Chapter VIII: The Daily Round (2)

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For these many weeks Pozieres has been but a name and a waste brick pile; yet the site of the powdered village cannot be mistaken from the air, for, slightly to the east, two huge mine-craters sentinel it, left and right. From here to Le Sars, which straddles the road four miles beyond, was our photographic objective. We were to cover either side of the road twice, so I had arranged to use half the number of plates during each there-and-back journey.

The R.F.C. camera used by us is so simple as to be called foolproof. Eighteen plates are stacked in a changing-box over the shutter. You slide the loading handle forward and backward, and the first plate falls into position. Arrived over the spot to be spied upon, you take careful sight and pull a string--and the camera has reproduced whatever is 9000 feet below it. Again you operate the loading handle; the exposed plate is pushed into an empty changing-box underneath an extension, and plate the second falls into readiness for exposure, while the indicator shows 2. And so on until the changing-box for bare plates is emptied and the changing-box for used ones is filled. Whatever skill attaches to the taking of aerial snapshots is in judging when the machine is flying dead level and above the exact objective, and in repeating the process after a properly timed interval.

A.-A. guns by the dozen hit out immediately we crossed the lines, for we were their one target. No other craft were in sight, except a lone B.E., which was drifted by the wind as it spotted for artillery from the British side of the trenches. Scores of black puffs, attended by cavernous coughs, did their best to put the wind up us. They succeeded to a certain extent, though not enough to hinder the work on hand.

Everything was in Archie's favour. We were at 7000 feet--an easy height for A.-A. sighting--we were silhouetted against a cover of high clouds, our ground speed was only some thirty miles an hour against the raging wind, and we dared not dodge the bursts, however close, as area photography from anything but an even line of flight is useless. Yet, though the bursts kept us on edge, we were not touched by so much as a splinter. In this we were lucky under the conditions. The luck could scarcely have held had the job lasted much longer than a quarter of an hour--which is a consoling thought when one is safe back and writing to a dear friend in England, not?

Northward, along the left-hand side of the road, was my first subject; and a damned unpleasant subject it was--a dirty-soiled, shell-scarred wilderness. I looked overboard to make certain of the map square, withdrew back into the office, pulled the shutter-string, and loaded the next plate for exposure.

"_Wouff!_ _Ouff!_ _Ouff!_" barked Archie, many times and loud. An instinct to swerve assaulted the pilot, but after a slight deviation he controlled his impulse and held the bus above the roadside. He had a difficult task to maintain a level course. Whereas we wanted to make east-north-east, the wind was due east, so that it cut across and drifted us in a transverse direction. To keep straight it was necessary to steer crooked--that is to say, head three-quarters into the wind to counteract the drift, the line of flight thus forming an angle of about 12 deg. with the longitudinal axis of the aeroplane.

"_Wouff!_ _ouff!_" Archibald continued, as I counted in seconds the interval to the scene of the next snapshot, which, as assurance that the whole ground would be covered, was to overlap slightly the first. A quick glance below, another tug at the string, and plate the second was etched with information. The third, fourth, and fifth followed; and finally, to our great relief, we reach Le Sars.

Here the pilot was able to dodge for a few seconds while we turned to retrace the course, this time along the southern edge of the road. He side-slipped the bus, pulled it around in an Immelmann turn, and then felt the rudder-controls until we were in the required direction. The interval between successive exposures was now shorter, as the east wind brought our ground speed to 120 miles an hour, even with the engine throttled back. There was scarcely time to sight the objective before the photograph must be taken and the next plate loaded into place. Within two minutes we were again over Pozieres.

V. took us across the lines, so as to deceive the Archie merchants into a belief that we were going home. We then climbed a little, turned sharply, and began to repeat our outward trip to north of the road.

Evidently Archie had allowed his leg to be pulled by the feint, and for two minutes he only molested the machine with a few wild shots. But soon he recovered his old form, so that when we had reached Le Sars the bus was again wreathed by black puffs. We vertical-turned across the road and headed for the trenches once more, with the last few plates waiting for exposure.

Archie now seemed to treat the deliberation of the solitary machine's movements as a challenge to his ability, and he determined to make us pay for our seeming contempt. An ugly barrage of A.-A. shell-bursts separated us from friendly air, the discs of black smoke expanding as they hung in little clusters. Into this barrier of hate we went unwillingly, like children sent to church as a duty.

