I did a couple more quite close to the aerodrome—beauties; and then came down in a steep spiral. They were all at a height of 6,000 feet, and I only lost 400 feet each time. Four good loops at the first time of attempting a loop isn’t bad considering I had never even looped as a passenger. Strangely enough, I wasn’t half so excited as I expected to be, and once accomplished, the feat seemed easy and not out of the ordinary. But to set your minds at rest I do not intend to go in for stunting.

I am quite bucked, though, at having done it, and it was a curious sensation, to say the least. I have been heartily congratulated: they were “d—d good loops!”

Thanks ever so much for the pastries and the cake. They were ripping. But really, though, you mustn’t trouble so much over me in the food line, for we have to pinch ourselves and tell each other “There is a war on” sometimes when we get some unusual delicacies. By the same post I got a pound of lovely nut chocolate from S. We had a tremendous scrap in the Mess over it when I discovered what it was, and it ended up with the box of chocolate on the floor, with me on top of it, and five people on top of me. When they discovered that the more people there were on top of me the farther off became the chocolate, they got up, and I handed it round in the usual civilised manner. It was great fun, though, and the chocolate being in a tin did not suffer.

We had a visit from Ian Hay’s friend to-day, if you recall a certain incident in the trenches. He recently got the Military Cross.10

One of the difficulties I have to contend with here is finding out the correct day and date. Days here are all one to us, and it has even sometimes to be put to the vote.

Yesterday I spent four and a half hours in my machine! Not all in the air, though. I took up fifteen different passengers, and gave them all a spiral. They were sent over to see what signalling on the ground looks like from a ’plane. I don’t think any of them had been up before. At Hendon I should have made between £30 and £40 for that.

As I was going out of the aerodrome I flew over a passing car and we waved merrily to each other. Then I chased the car, slowed my engine and dived at it, and a little later flew after it again. The driver must have been watching me too closely, for he went into the ditch. My passenger was awfully bucked about it.

I suppose you know we have adopted the new time now. It only alters the hour of our meals, however; our work goes on according to the light and the weather.

Cricket is the great “stunt” here in the afternoon and Rugby in the evenings. The mornings are spent in repairing the damage of overnight caused by the Rugger. All this, of course, provided the little incidentals of flying, and so on, do not interfere to excess. The batsman is out-numbered by fielders in the proportion of fifteen to one, and for his further annoyance he may not smite the ball more than quite a moderate distance or it counts as out. Still, the game provides much amusement, and as the batsman generally ignores the boundary rule, and smites at every ball on the principle of a short life and a gay one, it is also conducive to short innings.

I had another twenty minutes’ night flying a couple of nights ago, and did a good landing. It was almost pitch dark, as there was a long row of clouds at 2,000 feet which hid the moon. We had flares out, and a searchlight lighting up the track; but from the moment you start moving you go out into inky darkness, flying on, seeing nothing till the altimeter tells you that you are high enough to turn. Then round, and the twinkling lights of the Aerodrome beneath. Higher, and gradually, as you become accustomed to the dark, you pick out a road here and a clump of trees there, till finally the picture is complete. At length, you throttle down the engine and glide—keeping a watchful eye on the altimeter, aerodrome, and air speed indicator. When about 400 feet up you open out your engine again, and fly in towards the aerodrome, stopping your engine just outside. Then you glide down and land alongside the flares.

As I write, I hear a lively bugle band in the distance on the march. More troops going up to the trenches, I suppose. Our gramophone still plays on, our gardens and flower-beds are blooming, and all is well.

To-day I went up to take photos, and went over the lines four times, carefully sighting the required trenches, and taking eighteen photos. I spent nearly two and a half hours in the air, and when I got back I found the string that worked the shutter had broken after my third photo, and the rest had not come out. It was disappointing, because my last three journeys over the lines need not have been made, and incidentally it would have saved getting a hole through one of my planes.

J. saw a scrap in the air to-day in which one of our machines was brought down. He was too far off to help. The report came in first that it was my ’bus which was down, but neither I nor my escort machine saw the fight, which must have been some distance off.

All goes well, and I have finished my job for to-day (a three hours’ patrol) without seeing a Hun or getting an Archie. Two of us went up and F had streamers on his wings; he was going to direct the flight, and I was to follow him. It was very cloudy, and F being in a skittish mood played hide-and-seek round them. This was good fun for the first hour, but after that it became boring. Once, when I was following him a short distance behind, he ran slap into the middle of a huge cloud. I said to myself, “If you think I am going to follow you there you’re jolly well mistaken”; so I waited outside the cloud, and was gratified to see him come out at the bottom in a vertical bank, about 500 feet directly below me. It turned out that he had been pumping up the pressure in his petrol tank, roaring with laughter as his passenger gave a little jump at every pumpful, for the passenger sits on one of the large petrol tanks, which swells or “unkinks” itself as you pump, and to his disgust he had run slap into the cloud without seeing it. It was a wonderful sight among the clouds, and to see the other aeroplane dodging in and out of grottos, canyons, and tunnels, poking its nose here and there, sometimes worrying a zigzag course through a maze of cloudlets, and sometimes turning back from an impenetrable part with a vertical bank, outlining the machine sharply against the cloud. Finally we came down to a height of 5,000 feet, and there, just by the lines, we had a sham battle for the amusement of the Tommies in the trenches.

