To me fell the first patrol, and a call from the Orderly Officer at 3.30 a.m. was not received with the utmost courtesy. After hot tea and toast by candle light, we scrambled into warm leather coats, woollen-lined boots, gloves and helmets, and climbed aboard. By the time I had inspected my guns and the usual contents of the cockpit, the engine was ticking over and we were ready to start. It was still dark enough, as we took off, for the pilot to need all his lamps alight to see the various instruments, and, as we climbed, the crisp morning air set our blood tingling with the joy of living. When above the clouds at about 8000 feet the first rays of the rising sun shot across the sky, and very shortly the clouds, which until then had been snowy white, were bathed in a crimson glow that held us spell-bound with its beauty. Primarily, the crests of those billowy mists were tipped as with a wand of fire whilst, as we ascended into space and the sun gradually rose above the horizon, the colour spread over that sea of cloud until it appeared like a stupendous stream of lava belched forth from some volcano which, after years of quiescence, had suddenly burst into activity. [Illustration: GOT HIM COLD _By Lieut. O. H. Coulson_ ] [Illustration] I have seen many sunrises under varying conditions, sunrises at whose beauty I marvelled, but never before had I witnessed anything that could come within coo-ee of the riotous blaze of colour that lay spread beneath us, covering the Holy Land, as it were, with a cloth of gold. It disappeared from view, however, all too soon, for, as the sun gained in strength and we in height, the colour slowly faded from fiery brilliance to a delicate pink until, finally, the clouds once again showed up in all their glistening purity. It seemed impossible to realize, whilst nature was all aglow beneath us, that war was being waged with all its relentless cruelty, that guns were sending forth their messengers of death and pain, and, above all, that we, who had been privileged to witness the glory of God’s handiwork, were scanning the heavens for something in the way of Hun airmen to kill. To me it seemed a sacrilege that, on such a glorious day, hate should be animating the hearts of men, and that I should be a willing agent, eager for an opportunity of sending a fellow-mortal crashing to earth and death. The Hun, however, evidently deeming discretion the better part of valour, did not put in an appearance, and when, after three hours’ cruising up and down the lines, we returned to the aerodrome, I believe I was pleased that I had not been, by force of circumstances, compelled to share in sending some creature to meet his Maker. So, throughout the day, the work went on, and, as a Hun “bus” was reported to have bombed our troops in the early morning, every one of our machines thereafter carried four bombs to drop on any suitable target that offered itself.