The would-be aviator should go to a good school where the best facilities can be had and where there is a good large place to fly, without obstructions. The machine should be thoroughly mastered and every part understood. Training a man to fly does not, as I regard it, consist in putting him in an aeroplane and letting him go up before he knows how to get down again. Anybody may be able to go up in an aeroplane, but it requires skill and practice to come down without damage to man or machine. HOW TO FLY An aeroplane is supported in the air by its wings. These are placed at a slight angle to the direction in which it goes so that the front edge is slightly higher than the rear edge. This tends to push the air downward and the speed of the aeroplane must be great enough to skim over the air before it has a chance to flow away. You may have had the experience of skating over thin ice which would bend beneath your weight as long as you kept moving, although it would have broken if you remained in one place. This is precisely the same phenomenon, and as the water has not time to flow away underneath from the thin ice so the air is caught under the surfaces of the wings and the machine passes on gathering new air as it goes to support it, faster than the air can flow away. A curved surface is better than a flat one and to find just the proper curve to be most efficient at the speed at which the machine is to fly is a very difficult problem and must be determined by very careful laboratory experiments. The various flying machines have different ways of accomplishing the control of the rudders for steering to the right or left, and up and down, for a flying machine is different from all other vehicles in this one respect. In addition to the steering, the machine must be balanced, and as the air is the most unstable of all mediums, how to maintain the equilibrium becomes perhaps the most important point in the construction of an aeroplane, as well as the most necessary one for the aviator to master. This is accomplished in various ways and is the characteristic feature of the different machines. The Curtiss machine is considered one of the simplest of all. When it is remembered that Mr. C. F. Willard, my first pupil, learned to operate a machine with hardly any instruction it would seem that the mere learning to operate should not be a serious obstacle to overcome. If the air is still and there are no wind gusts to strike the machine sideways and upset it, flying is easy, but if the air comes in gusts and is rolling and turbulent even the best and most skilful operator is kept busy manoeuvring the front rudder and endeavouring to keep the machine headed into the wind, and when it tips, moving the side controls to maintain the balance. With all of these movements it is no wonder that the aviator's mind must be active there is no time to think, every movement and act must be absolutely accurate and the body must be under full control.