Lieutenant, now Captain, Colcomb, has completed this account.  During the entire period of his observation, the pilot, in fact, did not make any maneuver or in any way shake the machine in order to dodge the firing.  He simply sent the airplane a bit higher and calmly lowered it again over the spot to be photographed, as if he were master of the air.  The following dialogue occurred: 

The Observer:  “I have finished; we can go back.”

The Pilot:  “Lieutenant, do me the favor of photographing for me the projectiles falling around us.”

Children have always had a passion for pictures; and the pictures were taken.

The chasers and bombardiers in the history of aviation have attracted public attention to the detriment of their comrades, the observers, whose admirable services will become better known in time.  It is by them that the battle field is exposed, and the preparations and ruses of the enemy balked:  they are the eyes of the commanders, and also the friends of the troops.  On April 29, 1916, Lieutenant Robbe flew over the trenches of the Mort-Homme at 200 meters, and brought back a detailed exposition of the entanglement of the lines.  A year later, in nearly the same place, Lieutenant Pierre Guilland, observer on board a biplane of the Moroccan division, was forced down by three enemy airplanes just at the moment when his division, whose progress he was following in order to report it, started its attack on the Corbeaux Woods east of the Mort-Homme, on August 20, 1917.  He fell on the first advancing lines and was picked up, unconscious and mortally wounded, by an artillery officer who proceeded to carry out the aviator’s mission.  When the latter reopened his eyes—­for only a short while—­he asked:  “Where am I?”—­“North of Chattancourt, west of Cumieres.”—­“Has the attack succeeded?”—­“Every object has been attained.”—­“Ah! that’s good, that’s good.” ...  He made them repeat the news to him.  He was dying, but his division was victorious.

Near Frise, Lieutenant Sains, who had been obliged to land on July 1, 1916, was rescued by the French army on July 4, after having hidden himself for three days in a shell-hole to avoid surrendering, his pilot, Quartermaster de Kyspotter, having been killed.

During the battle of the Aisne in April, 1917, Lieutenant Godillot, whose pilot had also been killed, slid along the plane, sat on the knees of the dead pilot, and brought the machine back into the French lines.  And Captain Mery, Lieutenant Viguier, Lieutenant de Saint-Severin, and Fressagues, Floret, de Niort, and Major Challe, Lieutenant Boudereau, Captain Roeckel, and Adjutant Fonck—­who was to become famous as a chaser—­how many of these elite observers furthered the destruction wrought by the artillery, and aided the progress of the infantry!

On October 24, 1916, as the fog cleared away, I saw the airplane of the Guyot de Salins division fly over Fort Douaumont just at the moment when Major Nicolai’s marines entered there.[17] The airplane had descended so low into the mist that it seemed as if magnetically drawn down by the earth, and the observer, leaning over the edge, was clapping his hands to applaud the triumph of his comrades.  The latter saw his gesture, even though they could not hear the applause, and cheered him—­a spontaneous exchange of soldierly confidence and affection between the sky and the earth.