yish laugh.--This kid a
captain! So I am not an impressive captain, then? I haven't run risks
enough to be a captain, probably!--His laugh said all this.

Lieutenant Constantin also says in his notes: "Guynemer disliked walking
about Paris, because people recognized him. When he saw them turn to
look at him, he would grumble at the curse of having a face that was
public property. So he preferred waiting for evening, and then drove his
little white car up the Champs Elysees to the Bois. He enjoyed this
peaceful recreation thoroughly, and forgot the excitement of his life at
the front. Memories of our boyhood days came back to him, and he dwelt
on them with delight: 'Do you remember one day in _seconde_ when we
quarreled and fought like madmen? You made such a mark on my arm that it
is there yet.' He did not mind, but I was ashamed of having been such a
young brute. Another day, in May, 1917, coming home on leave I met
Georges just as he stepped out of his hotel, and as I had just been
mentioned in dispatches I told him about it. Immediately he dragged me
into a shop, bought a _croix de guerre_, pinned it on my _vareuse_, and
hugged me before everybody."

Guynemer had a genius for graciousness, and his imagination was
inexhaustible when he wished to please, but his temper was hot and
quick. One day he had left his motor at the door of the hotel, and some
practical joker thought it clever to leave a note in the car with this
inscription in large letters: AVIATORS TO THE FRONT! Guynemer did not
take the joke at all, and was boiling with rage.

His complete freedom from conceit has often been remarked. At a luncheon
given in his honor by the well-known deputy, Captain Lasies, he would
not say a word about himself, but extolled his comrades until somebody
said: "You are really modesty itself."

Whereupon another guest asked: "Could you imagine him bragging?"

Guynemer was delighted, and when the party broke up he went out with the
gentleman who had said this and thanked him warmly. "Don't you see how
little they understand? I don't say I am modest, but if I weren't I
would be a fool, and I should not like to be that. I know quite well
that just now some of us are getting so much admiration and so many
honors that one may get more than one's share. Whereas the men in the
trenches--how different it is with them!"[24]

[Footnote 24: _Journal des Debats_ for September 26, 1917.]

But it was inevitable that he should be lio