The worst of the vortex having been safely passed, the damp of the cloud changed into sleet, which froze on the machine and on our faces and goggles; so that in addition to attending to the machine and gun, both of us unfortunate occupants had to be continually wiping our glasses. Our clothes, too, were wet through, outside from the cloud, and inside as the result of the very violent exercise taken in hanging on to the bucking aeroplane and in controlling it. Never have I worked so hard for mere existence, and never have I had a more unpleasant time. But all was now comparatively plain sailing, and once the machine was got under control, everything was more or less comfortable again. The machine was actually in the cloud for about a quarter of an hour, and had flown some ten or twelve miles and had dropped 5000 or 6000 feet. To add to the entertainment, the storm had burst during the process, and the thunder and lightning were studied at close range. Man-made shells are pretty beastly and are apt to kill if they hit one, or go bang near enough, but they aren’t nearly so frightening as the Almighty’s automatic display, if you happen to be on the stage. The enemy did open a pretty hot fire on the machine when it emerged, but we could not really be bothered on that occasion to take any notice of it. A further search was made for the German machine, but no trace of it could be found anywhere in the sky, so we supposed that the fright it got was enough for it and that it had gone home for good, in which it showed its wisdom. * * * * * Hot weather now with a strong north-easterly gale—we can just fly against it and that is about all. Some machines can hardly do that and therefore make an easier target for Archibald and his big brother the Crump from Krupps. * * * * * I am sending you back a bit of shell which broke a rib in one of the wings and then stuck in another. This is rather unusual, so perhaps you may care to keep it. It may interest you to know that we were flying at a height well over 10,000 feet—a pretty good shot, was it not? Luckily it didn’t do any damage that mattered. * * * * * We have recently had some very interesting and exciting work to do. We had to come down to the low altitude of about 5000 feet to reconnoitre a small piece of country very carefully, for a big long-range German siege gun, that had been annoying some of our troops well behind the lines. We took several photographs and searched the country minutely with our field-glasses, and eventually found four or five places, any one of which might quite possibly provide shelter and concealment for this big German piece.