The Prince George's enquirer and southern Maryland advertiser. (Upper Marlborough, Md.) 1882-1925, 1918-08-02

| wien uiFkllpSS comes you realize
that, at any rate, he won't be back that
night, and you hope for a telephone
call from him telling of his where
abouts.
If the night passes without sign or
word from him, he is reported as miss
ing and then you watch for his cas-
ualty to appear in the war office lists.
One day, perhaps a month later, a
message is dropped over Che line by
the German flying corps with a list of
pilots captured or killed by the Huns,
and theI, for the first time, you know
failed to return the day he last went
over the line with his squadron.
I was still musing over this melan-
choly phase of the scouts life when
an orderly told me there was beauti-
| full battle going on in the air, and he
volunteered to help me outside the
hospital that l might witness it, and
1 readily accepted his assistance.
That afternoon 1 saw one of the
gamest fights l ever expect to witness.
There were six of our machines
against perhaps sixteen Huns. From
the type of the British machines knew
that they might possibly be from my
own aerodrome. Two of our machines
had been apparently picked out by
six of the Huns and were bearing the
brunt of the fight The contest seemed
to me to be so unequal that victory for
| hn n he thnupht nf
and yet at one time they so completely
outmaneuvered the Huns that /
| thought their superior skill might save
the day for them, despite the fact that
they were so hOpelessly outnumbered.
| One thing l was sure of: they would
never give in.
OF course, it would have been COM
paratively simple matter for our men,
when they saw how things were going
against them, to have turned their
noses down, landed behind the Ger
man lines and given themselves up as
prisoners, but that is not the way of
the r. F. C.
A battle of this kind seldom lasts
many minutes, although every second
seems like an hour to those who par
| ticipate in it, and even onlOokerS Suf-
| fer more thrills in the course of the
struggle than they would ordinarily
| experience in a lifetime. 1t is appar-
ent even to novice that the losers
! fate is death.
| OF course, the Germans around the
! hospital were all watching and roofing
! for their comrades, but the English,
too, had one sympathiZer in that group
! who made no effort to stif1e his admira-
ton for the bravery his countrymen
were displaying.
The end came suddenly. Four ma
chimes crashed to earth almost stimuli
taneOusly. 1t was an even break-two
! of theirs and two of ours. The others
apparently returned to their respective
lines.
The wound in my mouth made it i'm
possible for me to speak, but by means
of a pencil and paper l requested one
| of the German officers to find out for
ME WHO the English officers were who
had been shot down.
| 4 little later he returned and handed
me a photograph taken from the body
of one Of the victims. 1t was 4 picture
| of Paul Raney of Toronto, and myself.
| taken together. Poor Raney. He was
the best friend l had and one of the
! best and gamest men who ever fought
in France.
1t was he, learned long after, who,
when 1 was reported missing, had
checked over all my belongings and
sent them back to England with 4
| signed memOrandum-whic is now in
my possession. Poor fellow, he little
realized then that but a day or two
later he would be engaged in his last
heroic battle with me q helpless on
| loOkeTi
The same German officer who
I brought me the photograph also drew
| Il map for me of the exact spot where
Raney was buried in Flanders. l
| guarded it carefully all through my
| subsequent adventures and finally
! turned it over to his father and mother
when l visited them in Toronto to per-
| form the hardest and SaddeSt duty |
have ever been called upon to execute
to confirm to them in person the
! tidings of poor PaulS death.
The other British pilot who fell was
! also from my squadron and Il man
I knew Well-LieUtenant Keith of Aus
/ tralia. l had given him Il picture of
myself only Il few hours before ! start
! ed on my own disastrous flight. He
/ was one of the star pilots of our squad
| ron and had been in many Il desperate
/ battle before, but this time the odds
were too great for him. He put up
wonderful fight and he gave as much
/ as he took
! The next two days passed without
! incident and | was then taken to the
! intelligence department of the German
flying corps, which was located about
| an hour from the hospital. There | was
| kept two days, during which time they
put a thousand and one questions to
me. While | was there | turned over
! to them the message l had written in
| the hospital and asked them to have
! one of their flyers drop it on our side
! of the line.
| They asked me where | would like to
have it dropped, thinking perhaps 1
would give my airdrorne away, but