are all playing a part therein.

Suddenly there is the distant hum of a motor. One of the pilots
emerges from the tent and gazes fixedly up into the blue sky. He
points, and one glimpses a black speck against the blue, high
overhead. The sound of the motor ceases, and the speck grows larger.
It moves earthward in steep dives and circles, and as it swoops
closer, takes on the shape of an airplane. Now one can make out the
red, white, and blue circles under the wings which mark a French
war-plane, and the distinctive insignia of the pilot on its sides.

"_Ton patron arrive!_" one mechanician cries to another. "Your boss is
coming!"

The machine dips sharply over the top of a hangar, straightens out
again near the earth at a dizzy speed a few feet above it and, losing
momentum in a surprisingly short time, hits the ground with tail and
wheels. It bumps along a score of yards and then, its motor whirring
again, turns, rolls toward the hangar, and stops. A human form,
enveloped in a species of garment for all the world like a diver's
suit, and further adorned with goggles and a leather hood, rises
unsteadily in the cockpit, clambers awkwardly overboard and slides
down to terra firma.

A group of soldiers, enjoying a brief holiday from the trenches in a
cantonment near the field, straggle forward and gather timidly about
the airplane, listening open-mouthed for what its rider is about to
say.

"Hell!" mumbles that gentleman, as he starts divesting himself of his