I, the undersigned, firmly believe that as man has already made machines to run over the land and float over the water faster than the swiftest animal, so shortly he will make machines to fly through the air as fast, and finally faster, than the swiftest birds do now. And I hereby offer a bonus of £1,000 to any person who shall (in consequence of said bonus) within the next two years invent a flying machine, to go by Electrical, Chemical, Mechanical, or any other means, except by gas, a distance of 100 miles, and shall come and stop in front of the Book Arcade, Bourke Street, Melbourne, Australia, as easily and as safely as a carriage stops there now.
A workable flying machine would be the grandest invention of the age. My offer may not bring it about, but suppose a shilling subscription was made throughout the civilised world; say twenty million people gave 1/- each. That would be one million pounds, and offer that as a bonus for a useful flying machine, that bonus, I am sure, would produce the article. The shillings would be well spent, and it would immortalise the twenty million people who put their names down.
[Page 114--Miss Cole's Aerial Flight in a Flying Machine]
[Illustration: The Federation Of The Whole World Is Fast Coming.]
My prophecy with regard to flying machines, as may well be seen by the original statement herewith, was made twenty-eight years before the French aviator brought his machine to Australia which was on 2nd November, 1910, or two weeks before his successful flight.
Subsequently Mr. Hammond flew over the city. He remarked: "I was to early for breakfast, and just thirty years too late to claim E. W. Cole's prize of £1,000."
I believe that the advance of flying machines will be so rapid that within the next decade they will be used with as much ease and safety as any other means of present locomotion.
I will further state that their utility will be so great as to enable China, with her three hundred millions, to succeed in taking correct statistics.
And eventually the velocity with which they will fly may materially assist in establishing the peace of the world and the Parliament of Man.
My prophecy with regard to flying machines was made in 1868, and the bonus of £1,000 (see previous page) was offered in 1882.