The day after the accident, the mechanics, Taylor and Fumas, brought the broken propeller and some of the other broken parts to Orville’s bedside. From these parts he was able to determine the cause of the accident. A new pair of propellers, several inches longer than any previously used, had been installed just before the flight. The trouble started when a longitudinal crack developed in one blade of the right propeller. This crack permitted the blade to flatten and lose much of its thrust, with the result that the pressures on the two blades became unequal, causing a severe vibration of the propeller shaft housing. The vibration loosened one of the stay wires that held in position the tube in which the propeller shaft turned. Then the propeller began to swing sidewise and forward until a blade hit and tore loose the stay wire to the vertical tail, permitting the tail to take a nearly horizontal position. A pressure on the tail’s underside lifted the rear of the machine, thus causing it to dart for the ground. While Orville was recovering from his injuries, an acquaintance, C. H. Claudy, visited him and asked: “Has it got your nerve?” “Nerve?” repeated Orville, not quite understanding. “Oh, you mean will I be _afraid_ to fly again? The only thing I’m afraid of is that I can’t get well soon enough to finish those tests next year.” The cost had been high, but one result of those incomplete tests was that widespread incredulity in the United States about the Wrights’ achievements now finally ceased. At last, everyone, including even the most skeptical scientists, was convinced that a practical flying-machine was a reality. XV WHEN WILBUR WRIGHT WON FRANCE Wilbur Wright reached France in May, 1908, to fly the Wright machine that for a year had been in its crate at the customs warehouse in Le Havre. If he accomplished what he expected, final details of the Wrights’ business arrangement with the recently formed French syndicate would be carried out. As during the previous stay, when both the Wright brothers were in Europe, Wilbur kept in close touch with Hart O. Berg, European associate of Charles R. Flint & Co., the Wrights’ business representatives in all except the English-speaking countries. One of the first questions to be settled was where the actual demonstration of the Wright plane should take place. Naturally, there were not yet any areas in Europe designated as flying fields.