us that our gondola was as bright as day. Yes, they even flickered across the ship itself without detecting us. Meanwhile we drew closer and closer to our goal, sliding between the shafts of light with humming propellers. For several minutes this game continued. Then one searcher picked us up and held us fast in his circle of light. Thirty white arms grasped greedily at us as if they would tear us out of the air with their eager clutches. Our slender black ship was flooded with their radiance, which it reflected in jetty sparkles from its glittering body. Instantly it began to thunder and lighten below as if all Inferno had been let loose. Hundreds of guns fired simultaneously, their flashes twinkling like fireflies in the blackness beneath. Shells whizzed past and exploded. Shrapnel flew. The ship was enveloped in a cloud of gas, smoke, and flying missiles. Hissing like poisonous serpents, whistling, howling, visible during their whole trajectory, blue-white uncanny fire-shells and rockets sang past us. Peng! Peng! bellowed the English guns in their sharp staccato, like a great pack of hounds at the heels of a stag. But we kept steadily forward into this witches' cauldron. Every man stood at his post with bated breath. The weariness, the cold, and the rarefied air had been forgotten. Our beating hearts fairly drummed against our sides. I kept my eye glued on my vertical glass, my right hand on the lever of the electric bomb-release. Gradually our target came into the field of vision until it reached the point set. I pressed the lever, and at fixed intervals, one by one, the bombs fell. A new sound now punctuated the incessant roar beneath the dull throbbing boom! boom! as our missiles struck the earth. The whole thing lasted only a minute or two, but in that brief interval was concentrated the experience of an ordinary lifetime. We steered straight ahead across the area of fire. To be or not to be was now the question. Were a single one of the countless shells that flew past us to strike our six hundred feet of unprotected body, our gas would be aflame in an instant, and our fate would be sealed. It seemed a miracle that we ever emerged from the tumult. The firing grew weaker and at length ceased. The searchlights were extinguished. Night embraced us again, and covered also the land with its opaque blanket. Only dull-red, glowing spots far behind us marked the points where our bombs had started conflagrations. It was half-past two, and from our altitude the pale glow of England's midsummer dawn was already visible. So it was high time to get back over the open sea, for once there our principal danger would be over. But our frozen compass was our undoing. Instead of steering to the east, we inadvertently headed toward the north, and before we discovered our error we had lost valuable time. Added to that, our forward motor also failed us, so that our speed was sensibly diminished. I had just returned to my station after dispatching a radiogram reporting the success of our raid, and was talking with Captain Sch, when a bright light flooded our gondola, as if another searchlight had picked us up. Assuming that we were over the sea, I imagined for an instant that it must come from an enemy war-vessel; but when I glanced up from my position, six or eight feet below the body of the ship, I saw that she was on fire. Almost instantly our six hundred feet of hydrogen were ablaze. Dancing, lambent flames licked ravenously at her quickly bared skeleton, which seemed to grin jeeringly at us from the sea of light. So it was all over. I could hardly credit it for an instant. I threw off my overcoat, and shouted to Captain Sch- to do the same, thinking that if we fell into the sea we might save ourselves by swimming. It was a silly idea, of course, for we had no chance of surviving. Captain Sch realized this. Stand ing calm and motionless, he fixed his eyes for a moment upon the flames above, staring death steadfastly in the face. Then, as if bidding me farewell, he turned and said, 'It 's all over.' After that, absolute silence reigned in the gondola. Only the roar of the flames was audible. Not a man had left his post. Everyone stood waiting for the great experience - the end. This lasted several seconds. The vessel still kept an even keel. We had time to think over our situation. The quickest death would be the best; to be burned alive was horrible. So I sprang to one of the side windows of the gondola to jump out. Just at that moment a frightful shudder shot through the burning skeleton and the ship gave a convulsion like the bound of a horse when shot. The gondola struts broke with a snap, and the skeleton collapsed with a series of crashes like the smashing of a huge window. As our gondola swung over we fell backward and somewhat away from the flames. I found myself projected into a corner with others on top of me. The gondola was now grinding against the skeleton, which had assumed a vertical position and was falling like a projectile toward the earth. Flames and gas poured over us as we lay there in a heap. It grew fearfully hot. I felt flames against my face, and heard groans. I wrapped my arms around my head to protect it from the scorching flames, hoping the end would come quickly. That was the last I remember. Our vessel fell perpendicularly, descending like a mighty column of fire through the darkness, and striking stern first. There was a tremendous concussion when we hit the earth. It must have shocked me back to consciousness for a moment, for I remember a thrill of horror as I opened my eyes and saw myself surrounded by a sea of flames and red-hot metal beams and braces that seemed about to crush me. Then I lost consciousness a second time, and did not recover until the sun was already high in the heavens. Gradually I collected my thoughts. How did I get here in these strange surroundings, on this litter? It was like a dream. I half raised myself painfully, and saw that my legs were wound in thick, bloody bandages. I could hardly move them, for they were broken. Then I made a new discovery: my head and legs were covered with burns; my hands were lacerated; when I breathed I felt as if a knife were thrust into me. I thought to myself, 'Am I dreaming or awake?' Just