is descended from a family that came from France, and settled at Batiscan, province of Quebec, in 1660. ”

“ The handy-man raised his right hand dramatically.
"It's God A'mighty's everlastin' truth!" he swore.
"Understand, I have made you no promises," said the judge, disregarding him.
"You're goin' back on me!" cried Montgomery. "Then you look out. I'm a man as can do harm if I have a mind to; don't you give me the mind, boss!"
"I shall lay this matter before Mr. Moxlow in the morning," replied the judge quietly and with apparent indifference, but covertly he was watching the effect of his words on Montgomery. ”

“ It was no common fear, no casual emotion impressed on the striking countenance of Montgomeri; he was not one to bend his knee in entreaty, even to his sovereign, for a mere trivial cause. The princes and nobles round were themselves struck by his earnestness, knowing too well his great valour and extraordinary skill in every martial deed to doubt them now. The king alone remained unmoved.
“Tush, man!” he said, joyously; “what more harm will your good lance do our sacred person, than those whose blows yet tingle on our flesh? ”

“ On the occasion of his retirement he was appointed, at the recommendation of the Marquis of Salisbury, then secretary of state for India, to be a member of the privy council, an honour which is very rarely conferred upon Indian civil servants.
Montgomery's official career was eminently successful. He was not a brilliant man, but he was an extremely useful public servant. As a very young man he was remarked for the carefulness and accuracy of his work. When he became the head of a district, he was regarded as one of the ablest district officers in the presidency to which he belonged. ”

“ When either the person I am speaking to, or the matter I am speaking upon, interests me greatly, I am the worst orator in the world; and, therefore, my fair fellow traveller, I write to you, for you must be convinced that I am deeply concerned for you and for your future happiness.
Though I have not the pleasure of being acquainted with Mr. Montalbert, yet I will flatter myself that, when we meet, I shall find in him another friend.
He must be generous, amiable, and candid, for he is beloved by Rosalie ”

“ Montgomerie was a distinguished athlete, and at one time was heavy-weight champion boxer of the navy; a keen sportsman, he hunted big game in many parts of the world. He married in 1886 Alethe Marian, eldest daughter of Spencer Charrington of Hunsdon House, Hertfordshire, and for many years M.P. for the Tower Hamlets. ”

“ Montgomery, too, is almost as much of an egotist as Wordsworth; and thence, frequently, his power. The poet who keeps all the appearances of external nature, and even all the passions of humanity, at arm's length, that he may gaze on, inspect, study, and draw their portraits, either in the garb they ordinarily wear, or in a fancy dress, is likely to produce a strong likeness indeed; yet shall his pictures be wanting in ease and freedom—they shall be cold and stiff—and both passion and imagination shall desiderate something characteristic in nature, of the mountain or the man. ”