Scores of staccato war-whoops reminded us that the Boche gunners wanted our scalp. I don't know how V. felt about it, but I well know that I was in a state of acute fear. Half-way to Pozieres I abandoned checking the ground by the map, and judged the final photographs by counting the seconds between each--"one, two, three, four (_wouff!_ _wouff!_ _wouff!_ _wouff!_)"; pull the string, press forward the loading-handle, bring it back; "one, two, three, four (_wouff!_ _wouff!_ _wouff!_ _wouff!_)," et-cetera. Just as the final plate-number showed on the indicator a mighty report from underneath startled us, and the machine was pressed upward, left wing down.

This was terrifying enough but not harmful, for not one of the fragments from the near burst touched us, strange to say. The pilot righted the bus, and I made the last exposure, without, I am afraid, caring what patch of earth was shuttered on to the plate.

Nose down and engine full out, we hared over the trenches. Archie's hate followed for some distance, but to no purpose; and at last we were at liberty to fly home, at peace with the wind and the world. We landed less than three-quarters of an hour after we had left the aerodrome in a hurry.

"Good boys," said the Squadron Commander; "now see that lightning is used in developing your prints."

The camera was rushed to the photographic lorry, the plates were unloaded in the dark hut, the negatives were developed. Half an hour later I received the first proofs, and, with them, some degree of disappointment. Those covering the first outward and return journey between Pozieres and Le Sars were good, as were the next three, at the beginning of the second journey. Then came a confused blur of superimposed ground-patterns, and at the last five results blank as the brain of a flapper. A jamb in the upper changing-box had led to five exposures on the one plate.

As you know, mon amie, I am a fool. But I do not like to be reminded of the self-evident fact. The photographic officer said I must have made some silly mistake with the loading handle, and he remarked sadly that the camera was supposed to be foolproof. I said he must have made some silly mistake when inspecting the camera before it left his workshop, and I remarked viciously that the camera was foolproof against a careless operator, but by no means foolproof against the careless expert. There we left the subject and the spoiled plates, as the evening was too far advanced for the trip to be repeated. As the photoman has a pleasant job at wing headquarters, whereas I am but an observer--that is to say, an R.F.C. doormat--the blame was laid on me as a matter of course. However, the information supplied by the successful exposures pleased the staff people at whose instigation the deed was done, and this was all that really mattered.

I have already told you that our main work in umpty squadron is long reconnaissance for G.H.Q. and offensive patrol. Special photographic stunts such as happened to-day are rare, thank the Lord. But our cameras often prepare the way for a bombing expedition. An observer returns from a reconnaissance flight with snapshots of a railhead, a busy factory, or an army headquarters. Prints are sent to the "I" people, who, at their leisure, map out in detail the point of interest. No fear of doubtful reports from the glossed surface of geometrical reproduction, for the camera, our most trusted spy, cannot distort the truth. Next a complete plan of the chosen objective, with its surroundings, is given to a bombing squadron; and finally, the pilots concerned, well primed with knowledge of exactly where to align their bomb-sights, fly off to destroy.

For the corps and army squadrons of the R.F.C. photography has a prominent place in the daily round. To them falls the duty of providing survey-maps of the complete system of enemy defences. Their all-seeing lenses penetrate through camouflage to new trenches and emplacements, while exposing fake fortifications. The broken or unbroken German line is fully revealed, even to such details as the barbed wire in front and the approaches in rear.

For clues to battery positions and the like, the gun country behind the frontier of the trenches is likewise searched by camera. One day a certain square on the artillery map seems lifeless. The following afternoon an overhead snapshot reveals a new clump of trees or a curious mark not to be found on earlier photographs. On the third day the mark has disappeared, or the trees are clustered in a slightly different shape. But meanwhile an exact position has been pin-pointed, so that certain heavy guns busy themselves with concentrated fire. By the fourth day the new gun-pits, or whatever it was that the Hun tried to smuggle into place unnoticed, have been demolished and is replaced by a wide rash of shell-holes.

Wonderful indeed is the record of war as preserved by prints in the archives of our photographic section. For example, we were shown last week a pair of striking snapshots taken above Martinpuich, before and after bombardment. The Before one pictured a neat little village in compact perspective of squares, rectangles, and triangles. The Aftermath pictured a tangled heap of sprawling chaos, as little like a village as is the usual popular novel like literature.

Of all the Flying Corps photographs of war, perhaps the most striking is that taken before Ypres of the first Hun gas attack. A B.E2.C., well behind the German lines, caught sight of a strange snowball of a cloud rolling across open ground, in the wake of an east wind. It flew to investigate, and the pilot photographed the phenomenon from the rear. This reproduction of a tenuous mass blown along the discoloured earth will show coming generations how the Boche introduced to the black art of warfare its most devilish form of frightfulness.

