This is rather the attitude we should have expected of the all-highest, whom, of course, the seasons ought to obey. It is hard on him that we should have had such a late summer, and that his “Zeppers” should have had to wait so long and, after all, done so little.

For the “gentle Zeppers” from the east to-day, like those from the west of old, come with fair weather and serene skies. They may find an exceptional night in winter when “the moon is hid,” for, like all evil-doers, “they love darkness rather than light,” and “the night is still,” but it is in the calm of summer and autumn that they look to make their best harvest and their boldest onslaughts. Equinoctial gales, sleet and snow do not suit them, so brave are they. They are not keen to face either the battle or the breeze, so brave are they.

It would be unfair to deny bravery altogether to the Boches. They have shown it in their own “book of arithmetic” way on land, on sea, and in the air. (H)immelmann, as the Tommies of course called him, certainly showed himself “at ’ome in his native (h)element, as bold as a ’awk,” though brought down by a half-fledged eagle at the finish. But he was an aviator and took risks. The brave “Zepps” have not taken many; we do not blame them. There is no reason why they should, and every reason why they should not. They are delicate and expensive birds to rear. When they are on the wing there are a good many “marks over,” and when the anti-aircraft gun finds those “marks,” light currency though they be, they fall even faster than on the Exchange.

Formidable, no doubt, the Zepps are. It is our good luck more than our good management that they have not done more damage. But brave, as bravery goes in this war, hardly that, so far. We should have expected the Kaiser to curse them and the weather, not to weep. Weeping? Kaisers and Kaiserins and Count Zeppelins should be made of sterner stuff. We do not hear that Herod and Herodias were seen weeping because the attack on Rachel cost them an assassin or two. Yet that is the picture Raemaekers gives us here, scathingly, sarcastically, graphic as ever.

“They were brave.” “They fought against odds unnumbered” (of women and children and men 10,000 feet below them). “They fell with their tails to the foe.” Yes, the Zepps are very brave. They’ll have to be braver still before they’re done!

HERBERT WARREN.

P.S.—This was written before September 2. Yes, they’ll have to take more risks, and they and their friends will have to be braver yet.

H. W.