ACROSS EUROPE TO THE BOSPHOROUS
It had just turned half-past twelve on Friday morning when Smith said
good-bye to his friend William Barracombe on Epsom Downs. The sky was
clear; the moon shone so brightly that by its light alone he could
read the compass at his elbow, without the aid of the small electric
lamp that hung above it. He set his course for the south-east, and
flew with a light breeze at a speed of at least two hundred miles an
hour.
His machine was a biplane, and represented the work and thought of
years. Smith never minimized the part which Laurent Rodier had had in
its construction; indeed, he was wont to say that without Rodier he
would have been nowhere. Their acquaintance and comradeship had begun
in the most accidental way. Two years before, Smith was taking part in
an aeroplane race from Paris to London. On reaching the Channel, he
found himself far ahead of all his competitors, except a Frenchman,
who, to his chagrin, managed to keep a lead of almost a mile. Each
carried a passenger. Not long after leaving the French coast, a cloud
of smoke suddenly appeared in the wake of the Frenchman's aeroplane,
and to Smith's alarm the machine in a few seconds dropped into the
sea. Instantly he steered for the spot, and brought his own aeroplane
to within a few feet of the water. To his surprise, he saw that part
of the wreckage was floating, and a man, apparently only half
conscious, was clinging to one of the stays. But for the engine having
providentially become disconnected in the fall, the whole machine with
its passengers must have sunk to the bottom.
Smith saw that it was impossible for him to rescue the man while he
himself remained in his aeroplane, for the slightest touch upon the
other would inevitably have submerged it. There was only one thing to
do. Leaving the aeroplane to the charge of his friend, he dived into
the sea, and rising beside the man, seized him at the moment when his
hold was relaxing, and contrived to hold him up until a fast motor
launch, which had witnessed the accident, came up and rescued them
both.
The man proved to be the chauffeur of the aeroplane; his employer was
drowned. Smith lost the race, but he gained what was infinitely more
valuable to him, the gratitude and devotion of Laurent Rodier. Finding
that the Frenchman was an expert mechanician, Smith took him into his
employment. Rodier turned out to be of a singularly inventive turn of
mind, and the two, putting their heads together, evolved after long
experiment a type of engine that enabled them to double the speed of
the aeroplane. These aerial vessels had already attained a maximum of
a hundred miles an hour, for progress had been rapid since Paulhan's
epoch-making flight from London to Manchester. To the younger
generation the aeroplane was becoming what the motor-car had been to
their elders. It was now a handier, more compact, and more easily
managed machine than the earlier types, and the risk of breakdown was
no greater than in the motor-car of the roads. The engine seldom
failed, as it was wont to do in the first years of aviation. The
principal danger that airmen had to fear was disaster from strong
squalls, or from vertical or spiral currents of air due to some
peculiarity in the confirmation of the land beneath them.
Smith's engine was a compound turbine, reciprocating engines having
proved extravagant in fuel. There were both a high and a low pressure
turbine on the same shaft, which also drove the dynamo for the
searchlight and the lamp illuminating the compass, and for igniting
the explosive mixture. By means of an eccentric, moreover, the shaft
worked a pump for compressing the mixture of hot air and petrol before
ignition, the air being heated by passing through jackets round the
high-pressure turbines. The framework of the planes consisted of
hollow rods made of an aluminum alloy of high tensile strength, and
the canvas stretched over the frames was laced with wire of the same
material. To stiffen the planes, a bracket was clamped at the axis,
and thin wire stays were strung top and bottom, as the masts of a
yacht are supported. The airman was in some degree protected from the
wind by a strong talc screen, also wire-laced; by means of this, and a
light radiator worked by a number of accumulators, he was enabled to
resist the cold, which had been so great a drawback to the pioneers of
airmanship.
In this aeroplane Smith and Rodier had made many a long expedition.
They had found that the machine was capable of supporting a total
weight of nearly 1,200 lbs., and since Smith turned the scale at
eleven stone eight, and Rodier at ten stone, in their clothes, the
total additional load they could carry was about 900 lbs. Eighty
gallons of petrol weighed about 600 lbs. with the cans, and twenty
gallons of lubricating oil about 160 lbs., so that there was a margin
of nearly 150 lbs. for food, rifles, and anything else there might be
occasion for carrying at any stage of the journey.
Smith was in charge of the aeroplane attached to his ship, the
Admiralty having adopted the machine for scouting purposes. It was
only recently that he had brought his own aeroplane to its present
perfection, after laborious experiments in the workshops he
established in the corner of his father's park, where he toiled
incessantly whenever he could obtain leave, and where Rodier was
constantly employed. His machine had just completed its trials, and he
expected to realize a considerable sum by his improvements. Of this he
had agreed to give Rodier one half, and the Frenchman had further
stipulated that the improvements should be offered also to the French
Government. This being a matter of patriotism, Smith readily
consented, remarking with a laugh that he would not be the first to
break the _entente cordiale_.
Just as a voyage round the world was a dream until Drake accomplished
it, so a flight round the world was the acme of every airman's
ambition. It was the accident of his father's plight that crystallized
in Smith's mind the desires held in suspension there. The act was
sudden: the idea had been long cherished.
He had decided on his course after a careful examination of the globe
borrowed from Mr. Dawkins, the village school-master. The most direct
route from London to the Solomon Islands ran across Norway and Sweden,
the White Sea, Northern Siberia, Manchuria, Korea and Japan, and
thence to New Guinea. But since it traversed some of the most desolate
regions of the earth, where the indispensable supplies of petrol and
machine oil could not be secured, he had chosen a route through fairly
large centres of population, along which at the necessary intervals he
could ensure, by aid of the telegraph, that the fuel would be in
readiness.