I would send you a few aerial photographs, as you suggest, if the private possession of them were not strictly verboten. Possibly you will have an opportunity of seeing all you want later, for if the authorities concerned are wise they will form a public collection of a few thousand representative snapshots, to show the worlds of to-day, to-morrow, and the day after what the camera did in the great war. Such a permanent record would be of great value to the military historian; and on a rainy afternoon, when the more vapid of the revues were not offering matinees, they might even be of interest to the average Londoner.

I can tell you little of the technical branch of this new science, which has influenced so largely the changing war of the past two years, and which will play an even greater part in the decisive war of the next two. All I know is that hundreds of photos are taken every day over enemy country, that ninety per cent of them are successful, and that the trained mechanics sometimes produce finished prints twenty minutes after we have given them our plates.

Moreover, I am not anxious to discuss the subject further, for it is 10 P.M., and at 5 A.M., unless my good angel sends bad weather, I shall be starting for an offensive patrol over Mossy-Face. Also you don't deserve even this much, as I have received no correspondence, books, or pork-pies from you for over a week. In ten minutes' time I shall be employed on the nightly slaughter of the spiders, earwigs, and moths that plague my tent.

Good night.

FRANCE, _September_, 1916

THE ARCHIBALD FAMILY.

... You remark on the familiarity with which I speak of Archie, and you ask for detailed information about his character and habits. Why should I not treat him with familiarity? If a man calls on you nearly every day you are entitled to use his Christian name. And if the intimacy be such that at each visit he tries to punch your head, he becomes more a brother than a friend.

How, you continue, did a creature so strenuous as the anti-aircraft gun come by the flippant name of Archie? Well, once upon a time the Boche A.-A. guns were very young and had all the impetuous inaccuracy incident to youth. British airmen scarcely knew they were fired at until they saw the pretty, white puffs in the distance.

One day a pilot noticed some far-away bursts, presumably meant for him. He was young enough to remember the good old days (you would doubtless call them the bad old days) when the music-halls produced hearty, if vulgar, humour, and he murmured "Archibald, certainly not!" The name clung, and as Archibald the A.-A. gun will go down to posterity. You can take it or leave it; any way, I cannot think of a better explanation for the moment.

Archie has since grown up and become sober, calculating, accurate, relentless, cunning, and deadly mathematical. John or Ernest would now fit him better, as being more serious, or Wilhelm, as being more frightful. For Archie is a true apostle of frightfulness. There is no greater adept at the gentle art of "putting the wind up" people.

Few airmen get hardened to the villainous noise of a loud _wouff!_ _wouff!_ at 12,000 feet, especially when it is near enough to be followed by the shriek of shell-fragments. Nothing disconcerts a man more as he tries to spy out the land, take photographs, direct artillery fire, or take aim through a bombsight, than to hear this noise and perhaps be lifted a hundred feet or so when a shell bursts close underneath. And one is haunted by the knowledge that, unlike the indirect fire of the more precise guns, Archie keeps his own eyes on the target and can observe all swerves and dashes for safety.

To anybody who has seen a machine broken up by a direct hit at some height between 8,000 and 15,000 feet, Archie becomes a prince among the demons of destruction. Direct hits are fortunately few, but hits by stray fragments are unfortunately many. Yet, though the damage on such occasions is regrettable, it is seldom overwhelming. Given a skilful pilot and a well-rigged bus, miracles can happen, though a machine stands no technical chance of staggering home. In the air uncommon escapes are common enough.

On several occasions, after a direct hit, a wounded British pilot has brought his craft to safety, with wings and fuselage weirdly ventilated and half the control wires helpless. Archie wounded a pilot from our aerodrome in the head and leg, and an opening the size of a duck's egg was ripped into the petrol tank facing him. The pressure went, and so did the engine-power. The lines were too distant to be reached in a glide, so the machine planed down towards Hun territory. The pilot was growing weak from loss of blood, but it occurred to him that if he stuck his knee into the hole he might be able to pump up pressure. He tried this, and the engine came back to life 50 feet from the ground. At this height he flew, in a semi-conscious condition, twelve miles over enemy country and crossed the lines with his bus scarcely touched by the dozens of machine-guns trained on it.

One of our pilots lost most of his rudder, but managed to get back by juggling with his elevator and ailerons. The fuselage of my own machine was once set on fire by a chunk of burning H.E. The flames died out under pressure from gloves and hands, just as they had touched the drums of ammunition and all but eaten through a longeron.

Escapes from personal injuries have been quite as strange. A piece of high explosive hit a machine sideways, passed right through the observer's cockpit, and grazed two kneecaps belonging to a friend of mine. He was left with nothing worse than two cuts and mild shell-shock.

