breathless haste to get on. He would not allow Corporal Guynemer to
address him as lieutenant, feeling so surely his equality, and to-morrow
perhaps his mastery. On July 6, 1915, he sent him a little guide for
aviators in a few lines: "Be cautious. Look well at what is happening
around you before acting. Invoke Saint Benoit every morning. But above
all, write in letters of fire in your memory: _In aviation, everything
not useful should be avoided._" Oh, of course! The "little girl" laughed
at the advice as he laughed at the tempest. He had an admiration for
Beauchamp, but when did a Roland ever listen to an Oliver? One day he
went up in a wind of over 25 meters, and even by nosing-up a bit he
could hardly make any progress. With the wind behind him he made over
200 kilometers. Then he landed. Vedrines addressed a few warning remarks
to him, and he was thought to be calmed. But off he went again before
the frightened spectators. He would always do too much, and nothing
could restrain him.

The importance of the development of aviation in the war had been
foreseen neither by the Germans nor ourselves. If before the beginning
of the campaign the military chiefs had understood all the services
which would be rendered by aerial strategic scouting, the regulation of
artillery fire would not have still been in an experimental stage. No
one knew the help which was to be derived from aerial photography. The
air duel was regarded simply as a possible incident that might occur
during a patrol or a reconnaissance, and in view of which the observer
or mechanician armed himself with a gun or an automatic pistol.
Airplanes armed with machine-guns were very exceptional, and at the end
of 1914 there were only thirty. The Germans used them generally before
we did; but it was the French aviators, nevertheless, who forced the
Germans to fight in the air. I had the opportunity in October, 1914, to
see, from a hill on the Aisne, one of these first airplane combats,
which ended by the enemy falling on the outskirts of the village of
Muizon on the left bank of the Vesle. The French champion bore the fine
name of Franc, and piloted a Voisin. At that date it was not unusual to
pick up messages dropped within our lines by enemy pilots, substantially
to this effect: "Useless for us to fight each other; there are enough
risks without that...."

Meanwhile, strategic reconnaissance was perfected as the line of the
front became firmly established, a