the Spads in which, as combat pilot, he had dueled ten thousand feet up in the sky with the German combat pilots and shot some twenty of them down. And it was while he was still in the French service that the flying men began to form new squadrons for strange service distinct from mere bomb-dropping, from guiding guns or sending back information or from fighting other airplanes. Pilots of these squadrons started to attack, by bomb and machine guns, the enemy infantry and artillery and horse. They had special, new "ships" made for them—one-seater or two-seater biplanes mounting two or three machine guns and built to stand the strain of diving down from a height and "flattening out" suddenly only a few yards from the ground while the pilot with his machine guns raked the ranks of troops over which he flew.
It was in one of these new raiding airplanes, accordingly, and as leader of a flight that Gerry Hull was going to battle this day. The field, from which he had arisen, had been far back of the English lines—so far back, indeed, that it still was secure as Gerry guided his flight of six machines up into the clear spring sunshine. His was one of the single-seaters; he was alone, therefore, as he led on to the north and east; and he was glad this morning to be alone. The exaltation which almost always pervaded him as he rose into the sky with his motor running powerfully and true, possessed him at its most this morning; it brought to him, together with the never-dulling wonder of his endowment of wings and his multiplied strength therefrom, a despite of fate which made him reckless yet calm.
His altimeter told that he had climbed to some four