Scottie, another observer (now a prisoner, poor chap), leaned forward to look at his map while on a reconnaissance. A dainty morsel from an Archie shell hurtled through the air and grazed the back of his neck. He finished the reconnaissance, made out his report, and got the scratch dressed at the hospital. Next day he resumed work; and he was delighted to find himself in the Roll of Honour, under the heading "Wounded." I once heard him explain to a new observer that when flying a close study of the map was a guarantee against losing one's way, one's head--and one's neck.

The Archibald family tree has several branches. Whenever the founder of the family went on the burst he broke out in the form of white puffs, like those thrown from the funnel of a liner when it begins to slow down. The white bursts still seek us out, but the modern Boche A.-A. gunner specialises more in the black variety. The white bursts contain shrapnel, which is cast outwards and upwards; the black ones contain high explosive, which spreads all around.

H.E. has a lesser radius of solid frightfulness than shrapnel, but if it does hit a machine the damage is greater. For vocal frightfulness the black beat the white hollow. If the Titans ever had an epidemic of whooping-cough, and a score of them chorused the symptoms in unison, I should imagine the noise was like the bursting of a black Archie shell.

Then there is the green branch of the family. This is something of a problem. One theory is that the green bursts are for ranging purposes only, another that they contain a special brand of H.E., and a third declares them to be gas shells. All three suggestions may be partly true, for there is certainly more than one brand of green Archie.

First cousin to Archie is the onion, otherwise the flaming rocket. It is fired in a long stream of what look like short rectangles of compressed flame at machines that have been enticed down to a height of 4000 to 6000 feet. It is most impressive as a firework display. There are also colourless phosphorous rockets that describe a wide parabola in their flight.

Within the past month or two we have been entertained at rare intervals by the family ghost. This fascinating and mysterious being appears very suddenly in the form of a pillar of white smoke, stretching to a height of several thousand feet. It is straight, and apparently rigid as far as the top, where it sprays round into a knob. Altogether, it suggests a giant piece of celery. It does not seem to disperse; but if you pass on and look away for a quarter of an hour, you will find on your return that it has faded away as suddenly as it came, after the manner of ghosts. Whether the pillars are intended to distribute gas is uncertain, but it is a curious fact that on the few occasions when we have seen them they have appeared to windward of us.

Like babies and lunatics, Archie has his good and bad days. If low clouds are about and he can only see through the gaps he is not very troublesome. Mist also helps to keep him quiet. He breaks out badly when the sky is a cover of unbroken blue, though the sun sometimes dazzles him, so that he fires amok. From his point of view it is a perfect day when a film of cloud about 20,000 feet above him screens the sky. The high clouds forms a perfect background for anything between it and the ground, and aircraft stand out boldly, like the figures on a Greek vase. On such a day we would willingly change places with the gunners below.

For my part, Archie has given me a fellow-feeling for the birds of the air. I have at times tried light-heartedly to shoot partridges and even pigeons, but if ever again I fire at anything on the wing, sympathy will spoil my aim.

FRANCE, _October, 1916_

VI.

BATTLES AND BULLETS.

... I am not sure which is the more disquieting, to be under fire in the air or on the ground.

Although the airman is less likely to be hit than the infantryman, he has to deal with complications that could not arise on solid earth. Like the infantryman, a pilot may be killed outright by a questing bullet, and there's an end of it. But in the case of a wound he has a far worse time. If an infantryman be plugged he knows he has probably received "a Blighty one," and as he is taken to the dressing-station he dreams of spending next week-end in England. A wounded pilot dare think of nothing but to get back to safety with his machine, and possibly an observer.

He may lose blood and be attacked by a paralysing faintness. He must then make his unwilling body continue to carry out the commands of his unwilling brain, for if he gives way to unconsciousness the machine, freed from reasoned control, will perform circus tricks and twist itself into a spinning nose-dive. Even when he has brought the bus to friendly country he must keep clear-headed; otherwise he will be unable to exercise the judgment necessary for landing.

Another unpleasant thought is that though he himself escape unhurt, an incendiary bullet may set his petrol tank ablaze, or some stray shots may cut his most vital control wires. And a headlong dive under these conditions is rather too exciting, even for the most confirmed seeker after sensation.

Yet with all these extra possibilities of what a bullet may mean, the chances of being plugged in the air are decidedly less than on the ground. While travelling at anything from 70 to 140 miles an hour it is decidedly more difficult to hit another object tearing along at a like speed and swerving in all directions, than from a machine-gun emplacement to rake a line of men advancing "over the top." Another point favourable to the airman is that he scarcely realises the presence of bullets around him, for the roar of his engine drowns that sinister hiss which makes a man automatically close his eyes and duck.

