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Today I read "The Horror of the Heights," an Arthur Conan Doyle short story in his Tales of Terror and Mystery that I picked up in our Patricia Clark Memorial Library. It told the story of early aviators and the dangers they faced. I had no idea of the perils with which these brave pioneering "aeronauts" came in contact. As the diary of one of the less fortunate souls stated, "There are jungles of the upper air, and there are worse things than tigers which inhabit them. I believe in time they will map these jungles accurately out."
Some of the perils encountered were air-snakes, jellyfish-like creatures the size of the dome of St. Paul's, and last, but not least:
"...a more terrible experience was in store for me. Floating downwards from a great height there came a purplish patch of vapour, small as I saw it first, but rapidly enlarging as it approached me, until it appeared to be hundreds of square feet in size. Though fashioned of some transparent, jelly-like substance, it was none the less of much more definite outline and solid consistence than anything which I had seen before. There were more traces, too, of a physical organization, especially two vast, shadowy, circular plates upon either side, which may have been eyes, and a perfectly solid white projection between them which was as curved and cruel as the beak of a vulture. The whole aspect of this monster was formidable and threatening, and it kept changing its colour from a very light mauve to a dark, angry purple so thick that it cast a shadow as it drifted between my monoplane and the sun. On the upper curve of its huge body there were three great projections which I can only describe as enormous bubbles, and I was convinced as I looked at them that they were charged with some extremely light gas which served to buoy up the misshapen and semi-solid mass in the rarefied air. The creature moved swiftly along, keeping pace easily with the monoplane, and for twenty miles or more it formed my horrible escort, hovering over me like a bird of prey which is waiting to pounce."
I'm sure glad these creatures have evidently been driven to extinction. Had they not, surely there would be far fewer passengers on commercial flights these days.
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