With the powerful wind behind us we are soon over the objective, a large wood some few miles behind the lines. The wood is reported to be a favourite bivouac ground, and it is surrounded by Boche aerodromes.
Now the bombers drop below the clouds to a height convenient for their job. As the wood covers an area of several square miles and almost any part of it may contain troops, there is no need to descend far before taking aim. Each pilot chooses a spot for his particular attention, for preference somewhere near the road that bisects the wood. He aligns his sights on the target, releases the bombs, and watches for signs of an interrupted lunch below.
It is quite impossible to tell the extent of the damage, for the raid is directed not against some definite object, but against an area containing troops, guns, and stores. The damage will be as much moral as material since nothing unnerves war-weary men more than to realise that they are never safe from aircraft.
The guns get busy at once, for the wood contains a nest of Archies. Ugly black bursts surround the bombers, who swerve and zig-zag as they run. When well away from the wood they climb back to us through the clouds.
We turn west and battle our way against the wind, now our foe. Half-way to the lines we wave an envious good-bye to the bombers and scouts, and begin our solitary patrol above the clouds.
We cruise all round the compass, hunting for Huns. Twice we see enemy machines through rifts in the clouds, but each time we dive towards them they refuse battle and remain at a height of some thousand feet, ready to drop even lower, if they can lure us down through the barrage of A.-A. shells. Nothing else of importance happens, and things get monotonous. I look at my watch and think it the slowest thing on earth, slower than the leave train. The minute-hand creeps round, and homing-time arrives.
We have one more flutter on the way to the trenches. Two Huns come to sniff at us, and we dive below the clouds once more.
But it is the old, old dodge of trying to salt the bird's tail. The Hun decoys make themselves scarce—and H.E. bursts make themselves plentiful. Archie has got the range of those clouds to a few feet, and, since we are a little beneath them, he has got our range too. We dodge with difficulty, for Archie revels in a background of low clouds. Nobody is hit, however, and our party crosses the lines; and so home.
From the point of view of our fighting machines, the afternoon has been uneventful. Nevertheless, the job has been done, so much so that the dwellers in the wood where we left our cards are still regretting their disturbed luncheon, while airmen and A.-A. gunners around the wood tell each other what they will do to the next lot of raiders. We shall probably call on them again next week, when I will let you know whether their bloodthirsty intentions mature.
France, September, 1916