14000 Miles Through The Air - 1922 Author:Ross Smith Purchase of this book includes free trial access to www.million-books.com where you can read more than a million books for free. This is an OCR edition with typos. Excerpt from book: CHAPTER II THROUGH CLOUD OCEAN TO LYONS WE climbed slowly upward through the cheerless, mist-laden skies, our engines well throttled back and running perfectl... more »y. So as to make sure that all was in thorough working order, we circled for ten minutes above Hounslow, then set on3. At 2,000 feet we suddenly emerged from the fog belt into brilliant sunshine, but the world below was lost to sight, screened by the dense pall of mist. Accordingly, we set a compass course for Folkestone, and just before reaching the outskirts a rift in the mists enabled us to pick up the grand old coast-line, every inch of which is measured by history; and so we checked our bearings. There was a certain amount of sentiment, mingled with regrets, in leaving old England, the land of our fathers. Stormy seas were sweeping up channel, lashing white foam against the gaunt, gray cliffs that peered through the mists in the winter light, phantom-like and unreal. The frigid breath of winter stung our faces andchilled us through; its garb of white had fallen across the land, making the prospect inexpressibly drear. The roadways, etched in dark relief, stood out like pencil-lines on the snow-clad landscape, all converging on Folkestone. I looked over the side as the town itself, which had played such an important part in the war, came under us. Thither the legions of the Empire, in ceaseless tides, had passed to and from the grim red fields of East and West, all acclaiming thy might, great land of our fathers ! It seemed hard to realize that we had at last started out on the long flight for which we had been planning and working so long, and as I glanced over the machine and the instruments, I wondered what the issue of it all might be—if the fates would be so kind as to smile on us ever so little and...« less