Meanwhile the great event of 1919, the crossing of the Atlantic by air, was gradually ripening to performance. In addition to the rigid airship, R.34, eight machines entered for this flight, these being a Short seaplane, Handley-Page, Martinsyde, Vickers-Vimy, and Sopwith aeroplanes, and three American flying boats, N.C.1, N.C.3, and N.C.4. The Short seaplane was the only one of the eight which proposed to make the journey westward; in flying from England to Ireland, before starting on the long trip to Newfoundland, it fell into the sea off the coast of Anglesey, and so far as it was concerned the attempt was abandoned. The first machines to start from the Western end were the three American seaplanes, which on the morning of May 6th left Trepassy, Newfoundland, on the 1,380 mile stage to Horta in the Azores. N.C.1 and N.C.3 gave up the attempt very early, but N.C.4, piloted by Lieut.-Commander Read, U.S.N., made Horta on May 17th and made a three days’ halt. On the 20th, the second stage of the journey to Ponta Delgada, a further 190 miles, was completed and a second halt of a week was made. On the 27th, the machine left for Lisbon, 900 miles distant, and completed the journey in a day. On the 30th a further stage of 340 miles took N.C.4 on to Ferrol, and the next day the last stage of 420 miles to Plymouth was accomplished. Meanwhile, H. G. Hawker, pilot of the Sopwith biplane, together with Commander Mackenzie Grieve, R.N., his navigator, found the weather sufficiently auspicious to set out at 6.48 p.m. on Sunday, May 18th, in the hope of completing the trip by the direct route before N.C.4 could reach Plymouth. They set out from Mount Pearl aerodrome, St John’s, Newfoundland, and vanished into space, being given up as lost, as Hamel was lost immediately before the War in attempting to fly the North Sea. There was a week of dead silence regarding their fate, but on the following Sunday morning there was world-wide relief at the news that the plucky attempt had not ended in disaster, but both aviators had been picked up by the steamer _Mary_ at 9.30 a.m. on the morning of the 19th, while still about 750 miles short of the conclusion of their journey. Engine failure brought them down, and they planed down to the sea close to the _Mary_ to be picked up; as the vessel was not fitted with wireless, the news of their rescue could not be communicated until land was reached. An equivalent of half the £10,000 prize offered by the _Daily Mail_ for the non-stop flight was presented by the paper in recognition of the very gallant attempt, and the King conferred the Air Force Cross on both pilot and navigator. Raynham, pilot of the Martinsyde competing machine, had the bad luck to crash his craft twice in attempting to start before he got outside the boundary of the aerodrome. The Handley-Page machine was withdrawn from the competition, and, attempting to fly to America, was crashed on the way. [Illustration: The Atlantic Flight.