On awakening on the morning of June 7th we had a pleasant surprise. We found the sun shining. The trees, on which the dewdrops still trembled, swayed their branches in the slight wind from across the mountain. The mountains seemed clear and clean-cut in the atmosphere about them. As the sun peeped over the top of the Cansiglio an anti-aircraft battery near Conegliano began firing and soon the aerial bombardment increased. All the sky was dotted with little pink and grayish clouds which blossomed and then dissolved in the clear upper air of the morning.... Even the battery at Vittorio had begun to fire. Soon after we observed in the pure sky above us the powerful wings of many of our “Caproni” in single file surrounded by many little chasing planes. The Caproni were directed towards an aviation camp near San Giacomo di Veglia, and meanwhile our chasing planes, gathered in a compact formation, were patrolling the air above the aerodrome of the enemy chasers in order to down any such impudent plane as dared to take rise and molest our bombing planes. A bombing machine with a chasing plane near it gives the impression of a young girl about whom a young colt cuts a thousand capers. All the people from the nearby houses came out into the open, unmindful of the shower of splinters which fell from the air. The women raised their arms towards the sky in supplication, and pointing out the Italian wings to the children murmured, “They are ours, ours.” An old white-haired man raised his hat as the Italian flag passed above him. But the Austrians, who cannot be accused of extreme temerity, waited until all our planes had departed before rising in flight and as the last of our planes was passing over our lines on its return flight, the heavy enemy chasers arose, filling the sky with the coarse, deep roaring of their motors. Their method of flying is altogether different from ours. At times I enjoyed watching them in their movements; I found none of that agility, none of that rapidity of movement which so distinguishes our chasers. If the weather continued favorable we intended that afternoon at one o’clock to begin placing our sheets. I decided to set a signal on the field which would indicate that the offensive was imminent on the sector of the Montello. I examined my conscience and questioned whether this report was not premature, but as time passed and I gathered more information from all sides, I became all the more convinced that the day could not be far distant when a rumbling, rolling bombardment would indicate that the offensive had been begun. Even the weather, which was now fair, could but help hasten events.