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But even then other conditions are likely to arise, such as air-currents, which may swing the missile to one side of the objective. Consequently adequate allowance has to be made for windage, which is a very difficult factor to calculate from aloft. Bomb-dropping from an aeroplane is even more difficult.
Employing to the full the old adage that there is nothing new under the sun, they have "discovered" in the Vedas and other Hindu sacred texts "irrefutable" evidence that the ancient Hindu sages anticipated all our modern ideas, including such up-to-date matters as bomb-dropping aeroplanes and the League of Nations. All this rhapsodical laudation of the past will, in the long run, prove futile.
The property damage, however, was slight and the effectiveness of bomb-dropping as a means of destroying a city or fortifications remained to be proved to the military mind. It was noted that a large proportion of the bombs dropped by German aviators failed to explode. Stories of heroism displayed by aviators on both sides of the great conflict have abounded.
Those who on account of the bombs that fell from the German aeroplanes into Paris left that city had no such excuse. The chance of any one person being hit by a bomb was one in several millions. But even with such generous odds in their favor, during the days the bomb-dropping lasted many thousands fled. They were obsessed by that one chance against them.
Josiah Bagby, Jr., son of the eccentric doctor at whose school Carl had learned to fly, was experimenting with hydroaeroplanes and with bomb-dropping devices at Palm Beach, and imploring Carl, as the steadiest pilot in America, to join him. The dully noiseless room echoed the music of a steady motor carrying him out over a blue bay. Carl's own answer to the tempter vision was: "Rats!
This did not in itself affect us very much, but a bomb-dropping aeronaut during the raid observed large bodies of troops massing near Meurchin, a large town behind Hulluch. Immediately the old alarm about a coming attack was renewed, and we once more were ordered to be in readiness. However, by evening as nothing had happened, we resumed normal conditions.
The difficulty of aiming has been demonstrated upon several occasions at aviation meetings and other similar gatherings. Monsieur Michelin, who has done so much for aviation in France, offered a prize of L1,00 $5,000 in 1912 for bomb-dropping from an aeroplane.
Towing torpedoes or high explosive charges behind moving vessels has been developed by the Italian Navy, but the chances of hitting a submersible with such devices are not very great. Bomb-dropping from aëroplanes can be practiced successfully under exceptional conditions only.
Then they practise bomb-dropping, too, and they are always on the alert for a possible Zeppelin raid on Paris. The other night a wireless message reached the Eiffel Tower from the frontier that one had started. It was midnight, and instantly the alarm was given at Buc. The airmen sleep in the hangars there, and in five minutes they had their machines wheeled out.
Cameras were fitted on practically every machine; equipment included accurate compasses and pressure petrol gauges, speed and height recording instruments, bomb-dropping fittings and sectional radiators which facilitated repairs and gave maximum engine efficiency in spite of variations of temperature. As counter to these, the Allied pilots had resource amounting to impudence.
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