Two of our machines have already gone crashing down. The sight of them falling is the greatest shock to the nerves imaginable; it is the true test of bravery, for one always feels tempted to give up and follow them, but only for the passing second. The lust of battle grows strong again; more bombs and yet more are dropped onto the stricken city. The flying of the machines is marvelous to behold.
Another of our craft is hit, making number three; she, too, disappears into the mist beneath. Our bombs are now all exhausted and we turn thankfully homewards. Another machine drops out, to land safely on the foreshore, and, as we afterwards learn, the pilot is made a prisoner. Then we reach our own lines once more and are safe.
_Somewhere in the North of France, Saturday._
The other day I had a dream; at six o’clock in the morning, at 10,000 feet up in the air, with the biting cold wind whistling by my ears. On all sides stretched the air, a boundless infinity; beneath, a moving panorama of wood, river, and hill, of men, guns and battle-field. Far in the distance, the waters of the North Sea glinted blue in the early morning sun; when suddenly the air became filled with a strange purring sound, and from all sides came flying hundreds of aircraft of varying shapes and sizes. Among them I noticed one, a leviathan. A long cigar-shaped, silver-tinted, super-airship; beneath and swinging easily in the breeze, the hull was in the shape of the old-fashioned sea-going steamer. For’ard was a wide expanse of promenade deck, where could plainly be distinguished the passengers walking to and fro. In the center, on a raised dais, a band, resplendent in blue and gold, were strumming some popular air. Amidships a great bridge, where the officer of the watch and the quartermaster were directing her course. Astern was another wide expanse of deck, but this apparently was reserved for the crew. Now a large group of men were busily engaged round a small, bullet-shaped aeroplane. With a whirr, she started off across the wide deck, and a second later was gracefully clearing the great ship’s side, and missing a green and white balloon buoy literally by inches, sank rapidly in a southerly direction; and then our wireless telephone rang. It was the big ship speaking us, “Had we seen anything of the home-bound mail?” “No, we had not.” “Could we say what the Siberian weather conditions had been the day previous?” “Well, nothing extraordinary, slight haze over North China.” “Strange, the Menelaus left Canton yesterday, should have reported Bombay this morning, Moscow reports her two hours overdue.” “No, we have seen nothing of the missing liner;” and, leaving the great pleasure ship miles in the rear, we skim across the Carpathians, speaking two Serbian cruisers on patrol duty along the Northern Frontier. From thence we run into a storm, have to climb to 5000, and by the time the mist and darkness clears away, the North Sea has loomed into view. Now we are more in the beaten track, swarms of small pleasure craft go cruising by; the Paris-London way is chock-a-block with traffic: cumbersome great four and eight engined merchant vessels, slim graceful pleasure craft, Government vessels, two giant American liners, and an Australian non-stop mail-boat, some naval craft and small police patrol craft, endeavoring to order the converging lines, and two military transports bringing home leave men from Abyssinia. The Far East fleet, flying majestically and impressively along with the flagship _Twentieth Century_ leading the line, the hind portion tapering off gracefully and far into the rear to the smaller aeroplane--torpedo craft. The air is full of the crackling of the wireless, every master endeavoring at the same time to engage a berth in either the London or Norwich aerodromes. Soon the fleet makes a sharp turn to the left, the less important and smaller craft scurrying hurriedly away to give her passage. The Home Fleet looms into view, silent and majestic; in the dim distance the two units sight each other, and after paying the usual compliments, pass on their respective ways. Nearer the English coast the air swarms with pleasure vessels, elegant and tiny airships float lazily in the air, their occupants lolling idly in the sun. Over Dover can be seen the ugly form of the new floating dock, said to be large enough to accommodate even an air dreadnought.