fter damage by gunfire in
Poland, August 1914.
21 1913 Z. VI Taken over by the army. Crashed
at Cologne after damage by gunfire
over Liege, 6th August 1914.
22 1914 Z. VII Taken over by the army. Crashed
in the Argonne after damage by
gunfire, August 1914.
23 1914 Z. VIII Taken over by the army. Brought
down by gunfire at Badonvillers,
23rd August 1914.
24 1914 L. 3 Taken over by the navy. Wrecked
off Fanoe, 17th February 1915.
25 1914 Z. IX Taken over by the army. Dismantled
August 1914.

The list is full of wreckage; what it does not show is the immense
progress made in a few years. As early as 1907 Count Zeppelin made a
voyage of eight hours in his third airship, covering 211 miles. In 1909
he voyaged, in stages, from Friedrichshafen to Berlin, landing at Tegel
in the presence of the Emperor on the 29th of August, and returning
safely to Friedrichshafen by the 2nd of September. But the growing
efficiency of the Zeppelin and the growing confidence of the German
public are best seen in the records of passenger-carrying flights. The
Zeppelin Company, being founded and supported by national enterprise,
did not sell any ships to foreign powers. For passenger-carrying
purposes it supplied ships to the subsidiary company usually called the
Delag (that is, the Deutsche Luftschiffahrt Aktien-Gesellschaft), which
had its headquarters at Frankfort-on-the-Main. The Delag acquired six
Zeppelin airships, which, unlike the military and naval ships, bore
names. A record of the voyages made by the _Viktoria Luise_, the
_Hansa_, and the _Sachsen_ will show how rapidly the German people were
familiarized with the Zeppelin, and how safe air-travel became, when
safety was essential, as it is in all passenger-carrying enterprises.
The _Viktoria Luise_ made her first trip on the 4th of March 1912, with
twenty-three passengers on board, from Friedrichshafen to
Frankfort-on-the-Main--a distance of about two hundred miles, which she
covered in seven and a half