trouble with most aviators; they grow so familiar with danger that they
forget the terrible risk that always hangs over the head of every one
who soars aloft in his frail airship; and then, when finally something
happens after they have become too reckless, they never get another
chance.

Sweeping along not more than three hundred feet above the ground, the
boys were home in almost no time. They could see the car containing
Percy Carberry, and his crony, Sandy, just vanishing among the houses of
Bloomsbury; and the Chief, about half-way there, waved his hat at them
as they sped past him.

Then the aeroplane dropped lightly down close to the hangar back of the
Bird home, where Andy and his father, the professor, lived, together
with old Colonel Whympers, the veteran who used crutches or a cane on
account of his rheumatism, brought on, he always declared, not by age,
oh! no, but the wounds he received many years ago, when he was fighting
for his country in the great civil war.

He was sitting there on a pile of lumber waiting for them, a quaint old
fellow, who was greatly beloved by both cousins; and who believed firmly
that some fine day Andy Bird was bound to even eclipse the fame which
his father had gained in the field of science and aviation.

It happened that the professor was away at the time delivering a series
of lectures before some body of scientists in a distant city. And
whenever the boys were in their shop the old veteran was in the habit of
coming around, to see what new and wonderful things engaged their
attention, as well as chatting with them. And he was as welcome as the
sun in May.