Just as a certain temper of nerve is required of the airman, so must he also possess special faculties of observation to fit him for military work. The air observer must be cool-headed and resolute. Above all things he must possess a certain measure of intuition which will complete, which will fill in the details, as it were, of the picture which his sharp eyes must pick out in relief from the blurred chessboard of fields and roads and trees far beneath him. Only experience will teach even the keenest eye to observe fruitfully. Only the trained eye, reinforced by a good military brain, will detect in that black thread on a white strip troops marching along a road, or distinguish a moving train in that white smudge gliding over a dark background. Only the trained mind will appreciate the military significance of these observations. Where the intuition comes in is in making the correct deductions from the things observed, and fitting them into their right place in the general scheme of our information of the enemy’s movements. Intelligent map-reading at the height at which aeroplanes in war are compelled to travel is more than an acquired accomplishment; it is a born gift. Where a pilot and an observer venture forth together in one machine, they must work in closest harmony. Like bowler and wicket-keeper in one of those successful combinations with which we are familiar in county cricket, each must divine by intuition the intention of the other. In the roar of the propeller, the rush of the hurricane, communication by word of mouth is hopeless, and even the portable telephone is of small avail. Now the observer is the captain on the bridge, the pilot the chief engineer in the engine-room. Now the rôles are reversed. Destruction threatens, and the pilot takes command. The observer can lean back and commend his soul to God, while his comrade strains every nerve to avert a swift end by a bullet in the air or a more terrible death on the cruel earth a mile below. Though only two years old, the Royal Flying Corps has already created its own distinctive atmosphere. I can only describe it as a subtle blend of the free-and-easy good-fellowship of the navy with the kind of hectic dare-devilry which is characteristic of airmen everywhere. Not that the foolhardiness of a certain type of airman that we all know is tolerated in the Royal Flying Corps. Its spirit demands high courage, cool nerve, and absolute devotion to duty, on the part of every one of its men, but feats of the “looping the loop” order are strictly repressed. It is to keep this spirit out of the Corps that the rule has been made forbidding any “advertising” of individual airmen by name in connection with their flights on military service.