Page:My Airships.djvu/74

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MY AIRSHIPS


Then when the time comes to land there is the true explorer's zest of coming on unknown eoples like a god from a machine. "What country is this?" Will the answer come in German, Russian, or Norwegian? Paris Aéro Club members have been shot at when crossing European frontiers. Others, landing, have been taken prisoners to the burgomeister or the military governor, to languish as spies while the telegraph clicked to the far-off capital, and then to end the evening over champagne at an officers' enthusiastic mess. Still others have had to strive with the dangerous ignorance and superstition even of some remote little peasant population. These are the chances of the winds.

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