My father was the most rational and the most dispassionate of men.

Until I was four years old I lived in the house of my paternal grandfather, about two miles from the pretty little village of Wallace, at the mouth of the river of that name.

I had not yet gotten into the world of light. But I felt as one who, standing outside, could knock against the wall and hear an answering knock from within.

In 1860 a total eclipse of the sun was visible in British America.

Flight by machines heavier than air is unpractical and insignificant, if not utterly impossible.

As the existence of a corps of professors of mathematics is peculiar to our navy, as well as an apparent, perhaps a real, anomaly, some account of it may be of interest.

Aerial flight is one of that class of problems with which man will never be able to cope.