f himself
as being secure in his strength. He has been shown the utter folly of
such thinking.

The menace--the invaders from Venus--came, and were destroyed, their
purposes defeated. Yet--in the vast reaches of space, in worlds of
other dimensions, in the cosmic crucible of life that embodies all
creation, there may be other forms of life, other menaces, hovering
clouds of death, preparing to sweep down upon Earth to snuff out her
life. Who can tell?

And who may say that man is free from the Venerian danger? The strange
sealing of the meteor implies that the menace is still present. Who
knows but what those inhuman Venerian brutes may even now be planning
some new invasion, may be preparing to renew their attack upon Earth?

Time alone will tell.

ROBOT PILOTS FOR AIRCRAFT

Perfection of an automatic mechanical piloting mechanism for airplanes
has been achieved after several years of experiment at the royal
aircraft establishment of Farnborough.

The apparatus has been successfully tried out on various types of
planes--two-seater day bombers, large twin-engine night bombers and
big flying boats. Its use as a second or relief pilot on long distance
flights by Royal Air Force machines is now being considered.

In every test the robot pilot has steered an accurate course for hours
at a time and over distances up to 400 miles while human members of
the crew have been concerned with other duties.

The basis of the mechanical pilot is a gyroscope that controls pistons
connected with the rudder and elevators of the plane. These pistons
are actuated by compressed air.

Once a course is set the robot pilot keeps the machine on that route
and errors of even a fraction of a degree are instantly and
automatically detected and corrected. All the human pilot has to do in
a plane so equipped is to take off and land the machine.

The Pilot's Assister is the official name of the new English device.
It weighs about 120 pounds.

Flights have been made with the mechanical pilot in all sorts of
weather. In dense fog and clouds, when a human pilot would have found
it almost impossible to maintain straight or level flight because of
the absence of any visible horizon by which to steer, the mechanical
pilot flew the plane with absolute accuracy. On one test flight the
automatic pilot steered a dead true course from Farnborough in South
England, to Newcastle, 270 miles farther north. The human pilot did
not touch the controls