could pump at
them--but nothing doing. They beat it home and so did I, for it had been
three to one. When I landed I had five holes in my machine. One of the
wires had been shot away and gave me some trouble in landing.

Feb. 10, 1918.--We have been pretty busy and had some exciting times. I
almost got mine day before yesterday and feel pretty lucky to be here.
We started out on a long trip into Germany and all the way over we had
no trouble at all. After we bombed, my observer and I dived down on
some villages and used our own guns on them. We got so low that the
anti-aircraft guns were popping too close, so we beat it. We soon saw a
bunch of hangars below us and we dived down on them and shot at them. In
a few minutes a bunch of Huns came up from the hangars after us and we
beat it to catch up with the others. We got up with them and looked
behind us and there were a number of Germans sneaking down on us.

Then the battle commenced and for forty minutes we had a hot fight. We
picked off (censored) of them and they went plunging down in flames.
Then the others went back and we all returned safely, but I noticed that
my machine worked queerly, and when I landed I had a hard time, and
barely got to the ground without smashing to pieces.

I looked the machine over, and you should have seen it. From top
to bottom it was one mass of holes. One bullet passed through my
combination and hit a can of tobacco. Another cut a main spar on one of
my wings, and another hit my stabilizer, tearing it half in two. One
other hit my gas tank and put a hole clear through it. Luckily my gas
was low and it did not explode, but, believe me, I was lucky.

IN THE BIG GERMAN DRIVE

April 20, 1918.--The orderly has just tapped on my window to put down my
shade, which means the Gothas are on their way. The guns are starting.
This attack has been frightful--day after day long lines of ambulances
roll by our camp carrying large numbers of wounded. Tomorrow we shall
continue our work of knocking down their batteries and bombing their
railroads. To-night, now, they are trying to get us.

I started on a "permission" about three weeks ago and had beautiful
visions of peace and content for a week, but was called back immediately
at the beginning of this horrible attack. Things look bad, and in a few
days we are moving farther up.

Our work here has been hard and exciting and always working in any kind
of weather. While our loss has been heavy we