erman
hospital, a prison camp, a jump from the footboard of a train, a series
of lone night-walks that extended over two months, and an escape across
the frontier of Neutralia, while two fellow-fugitives were shot dead by
Boche sentries.

Above the junction of Redhill the leader veered to the left and steered
by railway to the coast. Each pilot paid close attention to his place in
the group, for this was to be a test of whether our formation flying was
up to the standard necessary for work over enemy country. To keep exact
formation is far from easy for the novice who has to deal with the
vagaries of a rotary engine in a machine sensitive on the controls. The
engine develops a sudden increase of revolutions, and the pilot finds
himself overhauling the craft in front; he throttles back and finds
himself being overhauled by the craft behind; a slight deviation from
the course and the craft all around seem to be swinging sideways or
upwards. Not till a pilot can fly his bus unconsciously does he keep
place without repeated reference to the throttle and instrument-board.

Beyond Redhill we met an unwieldy cloudbank and were forced to lose
height. The clouds became denser and lower, and the formation continued
to descend, so that when the coast came into view we were below 3000
feet.

A more serious complication happened near Dovstone, the port which was
to be our cross-Channel springboard. There we ran into a mist, thick as
a London fog. It covered the Channel like a blanket, and completely
enveloped Dovstone and district. To cross under these conditions would
have been absurd, for opaque vapour isolated us from the ground and cut
the chain of vision which had bound together the six machines. We
dropped through the pall of mist and trusted to Providence to save us
from collision.

Four fortunate buses emerged directly above Dovstone aerodrome, where
they landed. The other two, in one of which I was a passenger, came out
a hundred feet over the cliffs. We turned inland, and soon found
ourselves travelling over a wilderness of roofs and chimneys. A
church-tower loomed ahead, so we climbed back into the mist. Next we all
but crashed into the hill south of Dovstone. We banked steeply and
swerved to the right, just as the slope seemed rushing towards us
through the haze.

Once more we descended into the clear air. Down below was a large field,
and in the middle of it was an aeroplane. Supposing this to be the
aerodrome, w