December 28, 1917 
LAND & WATER 
li 
or otJicr debris likely to interfere with the later routine cultiva- 
tion. For the sake of strength and " balance," it would best 
be made triangular in form, and built to tow from the apex 
by a fifteen or twenty-foot cable .running to its tank. This, 
or even a greater length of cable, would be necessary to insure 
that both tank and harrow should not be in difficulties in the 
same hole at once. .The teeth (made of two-inch steel 
bars) would be set at wide intervals— certainly not less than 
six inches apart — ^and provided (either by rows or individually) 
with levers that would slope them back in disentangling any 
debris raked up/. A ging of two or three men would be 
ample to work the harrow, but it would probably be found 
necessary to follow it with a tender and a gang of scavengers 
to dispose of the stuff it clawed up. It might be found 
practicable to fi.x a scraper on the rear end of the harrow, 
which would help in pushing down hummocks and filling 
hollows. 
The size of an implement of this kind would have to be 
worked out after determining the resistance it offered with its 
teeth set at full length. It would also, of course, vary with 
the power of its towing tank. The amount of open work 
in its frame should make it more or less impervious to serious 
injury- fronf explosions, but if it were found that these were 
going "to be frequent^ — ^whicli is highly improbable — It would 
doubtless prove advisable for its men to follow on foot or 
I ride on the tank. ' 
The effect of an implement of this kind — especially if 
equipped with the* scraper — going over even the roughest 
area would be to reduce the largest shell-craters to rounded 
depressions, as well as to break down and largely to fill in 
even the deepest and widest trenches. One more " tank 
operation," however, would probably be required to smooth 
the ground sufficient for ordinan,' cultivation. This might 
take the form of towing a string of heavy tractor ploughs over 
the harrowed section. A series of foot-deep, eighteen- 
inches-wide furrows should come pretty near to disposing of 
any irregularities prominent enough to interfere with the 
operation of tractor or horse-dra'w^n implements. If, how- 
ever, there was still too much of a " ditch " where some of the 
trenches had been, this could be reduced by running the 
tank up one side and down the other, with its following ploughs 
throwing earth into the depression both ways. (I have often 
closed up storm-water " washes " On my California ranch by 
using a " caterpillar " tractor in a similar way). After that 
the roughest stretch of " crater land " should be in shape for 
the French peasant to resume business as usual. 
" Hot Air " 
T ' 
By Centurion 
FT her go ! " said the Lieutenant. 
She went. At one moment I had been looking 
into the faces of the men around the car ; at the 
next I was looking down upon their heads and could 
study the i>arting of their hair— they had Wieir caps off and 
were in their shirt-sleeves. Only a drag-rope now anchored 
us to earth and that rope was very taut ; the balloon seemed 
to have suddenly developed a personality of her own and 
was obviously impatient to be off. I suddenly felt extra- 
ordinarily volatile ; there seemed to be nothing under my 
feet and nothing there was except some basket-work barely 
an inch thick. I felt that I was made of india-rubber, and 
that I might bounce at anv moment — ^which is a nasty sensa- 
tion, for it makes you feel a wild desire to bounce over the 
side of the car and sec what will happen to you. The Lieu 
tenant cast off the rope. We rose with amazing rapidity ; 
the earth rushed awav from us ; the white faces of the crowd 
lookmg up at us behind the fence lost all their individual 
features ; the ecstatic shouts of tlie children died away. 
I suddenly felt very queer. 
Xo! r didn't like this. I didn't like it at all. I have 
proceeded" — in the Army you never " go " anywhere be- 
cause that might imply you came to rest somewhere, and there 
IS no rest in the British Army— to some objective or other in 
nearly every form of transport kno\sn to the two Services, 
and of all of them I liked this bcastlv toy the least. I have 
flown in a Maurice Farman in a 30-niiIe gale at six thousand 
feet and felt nothing but a surprising absence 9I feeling— 
except wlien the " bus " " bumped," or when she began to 
volplane down, and I felt as if I were descending a gigantic 
staircase with a rather long leap frorn one stair to the next 
and no banisters to hang on to. I have helped to steer a 
tank, looking after the brakes whUe the tank commander 
performed like an organist with his hands and feet, peering 
through the visor as though he were reading a piece of music, 
and have reflected that this too was very unsensational e.xcept 
at the moment when we came to a crater and our great 
leviathan paused irresolutely on the edge, as though she were 
afraid of it, until she made up her mind to it, after which 
all you feel is that it's uncommonly like flying with an occa- 
sional " bump." I have looked on in a submarine while it 
submerged in the disciplinary silence that is the rule on those 
occasions, and have stood by the coxswain as he worked the 
plane-controls and wondered, as I watched the tell-tale bubble 
and the pointer of the depth-gauge, why the submarine didn't 
make a little more fuss about it. A hunt for a submarine in 
a naval drifter when the wind began to freshen-- yes ! 