Given a certain temperament and a certain, mood, an air fight is the greatest form of sport on earth. Every atom of personality, mental and physical, is conscripted into the task. The brain must be instinctive with insight into the enemy's moves, and with plans to check and outwit him. The eye must cover every direction and co-operate with the brain in perfect judgments of time and distance. Hands, fingers, and feet must be instantaneous in seizing an opportunity to swoop and fire, swerve and avoid, retire and return.

In an isolated fight between two single machines the primary aim of each pilot is to attack by surprise at close quarters. If this be impossible, he plays for position and tries to get above his opponent. He opens fire first if he can, as this may disconcert the enemy, but he must be careful not to waste ammunition at long range. A machine with little ammunition is at a tremendous disadvantage against a machine with plenty.

If an isolated British aeroplane sees a formation of Germans crossing to our side it has no hesitation in sweeping forward to break up the party. You will remember our old friend Marmaduke, dear lady? Only last week he attacked ten German machines, chased them back to their own place in the air, and drove two down.

Even from the purely selfish point of view much depends on the area. When an airman destroys a Boche over German country he may have no witnesses, in which case his report is attended by an elusive shadow of polite doubt. But if the deed be done near the trenches, his success is seen by plenty of people only too willing to support his claim. Sometimes a pilot may even force a damaged Boche machine to land among the British. He then follows his captive down, receives the surrender, and wonders if he deserves the Military Cross or merely congratulations.

The tactics of an air battle on a larger scale are much more complicated than those for single combats. A pilot must be prepared at every instant to change from the offensive to the defensive and back again, to take lightning decisions, and to extricate himself from one part of the fight and sweep away to another, if by so doing he can save a friend or destroy an enemy.

To help you realise some of the experiences of an air battle, my very dear madam, let us suppose you have changed your sex and surroundings, and are one of us, flying in a bunch over the back of the German front, seeking whom we may devour.

A moment ago the sky was clear of everything but those dainty cloud-banks to the east. Very suddenly a party of enemies appear out of nowhere, and we rush to meet them. Like the rest of us, you concentrate your whole being on the part you must play, and tune yourself up to the strain attendant on the first shock of encounter. What happens in the first few seconds often decides the fight.

The opposing forces close up and perfect their order of battle. The usual German method, during the past few weeks, has been to fly very high and range the machines one above the other. If the higher craft are in trouble they dive and join the others. If one of the lower ones be surrounded those above can swoop down to its help. Our own tactics vary according to circumstances.

At the start it is a case of follow-my-leader. The flight-commander selects a Boche and dives straight at him. You follow until you are within range, then swerve away and around, so as to attack from the side. Then, with a clear field, you pour in a raking fire by short bursts--_ta-ta-ta-ta_, _ta-ta-ta-ta-ta_, _ta-ta-ta-ta_, aiming to hit the Boche pilot and allowing for deflection. From all directions you hear the rattle of other guns, muffled by the louder noise of the engine.

A third British machine is under the Boche's tail, and the observer in it is firing upwards. The three of you draw nearer and nearer to your prey. The Hun puts his nose down to sweep away; but it is too late. His petrol tank bursts into flames, and the machine dives steeply, a streamer of flame running away behind it. The fire spreads to the fuselage and planes. After rushing earthwards for two or three thousand feet, the whole aeroplane crumbles up and you see the main portion falling like a stone. And you (who have shed the skin of sentiment and calm restraint and become for the duration of the fight a bold bad pilot with the lust of battle in your blood) are filled with joy.

Meanwhile, your observer's gun has been grinding away behind you, showing that you in your turn are attacked. You twist the machine round. Almost instinctively your feet push the rudder-control just sufficiently to let you aim dead at the nearest enemy. You press the trigger. Two shots are fired, and--your gun jambs.

You bank and turn sideways, so as to let your observer get in some shooting while you examine your gun. From the position of the check-lever you realise that there has been a misfire. Quickly but calmly--feverish haste might make a temporary stoppage chronic--you lean over and remedy the fault. Again you press the trigger, and never was sound more welcome than the _ta-ta-ta-ta-ta_ which shows you are ready for all comers.

Once more you turn to meet the attacking Germans. As you do so your observer points to a black-crossed bird which is gliding down after he has crippled it. But three more are closing round you. Something sings loudly a yard away. You turn your head and see that a landing wire has been shot through; and you thank the gods that it was not a flying wire.

The flight-commander and another companion have just arrived to help you. They dash at a Boche, and evidently some of their shots reach him, for he also separates himself and glides down. The two other Huns, finding themselves outnumbered, retire.

All this while the two rear machines have been having a bad time. They were surrounded by five enemies at the very beginning of the fight. One of the Boches has since disappeared, but the other four are very much there.

