On the exact spot where, a little more than a year before, the same man
almost lost his life and wrecked his first air-ship, No. 3 landed as
softly and neatly as a bird.

Though he made many other successful flights, he discovered so many
improvements that with the first small mishap he abandoned No. 3 and
began on No. 4.

The balloon "Santos-Dumont No. 4" was long and slim, and had an inner
air-bag to compensate for the contraction of the hydrogen gas. This
air-ship had one feature that was entirely new; the aeronaut had
arranged for himself, not a secure basket to stand in, but a frail,
unprotected bicycle seat attached to an ordinary bicycle frame. The
cranks were connected with the starting-gear of the motor.

Seated on his unguarded bicycle seat, and holding on to the
handle-bars, to which were attached the rudder-cords, Santos-Dumont made
voyages in the air with all the assurance of the sailor on the sea.

But No. 4 was soon too imperfect for the exacting Brazilian, and in
April, 1901, he had finished No. 5. This air-cruiser was the longest of
all (105 feet), and was fitted with a sixteen horse-power motor. Instead
of the bicycle frame, he built a triangular keel of pine strips and
strengthened it with tightly strung piano wires, the whole frame, though
sixty feet long, weighing but 110 pounds. Hung between the rods, being
suspended by piano wires as in a spider-web, was the motor, basket, and
propeller-shaft.

The last-named air-ship was built, if not expressly at least with the