have
done in the daytime. The end of the avenue, I knew, was the target of
their anti-aircraft gunnery. I flew out, and shrapnel tore all around
me. My machine was struck several times, and, as bad luck would have it,
the patent point of my magneto fell out just when I got to the spot
where shrapnel was thickest.

"My chances of getting home then seemed pretty slim--engines out of
order, lit up by fireworks, up 2,500 feet, and a target clear as a
pikestaff for the gunnery. However, I managed to slide in the direction
of the ship on the French coast. It seems easy to keep out of the way of
the guns; but, of course, they have a demoralising effect on a man in
the air. Not so much at dark as in the day, though. Well, I got home all
right.

"Only a day or so afterwards I dropped a bomb on or near a German
U-boat, and I can't say to this day whether I struck or damaged her.

"'Very lonely,'" murmured the pilot, reading from his log. "'Just saw a
torpedo boat.' On the next day, let's see.... Oh, yes.... 'Saw two
German destroyers, and raced back to our ship, and British ships sped
after the Germans.'

"A day or so later I had run in with two German machines. It chanced
that there was a wind blowing about 30 knots, and I was merely out
scouting, and did not carry a gun. The two enemy ships were joined by a
third, and then they gained sufficient courage to come a bit close. They
shot away my aileron control, and we were in a very bad way. For twenty
minutes we were continually under fire, and below there was a heavy
swell. It really was only through knowing how scared is the enemy flyer
when you go for him that I am here to-night. I let the enemy planes get
nearer and nearer to me, and by the time they were ready for firing I
dived at one of them. This so upset the poise of the three machines that
they turned tail and swung around to come at me. They made huge circles
to get on my flanks again. All this took time, and during it I was
getting nearer and nearer my base. Now and again the enemy machines were
like too many cooks and the broth; they nearly crashed into each other.
This also upset their nerves. Incidentally, when you are in the air,
only the other machine appears to be moving, and you seem perfectly
still. My escape is due in part to the arrival of one of our fighting
seaplanes. A German is desperately afraid of them, unless there are four
Germans to one Britisher. When they saw this fighting Britisher coming
t