Finally the flying did begin. But it was all by Frenchmen on French machines. There was the Blériot, aptly to be compared in shape to a dragon-fly; the Farman, a long box trailing a baby box in its wake. The Blériot suggests a successful wooing, the Farman a scientific conquest, of the air. The one soars and swoops and skims actually like a bird, the other progresses with scientific and mathematical precision. One might imagine a respectable barn-door fowl brood-mother, resting a while after the arduous labours of the pheasant season, speculating dismally on the prospects of being called upon to hatch out a brood of aeroplanes, and resolving to accept with resignation a clutch of Blériots but to draw the line firmly at Farmans. No respectable fowl could give even the kinship of adoption to a flying contrivance that suggests so strongly a collection of egg-boxes. Since then Englishmen have learned to fly, and aeroplaning is becoming one of the national sports. Also I see in some of the papers that because at the last Olympic Games England got more of the dust than of the laurels, the Englishman must set to work to learn to throw the javelin and the discus farther than any one else; and I believe that a section of him will accept the direction to do this and do it quite earnestly. So the Englishman who practises at football, cricket, hunting, sailing, rowing, fishing, running, walking, flying, shooting, must also learn to throw strange things great distances. Withal he has his work to do, and some time to give to the enjoyment of the beauty of his most beautiful England. A wonderful people of a wonderful country! CHAPTER VII THE CITIES OF ENGLAND There are so many great cities and historic towns in England that a mere guide-book enumeration of the chief of them would fill many pages--in rather a dull fashion. I shall not attempt that, but will take the reader for a brief glance at some of the more notable centres of population.