The work has been going very well since last I wrote you, which was only two or three days ago. I told you about at last leaving the blessed roller; I never was so relieved in my life. The first evening in the _decollé_ class, I was requisitioned to turn tails and the morning after there was too much wind to work. The _decollé_ is the one where you go up two or three metres and settle down by cutting speed. The first time I had three sorties in the wind, bounced around a lot, but did no damage. The next time was first thing in the morning. Two metres up on the first, four or five on the fifth--strictly against orders. I even had to _piqué_--point the machine toward the ground--a little, which is not at all _comme il faut_ in the _decollé_. But these Frenchmen are funny chaps--sometimes they will get terribly angry and punish one for disobeying, and again they will be tickled to death with it. If I had smashed while doing more than I was told to, there would have been a lot of trouble; as it was, no objection--and the monitor personally conducted me to the _piqué_ class with a very nice recommendation. Now there are two _piqué_ classes: one with a _piste_ about a quarter of a mile long, in which one is supposed to do little more than _decollé_, get up about five metres and _piqué un tout petit peu_--hardly at all. After comes the advanced _piqué_ with a much longer _piste_ on which one can get up 100 metres (300 feet). On my first sortie in the _piqué_, I was told to roll on the ground all the way, so continuing my policy, did a low _decollé_. Next I was supposed to do a two metre _decollé_, so went up ten and _piquéd_. Had ten sorties in that class one morning, getting as high as I could--about twenty metres--and went to the advanced _piqué_ that night--last night. Four sorties there last night with a machine with a poor motor, so didn’t get up over a hundred feet.