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Would Guynemer's friends now have to add: Captain Guynemer, 53? Nobody dared to do so, yet nobody now dared hope.
When the death of Guynemer had to be admitted, there was deep mourning, from Paris to the remote villages where news travels slowly, but is long pondered upon. Guynemer had been brought down from a height of 700 meters, northeast of Poelkapelle cemetery, in the Ypres sector. A German noncommissioned officer and two soldiers had immediately gone to where the machine was lying.
"In the brief moment during which dying men see, as in a vision, the whole past and the whole future, if Guynemer knew a comfort it was the certainty that his comrades would successfully complete what he had begun.
He wanted his quarry, and he wanted to set an example to and galvanize his men, and even the infantry. So, Deullin being absent, Guynemer borrowed his machine, and at last discovered a chain of German flyers, whom he attacked regardless of their number.
Lutetia, represented in this picture by Genevieve, is not anxious; yet she listens as if she might hear once more the threatening approach of Attila. It is because she knows that the barbarians may come back again, and can only be stopped by invincible faith. As long as France keeps her belief, she is secure. The life and death of a Guynemer are an act of faith in immortal France.
A long and minutiose training goes to the making of a good pilot. But the impatient Guynemer had patience for everything, and the self-willed Stanislas student became the hardest working of apprentices. His scientific knowledge furnished him with a method, and after his first long flights his progress was very rapid. But he wanted to master all the principles of aviation.
For a Guynemer is like the nation's flag: if the soldiers' eyes miss the waving colors, they may wander to the wretchedness of daily routine, and morbidly feed on blood and death. This is what the loss of a Guynemer might mean. But can a Guynemer be quite lost? Visited the Storks Escadrille. The flying field occupies a vast space, for it is common to the French and the British.
While in hospital, Guynemer had heard of these tremendous encounters, and wondered if the enchanting cruises he used to make by himself or with just one companion must be things of the past. Was he to be involved in the new tactics and to become a mere unit in a group, or a chief with the responsibility of collective maneuvers?
These letters roused the enthusiasm of the Chamber, and the following resolution was passed by acclamation: The government shall have an inscription placed in the Panthéon to perpetuate the memory of Captain Guynemer, the symbol of France's highest aspirations.
Artillery officers escorted them off, sentinels saluted them, a colonel offered them champagne. Guerder was taken first into the commanding officer's post, and on being questioned about the maneuver that won the victory excused himself with modesty: "That was the pilot's affair." Guynemer, who had stolen in, was willing to talk. "Who is this?" asked the colonel. "That's the pilot." "You?
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