A captain who lunched with us to-day, bearer of an historic name, was recently decorated (somewhat against his will) for forcing a Boche to land in our lines. The truth is that in the single combat high above the lines, the captain's motor failed and he coasted for home, maneuvering wildly to escape the pursuing Hun's bullets. A few kilometres within our lines the German motor failed also, and down they came together--the Boche a prisoner, the Frenchman covered with not particularly welcome glory. Not all our guests knew the story, and one high officer asked the captain how he maneuvered to drive down the Boche. "Oh, like this," erratically said the captain, illustrating with frantic motions of an imaginary stick and rudder. "But the Boche--?" inquired the other, puzzled, "how did you get him down--where was he?" "Ah, the Boche; he was _behind_ me," answered the captain. Another officer, recently promoted to a very high position in the aviation, is a genuine character, a "numero" as they say here. He recently spent many hours in perfecting a trick optical sight, guaranteed to down a Boche at any range, angle, or speed. He adored his invention, which, he admitted, would probably end the war when fully perfected, and grew quite testy when his friends told him the thing was far too complicated for anything but laboratory use. At last, though he had reached a non-flying rank and had not flown for months, he installed the optical wonder on a single-seater and went out over the lines to try it out. As luck would have it, he fell in with a patrol of eight Albatrosses, and the fight that followed has become legendary. Boche after Boche dove on him, riddling his plane with bullets, while the inventor, in a scientific ecstasy, peered this way and that through his sight, adjusting set-screws and making hasty mental notes. By a miracle he was not brought down, and in the end a French patrol came to his rescue. He had not fired a shot! At lunch the other day some one asked what sort of a chap this inventor was, and the answer was so exceedingly French that I will reproduce it word for word: "He detests women and dogs; he has a wife he adores, and a dog he can't let out of his sight." A priceless characterization, I think, of a testy yet amiable old martinet.