[Illustration: description: Photo close medium shot outdoor portrait of Wilmur Stultz wearing flight gear caption: [2] That is the way it is written in the log book. So far no one can make out that word before “stratum.” Can you? A.E. ] We are running between the clouds still, but they are coming together. Many clouds all about ... shouldn’t bother. Port motor coughing a bit. Sounds like water. We are going to go into, under or over a storm. I don’t like to, with one motor acting the way it is. How grey it is before; and behind, the mass of soggy cloud we came through, is pink with dawn. Dawn “the rosy fingered,” as the Odyssey has it. Himmel! The sea! We are 3000. Patchy clouds. We have been jazzing from 1000 to 5000 where we now are, to get out of clouds. At present there are sights of blue and sunshine, but everlasting clouds always in the offing. The radio is dead. The sea for a while. Clouds ahead. We ought to be coming somewhat in the range of our destination if we are on the course. Port motor off again. 3000 ft. 7 o’clock London. Can’t use radio at all. Coming down now in a rather clear spot. 2500 ft. Everything sliding forward. 8:50. 2 Boats!!!! Trans steamer. Try to get bearing. Radio won’t. One hr’s gas. Mess. All craft cutting our course. Why? * * * * So the log ends. Its last page records that we had but one hour’s supply of gas left; that the time for reaching Ireland had passed; that the course of the vessel sighted perplexed us; that our radio was useless. Where were we? Should we keep faith with our course and continue? “Mess” epitomized the blackness of the moment. Were we beaten? We all favored sticking to the course. We had to. With faith lost in that, it was hopeless to carry on. Besides, when last we checked it, before the radio went dead, the plane had been holding true. We circled the America, although having no idea of her identity at the time. With the radio crippled, in an effort to get our position, Bill scribbled a note. The note and an orange to weight it, I tied in a bag with an absurd piece of silver cord. As we circled the America, the bag was dropped through the hatch. But the combination of our speed, the movement of the vessel, the wind and the lightness of the missile was too much for our marksmanship. We tried another shot, using our remaining orange. No luck. [Illustration: description: Photo of airplane silhouette taken from ship deck caption: THE FRIENDSHIP “BOMBING” THE AMERICA _U. S. Shipping Board_ ] [Illustration: description: Photo of scribbled notebook page caption: THE LAST PAGE IN THE LOG BOOK ] Should we seek safety and try to come down beside the steamer? Perhaps one reason the attempt was never attempted was the roughness of the sea which not only made a landing difficult but a take-off impossible.