cess, from a practical point of view, was due to the fact that he
was without the level-headedness and the business ability which
characterised others of the pioneers. When he was in flight in his
Antoinette--Latham flew that machine and no other--he was a supreme
artist. His machine was beautiful, and his handling of it was
beautiful.

M. Henri Farman, beyond question, of course, another of the great
pioneers, is a man of imagination and of a highly nervous temperament,
yet possessing at the same time a very pronounced vein of caution. No
success has for an instant caused him to lose his head. At Rheims, in
1909, when he had created a world's record by flying for more than
three hours without alighting, those who hastened to congratulate him,
after his descent, found him absolutely normal and unmoved. Washing
his hands at a little basin in the corner of the shed, he discussed
very quietly and yet interestedly, and entirely without any
affectation of nonchalance, the details of his flight and the
behaviour of his motor. His attitude was that the flight was something,
yet not a great deal, and that very much more remained to be done; a
perfectly right and proper attitude, one which was just as it should
be, yet one encountered very rarely under such circumstances--human
nature being what it is.

Farman's patience, his perseverance, were in the very early days what
gave him his first success. With the biplane the Voisins built him,
for example, nothing but his own determination, and his ceaseless work
upon his engine, enabled him to do more with this type of machine than
others had done.

As the aeroplane increased in efficiency, and in the reliability of
its engine, and was used in cross-country journeys, there came an era
of flying contests, in which large prizes were offered, and in which
airmen passed between cities and across frontiers, and traversed in
their voyages the greater part of Europe. In the making of these
flights, which needed an exceptional determination and skill, allied
also to a perfect bodily fitness, there came into prominence certain
aviators whose precision in their daily flights, passing across
country with the speed and regularity of express trains, won
admiration throughout the world. Prominent among these champions was
the French naval officer, Lieut. J. Conneau, who adopted in his
contests the flying name of "Beaumont." His success and his exactitude,
when piloting a Bleriot monoplane for