risks; this is the only risk that he will not take
gladly. It follows that the opinion of pilots concerning their machines
is peculiarly liable to error. They talk to one another, and an ill
report spreads like wildfire. When the Sopwith Tabloid was first
produced, it was unfavourably reported on by those who flew it, and at
once fell into disrepute throughout the squadrons. The fact is that the
pilots of that time were not good enough for the machine; if they had
stuck to it, and learnt its ways, they would soon have sworn by it as,
later on in the war, they swore by the Sopwith Camel. A similar ill
repute attached itself, like an invisible label, to the De Havilland
machine called the D.H. 2. This machine, when it made its first
appearance at the front, was nicknamed 'The Spinning Incinerator'. Like
many other machines which are quick to respond to control, the D.H. 2
very easily fell into a spin, and in one accident of this kind it had
caught fire. In February 1916, when the Fokker menace was at its height,
No. 24 Squadron--the first British squadron of single-seater fighting
scouts--arrived in France. It was equipped with D.H. 2's, and the pilots
of the Fokkers had no reason to think the D.H. 2 an inferior machine.
The historian of No. 24 Squadron says:

'A certain amount of trouble was caused at first through the ease with
which these machines used to "spin"--a manoeuvre not at that time
understood--and several casualties resulted. Lieutenant Cowan did much
to inspire confidence by the facility with which he handled his machine.
He was the first pilot really to "stunt" this machine, and gradually the
squadron gained complete assurance.'

Nerves are tense in war, and a mishap at the front usually led to an
immediate demand for new material or a new policy from those at home who
supplied the expeditionary force. Major-General Sir Sefton Brancker, in
his notes on the early part of the war, mentions three of these quick
demands. When the aeroplane piloted by Lieutenant Waterfall was brought
down by infantry fire in Belgium, this first mishap of the kind led to
an immediate demand for armoured aeroplanes. The demand was not
fulfilled until 1918, and then only in a special type of machine,
designed for low flying. Again, the alarm of the 1st of September 1914,
when the machines of the Flying Corps, being unable to fly by night, ran
the risk of capture by German cavalry, led to a demand for folding
aeroplanes suitable fo