“I have nothink to write about this time. I got a letter from Bert the other day, he’s out in France, and old George’s group is called up too. I wonder when those Saterday nites with them will cum back, they were times. Then that supper with me and him at Eliza’s after—my! Everyone thinks as how the war will be over with luck in a few years’ time. ’As Pa got that job or is he still at the ‘Green Man’? Well hoping this finds you as it leaves me at present, in the pink. I wish you’d send our cook the resepe for them cooked chips you used ter do on Saterday nites. Give my love to Rose.”

No, I’m still sane—merely a temporary lapse owing to an overdose of censoring. The squadron yesterday, noticing that I was orderly officer, decided to give me a run for my money, and wrote millions of letters.

My Flight Commander—one of the finest fellows I have ever met—is busy cooking tobacco with E. in a tin by means of a spirit lamp! They are trying to determine its “flash point,” and I have sent word round to the M.O. to stand by with stretchers.

I was up with K. yesterday, strafing some trenches. We started at 3,000 feet and the clouds descended lower and lower till we ended up at a height of 1,200 feet over a well-known town, where it became too wet and too hot at the same time for our job. To-day the clouds are crawling about just over the ground, so there is nothing doing.

Our food here is English right enough. We get French bread as well, and it is generally preferred to ration bread. The gardens here have flowers—planted out mostly—pansies, nasturtiums, etc. I suggested that asparagus would be rather a good thing to plant, but the idea didn’t seem to catch on!

There is no reason whatever to be worried about not receiving letters. If there is ever a move either way it would not affect the R.F.C. to any great extent. It couldn’t improve German Archie shooting or anything of that sort. No fighting on the ground can reach us, and in a big bombardment it only means that we are kept fairly busy directing the fire of our batteries, etc.

Sorry I shan’t be able to write you to-day except this rough note written in my biplane. I have finished my job, and am writing in the hope of catching the post. There is bad news to-day. My pal B., who was on a bombing stunt this morning, has not returned, so I am afraid he may have landed in Hunland. I am just doing a long glide down to the aerodrome; my passenger has asked me not to spiral down as he has got a bad head. I enclose his note. His writing is better than mine, as he has written on a soft pad. (Enclosure:—“Got a rotten head, so go steady, will you?”)

I’ve got a top-hole souvenir now. It is a machine-gun bullet which my rigger found in my fuselage—that is to say, the aeroplane fuselage. It is bent “some,” as it smote something rather hard—a bomb.

I went up to take some special photos for the C.O. to-day, but the weather was very bad, and the sky as smothered in clouds as I was in Archie, and that is saying a good deal. It took me three trips over the line to get five photos. Four came out, including on them corners of clouds I was dodging. The Huns got our range to a nicety, but there was not a scratch on the machine. One Archie burst just in front of us, and I looked up to see the corporal I had as passenger disappear in the smoke as we actually went through it. It was like going through a tiny cloud. I have heard and seen plenty of Archie before, but never before smelt it. The C.O. was rather pleased, though only one photo was really of any use.

The engine in my machine has put up a record for the squadron. It did over a hundred and ten hours’ running without being touched or even having the sparking plugs changed. It was still going strong when we changed it and put a new one in. I have tested the new one and flown with it, and it is very good.

We are kept well up-to-date with the London theatre news by the fellows who come back from leave. They also bring the records of them back for the gramophone, and now the camp resounds with music from “The Bing Boys are Here” and “Mr. Manhattan.”

To people who think this branch of the Service the most dangerous, you can say I’d sooner be here than in the trenches these days, and I think the opinion of the whole corps is the same.

I ran out of petrol a quarter of a mile from the aerodrome, and had to land in a field of wheat about five feet high. I had been up three hours and twenty minutes non-stop when my petrol ran out, and the gauge still showed three gallons in the tank, though it was bone dry. I was 700 feet up and had to make up my mind where I was going to land in about four seconds. I brought her down, and pancaked her beautifully into the field about three yards from a road. It is jolly hard to land in wheat without turning over, but I did it without hurting the machine at all; in fact J. flew it that evening on a night stunt. We wheeled it from the field along the road back to the aerodrome inside half an hour. My passenger said he enjoyed the flight more than any other he had had!

At the present moment there is some storm on. J. is playing the violin not two yards from me, and I cannot hear a single note except during lulls. Perhaps it is just as well.

