as the Vickers 'Gun-bus,' a 'pusher'
machine, with the propeller revolving behind the main planes between the
outriggers carrying the tail, with a seat right in front for a gunner
who was provided with a machine gun on a swivelling mount which had a
free field of fire in every direction forward. The device which proved
the death-blow for this type of aircraft during the war will be dealt
with in the appropriate place later, but the machine should not go
unrecorded.

As a result of a number of accidents to monoplanes the Government
appointed a Committee at the end of 1912 to inquire into the causes of
these. The report which was presented in March, 1913, exonerated the
monoplane by coming to the conclusion that the accidents were not caused
by conditions peculiar to monoplanes, but pointed out certain
desiderata in aeroplane design generally which are worth recording. They
recommended that the wings of aeroplanes should be so internally braced
as to have sufficient strength in themselves not to collapse if the
external bracing wires should give way. The practice, more common in
monoplanes than biplanes, of carrying important bracing wires from
the wings to the undercarriage was condemned owing to the liability of
damage from frequent landings. They also pointed out the desirability of
duplicating all main wires and their attachments, and of using stranded
cable for control wires. Owing to the suspicion that one accident at
least had been caused through the tearing of the fabric away from the
wing, it was recommended that fabric should be more securely fastened to
the ribs of the wings, and that devices for preventing the spreading of
tears should be considered. In the last connection it is interesting to
note that the French Deperdussin firm produced a fabric wing-covering
with extra strong threads run at right-angles through the fabric at
intervals in order to limit the tearing to a defined area.

In spite, however, of the whitewashing of the monoplane by the
Government Committee just mentioned, considerable stir was occasioned
later in the year by the decision of the War office not to order any
more monoplanes; and from this time forward until the War period the
British Army was provided exclusively with biplanes. Even prior to this
the popularity of the monoplane had begun to wane. At the Olympia
Aero Show in March, 1913, biplanes for the first time outnumbered the
'single-deckers'(as the Germans call monoplanes); wh