After all, it is the surprises that add the most spice, and it was
certainly a pleasant surprise to receive your knit helmet. As a matter
of fact, no gift could have been more aptly chosen. The only helmet I
had was knit by a girl friend whose enthusiasm was greater than her
skill; it no doubt represented much painstaking, but romance will not
keep the head warm nor the ravelings out of one’s eyes when aloft, and I
had wished hard and oft for a helmet of just the type you sent; others
had them. Thank you so much for it, it fits perfectly.
You probably know something of how my time has been spent. I am still in
the LaFayette Flying Corps of the French Foreign Legion. We have been
through four French schools of aviation and are now as good pilots as
can be made without experience at the Front. We are now working in
machines the same as are used at the Front, and engage daily in target
practice and sharpshooting as well as the theory of gunmanship. We have
been trained for pilots in the class machines, that is, fighting
monoplane biplanes. They travel at a speed of from ninety to one hundred
and fifty miles an hour; in a dive they will go two hundred and fifty or
so. Aerial acrobatics in these machines are like a morning swim, and
they have the appearance of a clipped-wing dragon fly. The life is
wonderful and healthy and full of thrills. Every flight brings a new
experience. We have flown circles around the highest peaks of the
Pyrenees and swooped over the bathers at Biarritz. We have played
hide-and-seek in the clouds and fought sham battles above them. One day
I went to an altitude of 21,500 feet and froze three finger tips; I came
down out of the sunshine through a snow storm and landed in the rain
after sunset. Such changes were never possible before this age. They are
a great strain on the system, and it is resisting that strain which is
an aviator’s real work. The rest is play and sport.
I would like to write more but must go to bed. Thank you again for your
thoughtfulness. My best wishes for a happy, prosperous New Year to the
Halbert family.
As ever, sincerely,