but small
cottages were dotted about here and there in plenty.

"Not much room in one of those pastures," commented Dicky. "Mind you
pick a decent one. Don't spoil the hedge on the other side of it,
either."

Dicky's mood was infectious. Bob was sick at heart, but his friend's
joking way of speaking had its effect.

"Would you rather be starved to death or neatly smashed? Do you prefer
your misery long drawn out or all over in a jiffy?" Bob was joking
now, though grimly enough.

"You tend to your part and let the Huns tend to theirs," answered
Jimmy.

They were almost down now. As they approached the field which Bob
had chosen for landing, what was their horror to see, but one field
away, two German soldiers in their field gray! They were armed with
rifles, and appeared to be carrying full field kit.

No others were in sight. The two burly Teutons looked in amazement at
the aeroplane, as if unable to grasp the fact that it was plainly
marked with the red, white and blue circles stamping it as a machine
belonging to the Allied armies.

While the boys knew well where they were, and how impossible it seemed
that they could escape capture eventually, the sight of two German
soldiers right at the spot upon which they had so unfortunately
been compelled to land, was a real disappointment to them. Perhaps
it was just such a disappointment, however, that was needed to key
them up to prompt action.

Bob did not dare to try to clear the tall, thick hedge which separated
the field he had chosen for a landing place from the one next to it.
He must stick to his original intention. As he swooped down to the
fairly level ground Dicky took one last glance at the pair of
soldiers, who had started toward the point where they thought the
plane would land. The question in Dicky's mind was as to whether
or not the Boches would take a pot shot at the airmen before the
machine came to rest. Evidently that had not occurred to them,
however, and they merely started on a run, with the humane idea of
taking the aviators prisoner.

The machine taxied the full length of the pasture and went full tilt
into the hedge at the end of it. Luckily this hedge was just thick
enough to stop the aeroplane effectively and yet prevent it from
breaking through and capsizing. While the machine did not go on
through the hedge, the two boys did. They crashed through and
landed on the soft earth on the other side at almost the same moment