I went up in a balloon. Lieutenant Grant from Ohio, with whom I formed a friendship, took me up one morning from five to six-thirty. The great balloon made a curved outline against the sky above the tree tops. As we approached in the morning dusk, the darkness and the night chill still struggling to keep off the coming day, many figures hustled to muffled commands. Then, at the order, the balloon moved out into the open and upward until the men clinging to the wet side ropes formed a circle about the basket on the ground. We were put into belts and fastened to our parachutes before getting into the car. Then at the command to give way, the car left the ground and mounted upwards. Soon we were at two thousand feet, and the woods and machines and human forms were lost in the ground haze which clung in the hollows. With all the flying in the sky which I have done, this was the first time I had hung in the air. I had never realized the air was so empty and so still. The stillness of the mountains is broken by its echo. There are splashes in the stillness of the sea, but the air doesn’t even breathe. Only the desert could be so silent. My companion spoke into his telephone in low tones, to test the wires. He showed me the map, and then pointed out the direction of the enemy lines. Suddenly there was a flicker of fire in the western horizon, like fire flies in the grass. Some time after, there came the distant booms. Opposition firing started, and for a time the duel lasted. But as the sun began to rise, and the mist clear, the firing became intermittent, and finally ceased, and the appalling silence seemed to bear us skyward with its pressure. I shivered. I wonder if the soul shivers as it leaves the earth in search of peace. I think I should prefer to have my soul stay down in the warm earth with my body and the kindly reaching roots of flowers and all the ants and friendly worms than to float up in that everlasting silence. It seemed high, too—much higher than I had ever been in an aeroplane, though it was only seven hundred meters. It was a wonderful experience—but give me the aeroplane, or the submarine, and leave the balloonist to listen for the heartbeat of the Sphinx. We had just gotten our room nicely decorated with curtains, rug, table cover, hanging lamps, and pictures when we were ordered to move; but everyone was glad of the prospect to get into the fight. We had gone on a patrol nearly to Metz that day and had tried but failed to catch two enemy planes which were located by anti-aircraft shells. That evening we ate our last meal in Toul, and the next morning were in Paris after an all-night ride. Paris is neither excited nor exciting. Refugees were coming in and going through. Many had left the city while it was being bombarded. All my friends had gone to various country places, and I could see the streets were not so crowded.