The weekly soliphone., 1917-03-08
SIMMS TELLS OF
 BALLOON JOURNEY
(By Willian1 Philip Simms, United Press Staff CorrespondenD

Press Staff Correspondent)
 With the British Armies in the Field, Feb 2.-(By MaiD D.-What does it feel like to have hostile battery of artillery pick you up and begin shooting at you while you hang in basket half mile high in an a captive balloon?
 Suppose, as you dangled at the top end of the wire cable no thick CT than child's little finger, the German howitzers should suddenly try to smash the auto-truek carry ing the winch holding the ground end of the string.
 Suppose you, up there in the win ter sky, saw an airplane making for you and you knew it would do it's best to shoot fire arrows into your sausage cause it to explode and chuck you headlong to the frozen earth below?
 Or, failing to explode, the balloon caught fire and you, to save your self, had to plunge downward at the tail end of parachute with shrapnel bursting about you all the time?
 Think you could do your work calmly, accurately? Think you would be sufficiently cool-headed to call up on the telephone, whose wires disappear under you i'll a dizzy dip groundward, and tell somebody in a little office about it and have him get your own batter ies working?
 These are the working conditions of every day of the soldiers at tached to the balloon sections. Of the army. Thanks to the courtesy of q major commanding one of these sections l was allowed to go up with an observation officer in one of these famous "sausages.' The latter was a young lieutenant. in reality an American, whose father once lived in Cincinnati. High in the air. over a world covered by four inches of snow, while the noise of the Big War bounded np in lumpy explosions and the concus- sions of the larger guns could be felt distinctly. he explained his work just as you would explain yours, in the office, shop or on the farm. Through the glasses the zig-zagging white lines of the trenches showed plainly.
 See" he said. looking through his glasses, "there are two distinct networks of trenches. with a mar row space between which is free from criss-crossing lines. That space is No Mans Land. Of course all activity on the other side of that space is German activity, and that is part of. the job we are up here to attend to.
 See that village beyond the Ger man lines to the left?'' he continued steadying himself without touching the sides of the basket-one of the secrets of accurate balloon obser- vation. That is Blank. And, to the right there. that road where you see the double row of trees. That is the part of the line We this balloon section-are interested in. Other parts are under observa- tion from those balloons you sec to the north and south of us-thouSh, naturally. we cooperate very close ly one balloon with another so that the minimum observable activity gets past us. Troops i'll march, sup ply columns. working parties among or behind the trenches, things like that we signal to our artillery and get battery-or several batteries - working We give them the range, then, as they fire we give them corrections: So many degrees to right or left. too long or too short. The whole thing is done by telephone, right from this basket. Here; put this on your head. The head-harness of telephone girl was handed me. l put 1t on.
 ,.Time me-" said the lieutenant, ------------------------------- Y2(l