*Advantages of Kite Balloon.* It became a necessity to resurrect the captive balloon and bring it up to date, not simply because the Germans were employing it in numbers, but because experience demonstrated that it possessed numerous advantages over the aeroplane for artillery observation. The observer in an aeroplane is carried back and forth over and around the location he wishes to watch, at high speed and at a constantly varying altitude. He must communicate by means of either signals or wireless, and it is not always possible for him in either case to know whether his signals have been received and understood, since it is possible to transmit messages by wireless from an aeroplane but a very difficult matter to receive. The observers in a kite balloon, on the other hand, have the advantage of being able to scrutinize a certain sector constantly with the aid of powerful glasses. With a few weeks of experience in observing a given terrain they become so familiar with it that any changes or the movements of troops or supplies are quickly distinguished. The greatest advantage, however, is that the information thus acquired may be instantly transmitted not merely to one but to any one or all of a group of batteries extending over a mile or two of front in either direction, the balloons being stationed 4 to 6 miles apart. The observers are fitted with portable head sets so that they speak directly into their telephones without the necessity of removing the glasses from their eyes, which enables them to watch the fall of the shells and tell the battery attendant in the dugout alongside the gun whether a shell fell "short", "over," "left," or "right," and the amount of correction needed before the smoke from the explosion has cleared away. With the aid of close corrections of this nature the battery commander is in a position to get the range exactly without the great expenditure of ammunition that firing entirely by map or with the assistance of aeroplane observers entails. Instances are recorded in which a 9.5-inch shell has been landed right in a concrete "pill-box" not over 15 feet square from a distance of 3 miles after six trial shots had been fired to obtain the range. Such a shot is reported back to the battery by the balloon observer as a "direct hit," and it is only necessary to fire the gun at the same range and direction to score as often as necessary.