to inspire the confidence of the world at large, and to bring
aerial travel and transportation within range of realisation.
But what has been the result? The discovery is not devoted to
the interests of peace and economic development, but to
extermination and destruction.

At the same time this development may be explained. The airship
and aeroplane in the present stage of evolution possess no
economic value. True, cross-country cruises by airship have been
inaugurated, and, up to a point, have proved popularly, if not
commercially, successful, while tentative efforts have been made
to utilise the aeroplane as a mail-carrier. Still, from the
view-point of the community at large aerial travel is as remote
as it was centuries ago.

It is somewhat interesting to observe how history is repeating
itself. When the Montgolfiers succeeded in lifting themselves
into the air by means of a vessel inflated with hot air, the new
vehicle was hailed not so much as one possessed of commercial
possibilities, but as an engine of war! When the indomitable
courage and perseverance of Count von Zeppelin in the face of
discouraging disasters and flagrant failures, at last commanded
the attention of the German Emperor, the latter regarded the
Zeppelin craft, not from the interests of peace, but as a
military weapon, and the whole of the subsequent efforts of the
Imperial admirer were devoted to the perfection of the airship in
this one direction.

Other nations, when they embarked on an identical line of
development, considered the airship from a similar point of view.