You sweep round and go to the rescue, accompanied by the flight-commander and the remaining British machine. Just as you arrive old X's bus drops forward and down, spinning as it goes. It falls slowly at first, but seems to gather momentum; the spin becomes wilder and wilder, the drop faster and faster.

"Poor old X," you think, "how damnable to lose him. Now the poor beggar won't get the leave he has been talking about for the last two months." Then your thoughts turn to Y, the observer in the lost machine. You know his fiancee, you remember he owes you 30 francs from last night's game of bridge.

You burn to avenge poor X and Y, but all the Huns have dived and are now too low for pursuit. You recover your place in the formation and the fight ends as suddenly as it began. One German machine has been destroyed and two driven down, but--"one of ours has failed to return."

When you return and land, you are not so contented as usual to be back. There will be two vacant places at dinner, and there is a nasty job to be done. You will have to write rather a painful letter to Y's fiancee.

Madam, you are now at liberty to give up the temporary role of a bold, bad pilot and become once more your charming self.

FRANCE, _November_, 1916

VII.

BACK IN BLIGHTY.

... You last heard of my continued existence, I believe, from a field post-card with but one of the printed lines uncrossed: "I have been admitted to hospital." When this was sent I had no more expectation of a return to Blighty than has a rich Bishop of not entering the Kingdom of Heaven. Nevertheless, here we are again, after a three days' tour along the Red Cross lines of communication.

Again I have been admitted to hospital. This one is more sumptuous but less satisfying than the casualty clearing station at Gezaincourt, whence the card was posted. There, in a small chateau converted into an R.A.M.C. half-way house, one was not over-anxious to be up and about, for that would have meant a further dose of war at close quarters. Here, in a huge military hospital at Westminster, one is very anxious to be up and about, for that would mean a long-delayed taste of the joys of London. At Gezaincourt rumbling gunfire punctuated the countryside stillness; aeroplanes hummed past on their way to the lines, and engendered gratitude for a respite from encounters with Archie; from the ward window I could see the star-shells as they streaked up through the dim night. At Westminster rumbling buses punctuate the back-street stillness; taxis hum past on their way to the West End, and engender a longing for renewed acquaintance with the normal world and the normal devil; from the ward window I can see the towers of Parliament as they stretch up through the London greyness. For an Englishman just returned from a foreign battlefield to his own capital it should be an inspiring view, that of the Home of Government, wherein the Snowdens, Outhwaites, Ponsonbys, and Sir Vested Interests, talk their hardest for the winning of the war by one side or the other, I am not sure which. But somehow it isn't.

I have mentioned the hospital's position, because it will help you on the day after to-morrow, if the herewith forecast is correct.

You will read this letter, hang me for my customary disturbing suddenness, and search a time-table. This will tell you that a train from your part of the country arrives in town at 11.45 A.M. (_e_), which bracketed letter means Saturdays excepted. By it you will travel on Tuesday morning. Then, in the afternoon, you will seek a taxi, but either the drivers will have as fares middle-aged contractors, good for a fat tip, or they will claim a lack of petrol, lady. You will therefore fight for place in a bus, which must be left at the corner of Whitehall and Queen Victoria Street. Next you will walk towards the river, past Westminster Abbey and the Houses of Talk, and so to Chelsea Embankment. Turn off by the Tate Gallery, enter the large building on your right, and you will have arrived. Visiting hours are from two to four, but as the Sister is one of the best and my very kind friend, you will not be turned out until five.

But I can hear you ask leading questions. No, I am not badly wounded nor seriously ill. Neither am I suffering from shell-shock, nor even from cold feet. A Blighty injury of the cushiest is the spring actuating this Jack-in-the-Box appearance. Have patience. To-day's inactivity has bred a pleasant boredom, which I shall work off by writing you a history of the reasons why I am back from the big war. They include a Hun aeroplane, a crash, a lobster, and two doctors.

You will remember how, months ago, our machine landed on an abandoned trench, after being damaged in a scrap? A bullet through the petrol-pipe having put the carburettor out of action, the engine ceased its revs., so that we glided several miles, crossed the then lines at a low height, and touched earth among the network of last June's lines. We pancaked on to the far edge of a trench, and the wheels slid backward into the cavity, causing the lower wings and fuselage to be crumpled and broken.

My left knee, which has always been weak since a far-back accident, was jerked by contact with the parapet. Next day it seemed none the worse, so I did not take the accident seriously. During the weeks and months that followed the knee was painless, but it grew larger and larger for no noticeable reason, like Alice in Wonderland and the daily cost of the war.

