“‘They’re coming down!’ yelled the lad as the airplane grew larger.

“‘It’s a hit!’ cried the lieutenant in command.

“Mattia saw the airplane turning over and over, falling, soaring like a leaf from a tree in the fall.

“‘Di—­did we hi—­hit him?’ questioned the lad.

“‘Of course we hit him,’ answered a soldier.  ’Don’t you see him coming?’

“For the first time the little French lad realized what war was.  He knew there was one man, and perhaps two, in that falling machine, and that he was watching them falling to what would probably be death.

“‘It is for France,’ he said to himself.  ’If they are Boches they must die.’  However, Mattia did not get the picture of that scene out of his mind for a long time.  Later on he became used to it and did not even marvel.

“One day the gun squad was sent to another point a long distance away and the lad returned to the rest camp.  He now felt himself to be a well-seasoned soldier and talked of high-angle guns as volubly as could an experienced gunner.  Still, he had not yet reached the realization of his ambitions.  He tried often to steal away to the trenches, but in each instance was stopped and turned back.

“While in billets he fell in with a machine-gun company and became much interested in what they told him of the perilous work of that branch of the service.  He concluded that this work would suit him better than the anti-aircraft service.  While the latter squads ordinarily were located behind the lines, the machine gunners were up where there was trouble all the time.  To join a machine-gun company was not so easy.

“Mattia’s chance came one night.  A company of machine gunners was ordered to a remote point on the line, a journey of some fifteen miles, where they were to establish a new emplacement, temporarily, to clean out a nest of Prussians.  The lad listened to what the men had to say about their proposed journey and the work they expected to have to do with the keenest interest.

“‘I too shall go,’ he decided, but he told no one of his intention.  Instead, he waited until the men were well started, then followed them.  There was no difficulty about this, as they did not have to pass any sentries on the way.

“Shells frequently fell near them, many soared over their heads with weird moanings.  He was getting so familiar with the sound of shells that he could tell the kind of shell that was passing by the noise made by it.

“Along toward the middle of the night the machine gunners reached their destination.  Mattia did not show himself until the soldiers began preparing an emplacement for their gun.  This emplacement was located in a clump of bushes, in which they dug a short trench, carrying the dirt far to the rear, so the enemy airplanes might not discover that the earth had been turned over there.

“The lieutenant in command discovered him and Mattia spent a few most uncomfortable minutes in trying to explain why he was there.