Today was Thanksgiving, and we all had the very pleasant surprise of a
day of _repos_ given us by the captain that we might be present at a
banquet given us by the American colony at Pau. It was held at one of
the good hotels and had all the proper characteristics of a regular
Thanksgiving dinner. There were forty-two of us there. After the meal we
had some songs from local talent, which were of no mean variety, and
then we went to a moving picture show which was rather a failure except
as a place to digest an excellent and more than hearty meal.
My, but the machines we have now are a joy to run. They climb, they
turn, they dive, and recover as you think. You have but to wish in the
third dimension and you are there. It is beyond description. You sit
comfortably behind a little windshield without glasses and watch the
country far below. You forget the motor and space, and speed until
suddenly something of interest causes you to lean out and you are struck
in the face by a gust of wind which bends your head back and pumps your
breath back into your lungs. Then you know what speed means. Soon your
motor begins to miss, and you become worried and look for a place to
land. You find the fields not more than one hundred feet square. You
glance at the altimeter and find that you have unconsciously climbed to
an altitude where the air is light, and your motor pants, so you make a
readjustment, glance back at the school fifteen miles behind, which you
left eight minutes ago, and go on your way.
Tomorrow I do spirals in fifteen-meter machines, and then go to _vol de
group_. There we learn to fly in group formation and keep relative
positions. They play “follow the leader” and “stump” in that class—some
class! Then come acrobatics.