Then an aggressive lobster, eaten in Amiens one fine evening, revenged itself by making necessary a visit to the casualty clearing station for attention to a mildly poisoned tummy. The doctor who examined me noticed the swollen knee, and looked grave. He pinched, punched, and pressed it, and finally said: "My dear boy, why the devil didn't you report this? It's aggravated synovitis, and, if you don't want permanent water-on-the-knee, you'll have to lie up for at least three weeks. I'll have you sent to the Base to-morrow."

My ambition did not yet soar beyond a short rest at the Base. Meanwhile it was pleasant to lie between real sheets and to watch real English girls making beds, taking temperatures, and looking after the newly wounded with a blend of tenderness and masterful competence. Their worst job appeared to be fighting the Somme mud. The casualties from the trench region were invariably caked with dirt until the nurses had bathed and cleaned them with comic tact and great success.

It being the day of an advance, scores of cases were sent to Gezaincourt from the field dressing stations. Each time an ambulance car, loaded with broken and nerve-shattered men, stopped by the hospital entrance, a young donkey brayed joyously from a field facing the doorway, as if to shout "Never say die!" Most of the casualties echoed the sentiment, for they seemed full of beans and congratulated themselves and each other on their luck in getting Blighty ones.

But it was otherwise with the cases of shell-shock. I can imagine no more wretched state of mind than that of a man whose nerves have just been unbalanced by close shaves from gun fire. There was in the same lysol-scented ward as myself a New Zealander in this condition. While he talked with a friend a shell had burst within a few yards of the pair, wounding him in the thigh and sweeping off the friend's head. He lost much blood and became a mental wreck. All day and all night he tossed about in his bed, miserably sleepless and acutely on edge, or lay in a vacant and despondent quiet. Nothing interested him, nothing comforted him--not even a promise from the doctor of a long rest in England.

There were also many victims of the prevailing epidemics of trench-fever and rabid influenza. The clearing station was thus hard put to it to make room for all newcomers by means of evacuation. For our batch this happened next evening. A long train drew up on the single-line railway near the hospital, the stretcher cases were borne to special Pullman cars, and the walking cases followed, each docketed in his button-hole by a card descriptive of wound or ailment.

You can have no idea of the comfort of a modern R.A.M.C. train as used at the Front. During the first few months of war, when the small amount of available rolling stock was worth its weight in man-power, the general travel accommodation for the wounded was the French railway truck, with straw strewn over the floor. In these the suffering sick were jolted, jerked, and halted for hours at a time, while the scorching sun danced through the van's open sides and the mosquito-flies bit their damnedest. But nowadays one travels in luxury and sleeping-berths, with ever-ready nurses eager to wait upon every whim.

A sling-armed Canadian was one of the party of four in our compartment. Great was his joy when a conjuring trick of coincidence revealed that the jolly sister who came to ask what we would like to drink proved to be not only a Canadian, but actually from his own little township in Manitoba. While they discussed mutual friends the rest of us felt highly disappointed that we also were not from the township. As evidence that they both were of the right stuff, neither of them platitudinised: "It's a small world, isn't it?"

The smooth-running train sped northward from the Somme battlefield, and we betted on each man's chances of being sent to Blighty. Before settling down to sleep, we likewise had a sweepstake on the Base of destination, for not until arrival were we told whether it was Rouen, Boulogne, or Etaples. I drew Boulogne and won, as we discovered on being awoken at early dawn by a nurse, who arrived with tea, a cheery "Morning, boys," and bread-and-butter thin as ever was poised between your slim fingers.

The wounded and shell-shocked New Zealander had pegged out during the journey. May the gods rest his troubled spirit!

From Boulogne station a fleet of ambulance cars distributed the train's freight of casualties among the various general hospitals. At three of the starry morning I found myself inside a large one-time hotel on the sea front, being introduced to a bed by a deft-handed nurse of unusual beauty.

The Blighty hopes of our party were realised or disappointed at midday, when the surgeon-in-charge came to decide which of the new arrivals were to be forwarded across Channel, and which were to be patched up in France. The world stands still the moment before the Ram Corps major, his examination concluded, delivers the blessed verdict: "Get him off by this afternoon's boat, sister." Or an unwelcome reassurance: "We'll soon get you right here."

For my part I had not the least expectation of Blighty until the surgeon showed signs of prolonged dissatisfaction with the swollen knee. Like the doctor at Gezaincourt, he pinched, punched, and pressed it, asked for its history, and finally pronounced: "I'm afraid it'll have to be rested for about six weeks." Then, after a pause: "Sorry we haven't room to keep you here for so long. You'll be fixed up on the other side." Hastily I remarked that I should be sorry indeed to take up valuable space at a Base hospital. The major's departure from the ward was the signal for a demonstration by the Blighty squad. Pillows and congratulations were thrown about, war-dances were performed on game legs, the sister was bombarded with inquiries about the next boat.