One of our squadron was out on a stunt the other day. Next day the ’phone was continually on the go, and there was so much “hot air” in the office that it was dangerous to fly over on account of the bumps. Several of us have got special leave to go to a flicker show some way off, and a tender is coming in a few minutes. I am very fit, and we are all a very happy party. I am sitting on my bed, in my little hut about 8 feet by 6 feet. It is really quite snug. Washstand, etc., and shelves and books and boots and clothes. Diabolo (home made) is the latest craze here! Here comes the tender, so I must catch the post first.

I was up on photos to-day. I hope and expect these are the last for a while. I had quite a job getting them owing to clouds. I flew about behind the German lines for over an hour before I could get a single photo, owing to there being no holes in the clouds. I got practically no Archie, and got the photos.

I went to the flicker show the other day and it was quite good. A splendid divisional band, a Charlie Chaplin film, and tea, and patisserie! Ah!

I think Gillespie’s book (Letters from Flanders) most interesting. I have only dipped into it here and there at present, but am going to read it through. Send some more as soon as you like.

Blessed if I know what to write about. I did the three-hour patrol yesterday, but it was very cold and cloudy and no Huns ventured out.

A visitor landed at our ’drome from night bombing and a bomb blew his machine up on landing. He calmly got out of the scrap-heap and walked away. It was a miraculous escape, and most of our people who were asleep thought it was a Hun bombing us. The engine was still running on the ground, and the C.O. stopped it by using a fire extinguisher in the air intake—a jolly clever and plucky thing to do, as there were gallons of petrol all around, and, for all he knew, more bombs.

There is a darling puppy here belonging to one of the men, and I go round and have a chat with it every morning when I inspect my transport. It is a jolly little thing, and quite looks forward to my visits.

I am at present flying a machine fitted with dual control. A couple of days ago I went up to test it and E. came with me. We trotted round the country very low and stunted gently over neighbouring villages. You can easily tell when people are watching you, as in looking up the black blob of the hat changes to the white blob of the face. We went up again yesterday, and when I had taken the machine to 2,000 feet or so, I signalled E., and he fitted in his control lever and took charge. I then had a pleasant little snooze of twenty minutes or so, waking up now and then to give my lever a pat in the required direction when he did not get the machine level quickly enough after turning, or something like that. He did jolly well, turning the machine splendidly sometimes. Then, when it was just about a quarter of an hour before dinner time he took out his lever, and I brought the machine down in the most gorgeous spiral I have ever done. Absolutely vertical bank on. M. was very amusing afterwards. “Quite a good spiral that,” he said patronisingly to E., “for a first attempt.”

I was up again this morning for two and a half hours with E. The weather was hopeless; our altitude was often under 2,000 feet by the lines. To relieve the monotony E. flew me for about half an hour while I observed—the clouds and mist! Finally, we got up a bit higher, and just before it was time to come home did a beautiful spiral quite close to the lines for the benefit of a few thousand Tommies and Huns in the trenches—just to show there was no ill-feeling, you know.

I had just got my letters to-day when I was sent up, so I had to take them with me, and read them in the air on the way to the lines.

I took up some chocolate the other day when I was on patrol, and gave some to the observer in the air, and we munched away for some time. He was a sergeant, one of the ancient observers, and he did not know that when I waggled the joy-stick—thus shaking the ’bus from side to side—I wanted him to turn round. I waggled away for about five minutes, and he sat there quite contentedly, thinking to himself (as he afterwards told me) that it was rather a bumpy day. Then I started switch-backing and he endured that, though on what theory I don’t know. Finally I nearly had to loop him to persuade him to turn round, and when he did so he had a grin on his face and a sort of “Think-you-can-frighten-me-with-your-stunts-you-giddy-kipper” look as well. The newspaper stories of the firing in France being heard in Ireland, the north of Scotland, and Timbuctoo amuse me greatly. Those people must have “some” ears.

I was most frightfully sorry that you hadn’t received up to Sunday my letter about the postponement of my leave. It must have been a rotten disappointment, and I raged round the camp until I finally simmered down again. Never mind, it won’t be long.... Six people have just invaded my 8 feet by 6 feet hut. That is one of the ways superfine Virginias depart this life quickly. Rescued the inkbottle from an untimely death as a billiard ball, the cue a rolled-up map; violent cussin’, almost worthy of Mother Guttersnipe caused E. to vamoose and the others buzzed off.

My dear old ’bus (or aeroplane as the authorities insist on its being called)11 has gone under at last. One new pilot too many was called upon to fly it, and I may be bringing home a new walking-stick! I have not been flying it for a week now, as I have a nice new—er—machine to fly. But E. and I did all our “hot-air stuff” on the other ’bus, and I looped it.

The splendid news has come through that my pal B. is “safe and well though a prisoner.” W., who is on leave, wired us.

I shan’t write to-morrow, as if all goes well it will be a race between this card and myself to get home first. The very best of love to you.