Up in their seats, a whir of the motor, and they are off on another adventure. They shy at mention of their names in print, for that is not good for the spirit of corps of this newest branch in the service of war. Anonymity is absolute. Everything is done by the corps for the corps. Possibly because it is so young, because it started with chosen men, the British Aviation Corps is unsurpassed; but partly it is because of the British temperament, with that combination of coolness and innate love of risk which the British manner sometimes belies. Something of the old spirit of knighthood characterises air service. It is individual work; its numbers are relatively few. I like one of the aviation customs, not for its chivalry alone, but because it makes one feel more kindly toward the Germans. If a German aviator has to descend in the British lines, whether from motor trouble or because he is winged by an anti-aircraft gun, a British aviator flies over the German lines and drops a “message-bag” with long streamers telling whether the unfortunate one is dead or alive, and the Germans do the same. * * * * * Some mornings ago I saw several young soldiers with notebooks going about our village street. They were from the cadet school where privates, from the trenches, take a course and return with chocolate drops on their sleeve-bands as commissioned officers. This was a course in billeting. For ours is not an army in tents, but one living in French houses and barns. The pupils were learning how to carry out this delicate task; for delicate it is. A stranger speaking another language becomes the guest of the host for whom he is fighting. Mr. Atkins receives only shelter; he supplies his own meals. His excess of marmalade one sees yellowing the cheeks of the children in the family where he is at home. Madame objects only to his efforts to cook in her kitchen; womanlike, she would rather handle the pots and pans herself. Tommy is thoroughly instructed in his duty as guest and under a discipline that is merciless so far as conduct toward the population goes; so the two get on better than French and English military authorities feared that they might. Time has taught them to understand each other and see that difference in race does not mean absence of human qualities in common, though differently expressed. Many armies I have seen, but never one better behaved than the British army in France and Flanders in its respect for property and the rights of the population. And while the fledgling officers are going on with their billeting, we hear the t-r-r-t of a machine gun at a machine-gun school about a mile distant, where picked men also from the trenches receive instruction in the use of an arm new to them. There are other schools within sound of the guns teaching the art of war to an expanding army in the midst of war, with the teachers bringing their experience from the battle-line.