All places on the afternoon boat having been booked, we were obliged to wait until the morning. What a day! The last of a long period amid the myriad ennuies of active service, the herald of a long spell amid the pleasant things of England. Impatience for the morrow was kept bottled with difficulty; every now and then the cork flew out, resulting in a wild rag among those able to run, walk, or hop. When the 'Times' was delivered, it seemed quite a minor matter that the Gazette should notify me that I had been presented with another pip.

After dinner some one remarked that "she" would soon come on duty, and there was an air of conscious expectancy among the veterans of the ward. "She," the V.A.D. girl who had received us when we were deposited at the hospital in the small hours of the morning, was--and is--an efficient nurse, a good comrade, a beautiful woman, and the friend of every casualty lucky enough to have been in her charge. For a wounded officer staled by the brutalities of trench life there could be no better mental tonic than the ministrations and charm of Our Lady of X Ward. I cannot guess the number and variety of proposals made to her by patients of a week's or a month's standing, but both must be large. She is also the possessor of this admirable and remarkable record. For two years she has been nursing--really nursing--in France, and yet, though she belongs to a well-known family, her photograph has never appeared in the illustrated papers that boom war-work patriots. On this particular evening, in the intervals of handing round medicines and cheerfulness, our comrade the night nurse made toffee for us over a gas-burner, a grey-haired colonel and a baby subaltern taking turns to stir the saucepan.

The next change of scene was to the quays of Boulogne. Ambulance cars from the several hospitals lined up before a ship side-marked by giant Red Crosses. The stretcher casualties were carried up the gangway, down the stairs, and into the boat's wards below. The remainder were made comfortable on deck. Distribution of life-saving contraptions, business with medical cards, gleeful hoots from the funnel, chug-chug from the paddles, and hey for Blighty! across a smooth lake of a sea. Yarns of attack and bombardment were interrupted by the pleasurable discovery that Dover's cliffs were still white.

We seemed an unkempt crowd indeed by contrast with dwellers on this side of the Channel. The ragged raiment of men pipped during a Somme advance did not harmonise with plush first-class compartments of the Chatham and Dover railway. Every uniform in our carriage, except mine and another, was muddied and bloodied, so that I felt almost ashamed of the comparative cleanliness allowed by life in an R.F.C. camp, miles behind the lines. The subaltern opposite, however, was immaculate as the fashion-plate of a Sackville Street tailor. Yet, we thought, he must have seen some tough times, for he knew all about each phase of the Somme operations. Beaumont Hamel? He explained exactly how the Blankshires and Dashshires, behind a dense barrage, converged up the high ground fronting the stronghold. Stuff Redoubt? He gave us a complete account of its capture, loss, and recapture. But this seasoned warrior quietened after the visit of an official who listed us with particulars of wounds, units, and service. His service overseas? Five months in the Claims Department at Amiens. Wound or sickness? Scabies.

Charing Cross, gateway of the beloved city! The solid old clock looked down benignly as if to say: "I am the first landmark of your own London to greet you. Pass along through that archway and greet the others."

But we could not pass along. The medical watchdogs and mesdemoiselles the ambulance-drivers saw to that. We were detailed to cars and forwarded to the various destinations, some to the provinces by way of another station, some to suburban hospitals, some to London proper. I was one of the lucky last-named and soon found myself settled in Westminster. Here the injured knee was again pinched, punched, and pressed, after which the ward surgeon told me I should probably stay in bed for a month. For exercise I shall be permitted to walk along the passage each morning to the department where they dispense massage and ionisation.

Meanwhile, it is midday and flying weather. Over there a formation of A flight, Umpty Squadron, will perhaps be droning back from a hundred-mile reconnaissance. V., my mad friend and sane pilot and flight-commander, leads it; and in my place, alas! Charlie-the-good-guide is making notes from the observer's cockpit. The Tripehound and others of the jolly company man the rear buses, which number four or five, according to whether the wicked bandit Missing has kidnapped some member of the family. And here loaf I, uncertain whether I am glad or sorry to be out of it. The devil of it is that, unlike most of my bed-neighbours, I feel enormously fit and am anxious to shake hands with life and London. Time hangs heavy and long, so bring all you can in the way of the latest books, the latest scandals, and your latest enthusiasms among the modern poets. Above all, bring yourself.

LONDON, _November_, 1916

THE COUNTRY LIFE PRESS, GARDEN CITY, NEW YORK

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Cavalry of the CloudsChapter VIII: The Daily Round (2)

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