proaching. Nevertheless, certain Bedouins were selected to raid
the railway station and sidings at Frankfort; "intelligence" having
reported important rail movements in that vicinity. The Bedouins were
ordered to return if they found, after testing the air, the weather
conditions unfavorable for a flight of such long distance. As an
alternative target to Frankfort they were given the Burbach Hutte Works
at Saarbrucken.

After gaining their height above the aerodrome, Jock and his navigation
officer steered a direct course for "D" lighthouse, situated north of
Barcarat and but a few miles from the front-line trenches. Having
accurately figured their drift and ground speed on this course, Jock and
his companion calculated that, by steering a straight course to
Frankfort, spending five minutes over the target, and steering a
straight course back to their aerodrome, they could make sufficient
headway against the wind on the return voyage to bring them safely home
with a ten minutes' supply of petrol left in their tanks; any error in
course necessitating a deviation, or any increase in the velocity of the
wind, might mean a prolonged sojourn in a German prison camp if not
subjection to the well-known tortures of a German hospital.

After an accurate calculation of direction and velocity of wind, a
course of thirty-nine degrees was steered from "D" lighthouse; the river
Saar was crossed north of Saarburg; Bitsch and Pirmasens were passed to
the north and Kaiserlautern to the south and then, the Vosges Mountains
having been crossed, Jock and his companion looked down on the Rhine
valley. The Rhine River was crossed north of Oppenheim, and from an
elevation of six thousand feet, Mainz, at the juncture of the rivers
Main and Rhine, showed clearly in the moonlight. Still holding their
course, the aviators looked out to the left, followed up the river Main
to Frankfort, here they throttled back the engines, glided swiftly down
through the anti-aircraft barrage and searchlights and released their
bombs as accurately as possible. Then, after an almost vertical "bank"
so sudden was the turn, Jock steered a straight course for the nearest
point in the lines, which was considerably over one hundred miles away.
Now the aviators had to face a strong head wind and steer straight into
a rapidly approaching storm. The time taken to fly from Frankfort to the
Rhine River, together with a change in drift, proved to the aviators
that the wind