of the angle of the planes upon the Venetian-blind principle.  I took a shot-gun with me and a dozen cartridges filled with buck-shot.  You should have seen the face of Perkins, my old mechanic, when I directed him to put them in.  I was dressed like an Arctic explorer, with two jerseys under my overalls, thick socks inside my padded boots, a storm-cap with flaps, and my talc goggles.  It was stifling outside the hangars, but I was going for the summit of the Himalayas, and had to dress for the part.  Perkins knew there was something on and implored me to take him with me.  Perhaps I should if I were using the biplane, but a monoplane is a one-man show—­if you want to get the last foot of life out of it.  Of course, I took an oxygen bag; the man who goes for the altitude record without one will either be frozen or smothered—­or both.

“I had a good look at the planes, the rudder-bar, and the elevating lever before I got in.  Everything was in order so far as I could see.  Then I switched on my engine and found that she was running sweetly.  When they let her go she rose almost at once upon the lowest speed.  I circled my home field once or twice just to warm her up, and then with a wave to Perkins and the others, I flattened out my planes and put her on her highest.  She skimmed like a swallow down wind for eight or ten miles until I turned her nose up a little and she began to climb in a great spiral for the cloud-bank above me.  It’s all-important to rise slowly and adapt yourself to the pressure as you go.

“It was a close, warm day for an English September, and there was the hush and heaviness of impending rain.  Now and then there came sudden puffs of wind from the south-west—­one of them so gusty and unexpected that it caught me napping and turned me half-round for an instant.  I remember the time when gusts and whirls and air-pockets used to be things of danger—­before we learned to put an overmastering power into our engines.  Just as I reached the cloud-banks, with the altimeter marking three thousand, down came the rain.  My word, how it poured!  It drummed upon my wings and lashed against my face, blurring my glasses so that I could hardly see.  I got down on to a low speed, for it was painful to travel against it.  As I got higher it became hail, and I had to turn tail to it.  One of my cylinders was out of action—­a dirty plug, I should imagine, but still I was rising steadily with plenty of power.  After a bit the trouble passed, whatever it was, and I heard the full, deep-throated purr—­the ten singing as one.  That’s where the beauty of our modern silencers comes in.  We can at last control our engines by ear.  How they squeal and squeak and sob when they are in trouble!  All those cries for help were wasted in the old days, when every sound was swallowed up by the monstrous racket of the machine.  If only the early aviators could come back to see the beauty and perfection of the mechanism which have been bought at the cost of their lives!