and was now above us. We counted two,
three, four machines, which the sparks of our exploding shells promptly
surrounded, while three French Spads rose at full speed to meet them.

As we stood watching and wondering if the enemy would accept the fight,
Guynemer suddenly appeared. He had been called, and now he and his
comrades, Captain Auger and Lieutenant Raymond, came running to their
machines. I watched Guynemer as he was being put into his leather suit.
His whole soul was in his eyes, which glared at one moving point in
space as if they themselves could shoot. Three of the German machines
had already turned back, but the remaining one went on, insolently
counting on his own power and speed. I shall never forget Guynemer, his
face lifted, his eyes illuminated as if hypnotized by this point in
space, his figure upright and stiffened like an arrow waiting to be
released by the bow. Before pulling down his helmet he gave the order:

"Straight at him."

The engines snorted and snored, the propellers began to move, the
machines rolled along, and suddenly were seen climbing almost
vertically. Up above the fight was beginning, and it seemed as if the
three starting airplanes could never reach in time the altitude of four
or five thousand meters at which it was taking place.

The attacking Spad was obviously trying to get its opponent within
firing range, but the German was a first-rate pilot and dodged without
losing height, banking, looping, taking advantage of the Frenchman's
dead angles, and striving to get him under his machine-gun. Round and
round the two airplanes circled, when suddenly the German bolted in the
direction of the Aisne cliffs. But the Spad partly caught up with him
and the aerial circling began anew, while two other Spads appeared--a
pack after a deer. The German cleverly took advantage now of the sun,
now of the evening vapors, but he was within range, and the tack-tack of
a machine-gun was heard. Guynemer and the other two were coming nearer,
when the Spad dropped beneath its adversary and fired upwards. The
German plunged, and we expected would sink, but he righted himself and
was off in an instant. However, this was Guynemer's chance: three shots,
not more, from his gun, and the German airplane crashed down somewhere
near Muizon, on the banks of the Vesle.[23]

[Footnote 23: This victory was not put down to Guynemer's account,
because another airman had shot first--which gives an idea of the Fr