And now he was fairly off. Constantinople was to be the first place of
call. He knew the orographical map of Europe as well as he knew his
manual of navigation. It was advisable to avoid mountainous country as
far as possible, for the necessity of rising to great heights, in
order to cross even the lower spurs of the Alps, would involve loss of
time, to say nothing of the cold, and the risk of accident in the
darkness. Coming to the coast, in the neighbourhood of Dover, about
half-an-hour after leaving Epsom, he steered for a point on the
opposite shore of the Channel somewhere near the Franco-Belgian
frontier. As an experienced airman he had long ceased to find the
interest of novelty in the scenes below him. The lights of the Calais
boat, and of vessels passing up and down the Channel, were almost
unnoticed. On leaving the sea, he flew over a flat country until, on
his right, he saw in the moonlight a dark mass which from dead
reckoning he thought must be the Ardennes. The broad river he had just
crossed, which gleamed like silver in the moonlight, was without doubt
the Meuse, and that which he came to in about an hour must be the
Moselle. At this point Rodier, who had been dozing, sat up and began
to take an interest in things; afterwards he told Smith that they must
have passed over the little village in which he was born, and he felt
a sentimental regret that the flight was not by day, when he might
have seen the red roof beneath which his mother still lived.
After another half-hour Smith began to feel the strain of remaining in
one position, with all his faculties concentrated. The air was so
calm, and the wind-screen so effective, that he suffered none of the
numbing effects which the great speed might otherwise have induced;
but it was no light task to keep his attention fixed at once on the
engine, the map outspread before him, the compass, and the country
below; and by the time he reached a still broader river, which could
only be the Rhine, he was tired. As yet he had been flying for only
three hours: could he live through seven days of it? He had once
crossed America in the Canadian Pacific, and though he got eight
hours' sleep every night, he felt an utter wreck at the end of the
journey. To be sure, he was now in the fresh air instead of a stuffy
railway carriage, and he was riding as smoothly as on a steamer,
without the jar and jolt that made journeys by rail so fatiguing.
Still, he thought it only good policy to pay heed to the first signs
of strain, and so he slowed down until the noise of the engine had
abated sufficiently for him to make his voice heard, and said:
"Roddy, you must take a turn. We're near the frontier between Baden
and Alsace, I fancy. The Bavarian hills can't be far off. You had
better rise a bit, and don't go too fast, or we may be knocking our
noses before we know where we are."
"Right O, mister," replied the Frenchman. "You take forty winks, and
eat some chocolate for what you call a nightcap."
"A good idea. I'd rise to about 4,500 feet, I think. Keep your eye on
the aneroid."
They exchanged places. Smith ate two or three sticks of chocolate,
took a good drink of water, and in five minutes was fast asleep. But
his nap lasted no more than a couple of hours. It appeared to him that
he never lost consciousness of his errand. When he opened his eyes the
dawn was already stealing over the sky, and at the tremendous pace to
which Rodier had put the engine the aeroplane seemed to rush into the
sunlight. Far below, the earth was spread out like a patchwork,
greens and whites and browns set in picturesque haphazard patterns;
men moving like ants, and horses like locusts.
"Where are we?" he bawled in Rodier's ear.
The Frenchman put his finger on the map. Smith glanced at his watch;
it was past five o'clock. They must be near the Servian frontier. That
broad streak of blue must be the Danube. Another three hours should
see them at Constantinople, the first stage of their journey. On they
rushed, feeling chill in the morning air at the height of nearly five
thousand feet. Lifting his binocular, Smith saw a railway train
running in the same direction as themselves, and though from the line
of smoke it was going at full speed, it appeared to be crawling like a
worm, and was soon left far behind. Now they were in Bulgaria: those
grey crinkly masses beyond must be the Balkans. Crossing the Dragoman
Pass, they came into an upward current of air that set the machine
rocking, and Smith for the first time felt a touch of nervousness lest
it should break down and fall among these inhospitable crags. Rodier
planed downwards, until they seemed to skim the crests. The air was
calmer here: the aeroplane steadied; and when the mountains were left
behind they came still lower, following the railway line.
Here was Philippopolis, with its citadel perched on a frowning rock.
It seemed but a few minutes when Adrianople came into view, and but a
few more when, descending to within five hundred feet of the ground,
they raced over the plains of St. Stefano. Now Rodier checked the
speed a little, and steering past the large monument erected to the
memory of the Russians who fell in '78, came within sight of
Constantinople. Smith was bewildered at the multitude of domes,
minarets, and white roofs before him. It would soon be necessary to
choose a landing-place, and Rodier planed upwards, so that he could
scan the whole neighbourhood in one comprehensive glance.
"Slow down!" Smith shouted.
There was a large open space below him; it was the Hippodrome. He made
a quick calculation of its length, and decided not to alight. A little
farther on he came to the Ministry of War with its large square; but
there a regiment of soldiers was drilling. Rodier steered a point to
the north-west, and the aeroplane passed over the Galata bridge that
spans the Golden Horn. The bridge was thronged with people, who, as
they caught sight of the strange machine flying over their heads,
stood and craned their necks, and the airmen heard their shouts of
amazement. To the right they saw, beyond the hill of Pera, a stretch
of low open country. Passing the second bridge over the Horn, they
came to a broad green space just without the city. It was the old
archery grounds of the Sultans.
"Dive, Roddy!" Smith cried.
Rodier jerked the lever back: the humming clatter of the engine
ceased; and the aeroplane swooped down as gracefully as a bird,
alighting gently on the green sward.