France, May.

Gallipoli had its own special difficulties for aeroplanes. There was no open space on which they could dream of alighting at Anzac; and one machine which had to come down at Suvla was shelled to pieces as soon as it landed. So planes had to live at Imbros, and there were ten miles of sea to be crossed before work began and after it finished, and some planes, which went out and were never heard of, were probably lost in that sea. There were brave flights far over the enemy's country. But, until the very last days at Helles, there was scarcely ever an enemy's plane which put up a successful fight against our own.

In France the enemy is almost as much in the air as we are. He has to be reckoned with all the time, and fierce fighting in the air, either against German machines or in face of German shell-fire such as we scarcely even imagined in watching the air-fighting of Gallipoli, is the daily spectacle of the trenches. We have seen a brave flight by a German low down within rifle-shot. But never anything to compare with the indifference to danger of the British pilots.

I was in the lines the other day when there sounded close at hand salvo after salvo so fast that I took it for a bombardment. The Germans were firing at one of our aeroplanes. It was flying as low as I ever saw a plane fly in Gallipoli—you could make out quite clearly the rings painted on the planes, which meant a British machine. A sputtering rifle fire broke out from the German trenches opposite—their infantry were firing at him. Then came that salvo again—twelve reports in quick succession—a sheaf of shells whining overhead like so many puppies—burst after burst in the sky, some short, some far past him—you would swear they must have gone through him—one right over him.

The hearts of our men were in their mouths as they watched. He sailed straight through the shrapnel puffs, turned sharply, and steered away. A new salvo broke out over the sky where he should have been. He immediately swerved into it like a footballer making a dodging run, then turned away again. A minute later a third sheaf of shells burst behind him, following him up. "He ought to be safe now," one thought to oneself, "but my word, they nearly got him—"

And then, as we were congratulating him on having escaped with a whole skin, and breathing more freely at the thought—he turned slowly and came straight up towards those guns again.

The Australians holding the trenches were delighted. "My word, he's got more guts than what I have," said one. Sheaf after sheaf of shells burst in the air all about him; but he steered straight up the middle of them till he reached the point he wanted to make, and then wheeled and made his patrol up and down over the trenches. He was flying higher but still low, and the crackle of rifles again broke out from the German lines. He was within the range of the feeblest "Archie" even at his highest. They were literally just so many big shot-guns, firing at a great bird; only this bird came up time and again to be shot at, simply trusting to the chance that they would not hit him.

"The rest may take their luck, but I should be dead sick if they was to get him," grunted a big Australian as he tugged a pull-through out of his rifle.

Of course they will get him if he does that often—you only need two eyes to know that. The communiquÉs tell of it every week. As you scurry past the hinterland of the lines in your motor-car you will sometimes see two or three aeroplanes flying like great herons overhead. They seem to be in company, keeping station almost, and holding on the same course, all mates together—until you catch the cough of a machine-gun, and realise that they are actually engaged in the deadliest sort of duel which can possibly be fought in these days. In a battle of infantry you are mostly hit by an unaimed shot, or a shot aimed into a mass of men. Even if a man fires at you once, it is probably someone else whom he aims at next time. But in the air the man who shoots at you is coming after you, and intends to go on shooting at you until he kills. The moment when you see an enemy's plane, and realise that you have to fight it, must be one to set even the strongest nerves tingling.

Generally the aeroplane with the black crosses on its wings is very high—barely visible. Sometimes, when the other planes are near it, it swoops steeply to earth behind the German lines. Or it may be that, far behind our own lines, you see a plane diving to earth at an angle which makes you wonder whether it is falling or being steered. It straightens out suddenly, and lands a few fields away. By the time you are there, a cluster of khaki is already round it. An English boy steps out of it, flushed and excited, and with intense strain written in his eyes and in every jerk of his head. Out of the seat just behind him they are lifting a man with a terrible wound in his side. In the arms of the seat from which they lift him are two holes as big as a shell would make—but they were not made by a shell. A cluster of bullets from the machine-gun of a German plane at close range has passed in at one side of the seat and out at the other. The rifle which the observer was carrying dropped from his hands out into space, and the pilot saw it fall just before he dived.

The German pilots are sometimes youngsters too—not very unlike our own. Our first sight of active war in France was when the train stopped at a country siding many miles behind the lines, and two British soldiers with fixed bayonets marched a third man—a youngster with a slight fair moustache—over the level crossing in front of us. He wore a grey peaked cap and a short overcoat jacket with a warm collar and tall, tight-fitting boots—very much like those of our own officers; and he walked with a big, swift stride, looking straight ahead of him. Somewhere, far over behind the German lines, they were probably expecting him at that moment. His servant would be getting ready his room. He had left the aerodrome only an hour before, and flown over strange lines which we have never seen, but which had become as familiar as his home to him, with no idea than to be back, as he always was before, within an hour or so. And then something seems to be wrong with the plane—he has to come down in a strange country; and within an hour he is out of the war for good and all. He strides along biting his lip. His comrades will expect him for an hour or so. By dinner-time they will realise that there is another member gone from their mess.

While I am writing these words someone runs in to say that a German aeroplane has been shot down—came down in flames, they say, and tore a great hole in the roadside. There seems to be some such news every day, now it is one of ours, now one of theirs. It is a brave game.

I suppose it needs a sportsman, even if he is a German, to fight in a service like that. The pity of it that he is fighting for such an ugly cause.