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By Dan Beard
If you cut out a small, circular piece of very fine cloth or silk, and with a tack made of a pin that has been filed off, tack the center of the cloth to the end of a bamboo arrow, using a bit of writing paper as a washer to prevent the pin-head from pulling through the cloth, you may make a dainty little parachute. Fasten a number of pieces of thread neatly to the edges of the cloth, and make them long enough, that when the cloth is folded the strings will just reach the cotton end of the arrow. The threads must all be exactly the same length and neatly tied to the stick about a quarter of its length from the butt end.
Shoot this arrow up in the air, and if you have made it properly when it descends the heavy end will fall first and will spread your little parachute like a tiny silk umbrella, and it will float airily down. After you have made a few experiments you will discover how much weight you need at the blunt end of the arrow, and this may be adjusted by bits of chewing-gum or putty.
When you once succeed you will feel rewarded for your labor by the sight of the beautiful little air-ships sailing so lightly through the air, and no one not in the secret can tell how it is possible to shoot such things from a blow-gun.
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