y white petals, like a flower.

The monoplane veered, wheeled and began to drive in a wriggling,
twisting course. The balloon cannon spoke again. Four miles away, to
the eastward, its fellow in another aviation camp let go, and the sound
of its discharge came to us faintly but distinctly. Another smoke flower
unfolded in the heavens, somewhat below the darting airship.

Both guns were in action now. Each fired at six-second intervals. All
about the flitting target the smokeballs burst--above it, below it, to
this side of it and to that. They polka-dotted the heavens in the area
through which the Frenchman scudded. They looked like a bed of white
water lilies and he like a black dragonfly skimming among the lilies.
It was a pretty sight and as thrilling a one as I have ever seen.

I cannot analyze my emotions as I viewed the spectacle, let alone try to
set them down on paper. Alongside of this, big-game hunting was a
commonplace thing, for this was big-game hunting of a magnificent kind,
new to the world--revolving cannon, with a range of from seven to eight
thousand feet, trying to bring down a human being out of the very
clouds.

He ran for his life. Once I thought they had him. A shell burst
seemingly quite close to him, and his machine dipped far to one side and
dropped through space at that angle for some hundreds of feet
apparently.

A yell of exultation rose from the watching Germans, who knew that an
explosion close to an aeroplane is often sufficient, through the force
of air concussion alone, to crumple the flimsy wings and bring it down,
even though none of the flying shrapnel from the bursting bomb actually
touch the operator or the machine.

However, they whooped their joy too soon. The flyer righted, rose,
darted confusingly to the right, then to the left, and then bored
straight into a woolly white cloudrack and was gone. The moment it
disappeared the two balloon cannon ceased firing; and I, taking stock of
my own sensations, found myself quivering all over and quite hoarse.

I must have done some yelling myself; but whether I rooted for the flyer
to get away safely or for the cannon to hit him, I cannot for the life
of me say. I can only trust that I preserved my neutrality and rooted
for both.

Subsequently I decided in my own mind that from within the Allies' lines
the Frenchman saw us--meaning the lieutenant and myself--in the air, and
came forth with intent to bombard us from on h