this was— this was uncommonly like tliat. It was distinctly 
sensational. There was the same feeling in the pit of my 
stomach. Was I going to ? I looked over the .side of 
the car. Xo, it would be too disgraceful. Another outrage 
upon an inoffensive civilian population. 
I looked up through the ring into the open neck of the 
baUoon and saw to the very top of the yellow interior— it 
seemed uncommonly empty ; I studied the "diagonals of rope- 
netting— the ropes seemed rcmnrkablv thin; I looked at the 
clothes-basket m which I an d the other three stood— it was 
» Stories by •■ Centurion " appear exclusively in Land & Water- 
( opynght in the United States ot America. 1917. 
desperately small. I looked over the side, which reached no 
higher than my waist, and hastily withdrew my gaze. I looked 
at the coil of rope and the bags of sand at oflrfeet and thought 
I had better sit down. I looked at my three companions and 
I thought I had better not. For all three of them were 
sitting nonchalantly on the edge of the basket like performing 
monkeys on a trapeze, their arms embracing the stays over- 
head ; one of them was swinging a long leg over the side. 
It's — it's — a fine day," 1 remarked, desperately. 
" You'll feel better in a moment," said the Lieutenant 
pointedly. " It's the gas, you know. It always affects one 
a bit at first." 
" I rather like gas," I said, insincerely. " But I don't 
like it quite so fresh from the meter." 
" There's the river ! " said the Lieutenant, whom I will call 
the pilot, for such he was. The other two, each wearing a 
single " pip " on their sVeves, were " learning the ropes ' — 
more particularly tht valv^ rope. 
I began to sit up ana ta'c.' notice. I looked over the side. 
I saw quadrangles, poKgons, circles, also buildings leaning 
back at various angles much as a house appears in a badly 
focusscd photograph. 
" Wliat a city to bomb ! " I said involuntarily. 
Yes, isn't it ? " said the Lieutenant. " One always feels 
like that at first." So this was sensation Number Two. 
" We did bomb her the other day," he resumed, " with 
sandbags. We'd got over Battersea and found ourselves 
suddenly coming down and likely to get a cold tub in the 
river. "So I said ' Poop off some ballast ' to a fellow who was 
learning the ropes. And before I knew what he was doing 
the silly fool had thrown out half a dozen bags — bo(Uly. 
Of course, you should always shake out the contents slowly 
— Uke a sower going forth to sow. (They landed like bombs 
bang on the skylight of a factory or workshop or something 
of the kind. I saw them go through. As we rose, I saw a 
crowd of people rushing out into the street like ants when 
you've kicked over an ant-heap. They must have thought 
it was a raid — broad daylight too. The last I saw of them 
was a fat man shaking his fist at us." 
We rose to about 800 feet and, as we ascended, the several 
noises of London were merged into one diapason hum, but out 
of it certain individual sounds retained their identity. They 
were cab-whistles. The whole city seemed alive with them, 
and one could hear each and every one., 
" The %yhistling for a cab, the barking of a dog, the crowing 
of a cock," said the pilot in a literarj' style faintly reminiscent 
of the Book of Proverbs, " these are the last sounds one 
ceases to hear." 
As we travelled over the North of London a dark mist 
blotted out the great city, but the white trail of smoke from 
railway-engines showed through it clearly like streaks of cotton 
wool. It was raining below. The houses were invisible, but 
railway-tracks gleamed through the mist witli a curious effect 
as though we were gazing at their reflection in water. My 
destructive mood returned ; I felt that at that moment "I 
longed of all things to drop a bomb on that railway track. 
Which suggests that there's something very impersonal about 
bombing a city. I think of all lethal enterprises aerial bomb- 
ing must be the least demoralising to the character. Yan 