then a human voice interrupted my groping thoughts: 'Do you want a cigarette?' And a Tommy stuck a cigarette-case under my nose with a friendly grin. So it was no dream. I was a prisoner. I now learned what had happened. An English aviator had crept up on us unobserved and had managed to fire our ship. We fell in an open field near Ipswich. All our crew was killed except myself and two subordinate officers, one of whom died later from his wounds. The other was in one of the side gondolas, which chanced to be out of reach of the flames, and though he became unconscious for a moment he was not injured. The moment we struck ground he clambered out and ran away as if the Furies were after him; but a person must be excused for losing his head under such circum stances. I never have been able to under "THE ABODE OF PEACE" A VISIT AT TAGORE'S ACADEMY BY J. A. SPENDER THE Bengal plain spreads about me like the sea; and the sun beats on it from a cloudless sky. There are no hedges or boundaries, and the predominant earth-color is a pale brown. But there is life and cultivation everywhere. Trees abound, and a vividgreen banana-grove stands out in the distance against a dark screen of mangoes. There are large tanks in the hollows, and brown-legged peasants lift the water from level to level in iron scoops attached to bamboo hoists. Bullock carts are crossing the flat in all directions, with little parties of men, women, and children trotting in attendance. The women are swathed in white, with a rose-colored or orange scarf about their shoulders; the little children are generally as nature made them, their brown skins burnished in the sunlight. There is a perpetual chatter of birds, and the trill of the big kites breaks in on the chorus of the crows. Sixty years ago this country was infested with dacoits, and it is related that the famous Maharshi Devendranath Tagore, father of the poet, halting to meditate in a grove of chatini trees, was set upon by a gang of them, who were about to rob and kill him, when their hearts were so touched by the beauty and sanctity of his face that they not only spared him but be 1 From the Westminster Gazette (Independent Liberal daily), March 8 came his devoted disciples. Under the trees is a simple marble monument commemorating the occasion and recording the mystic's thought: He is the repose of my life; Within a hundred yards of this spot Devendranath Tagore built a large house and settled down in it with his family; and twenty-five years ago his famous son, Rabindranath, the poet and writer, founded the colony known Shantiniketan-'the Abode of Peace' on the adjoining estate. Here my wife and I had the great pleasure of spending three days with him and his as fellow workers. The colony is first of all a school for boys and girls, who are educated together. This deliberately cuts across Indian tradition and sentiment, and might be disastrous if it were not in expert hands. Here it is perfectly successful. There are separate hostels for boys and girls, the girls living in a three-storied house, the boys in the long low bungalows that are scattered about between the trees. The classrooms are mainly the open air; the children sit cross-legged in circles under the trees, the teacher at one end, with his maps or diagrams hanging from a bough. They make delightful groups, in their white tunics and colored scarves; all the faces seem eager and intelligent, and many of them are strik ingly handsome. For half an hour I sat listening to an English lesson, and was struck with the ease with which they read and their quickness in catching the accent and intonation. They seemed to be quite unembarrassed by my presence, and completely at ease with their teacher, who spoke and read English perfectly. From that I passed to a geography lesson, which, for my benefit, the teacher changed from Bengali to English, and, to all appearances, without in the least disturbing the flow of his instruction. There is a power house close by, which serves the double purpose of lighting the colony and instructing the boys in the handling of the plant; and adjoining it is a carpenter's shop, where they make most of the furniture and do the necessary repairs, under the instruction of their teachers. Across the road is the art school and library, a building of two stories, with a large open verandah above the porch. All who have the slightest aptitude are encouraged to draw, and taught to paint in water colors. There is no hardand-fast curriculum; boys and girls follow their own bent, draw any figure or object that strikes their fancy, and bring the results to be criticized by the master. They provided me with paper, paints, and brushes and sat me down to sketch, with a group of watchful critics looking over my shoulder. It was terrifying to me, but perfectly natural to them, and presently they began running back to their rooms and bringing little bundles of their own drawings for me to criticize. Some of these seemed to be extraordinarily interesting and original. One or two were copies of European models, but most followed the Indian style, figures and simple objects being drawn in sharp outline, and almost invariably fitted into a design that had been imposed on the model. Within the school the art lesson was going on to an accompaniment of music. The pupils sat cross-legged with their drawing-boards on the floor in front of them, while a lad of about eighteen, with a charming tenor voice, sang Bengali songs and accompanied himself on a richly carved zither. The music is at first a little strange to the Western ear, but that quickly wears off, and then one gets the sense of rare and fascinating rhythms that seem to be an extension of speech rather than an art apart from it. Rabindranath Tagore is as much musician as poet; he has provided the music for more than a hundred of his own songs; he sings them beautifully himself, and they are known and sung all over Bengal. Unfortunately this music is passed on without being written down, and, like the poetry, most of which is untranslated, it is unknown outside India. But one hears it everywhere at Shantiniketan, for in this place everyone sings, and music is literally one of the foundations of education. The day opens with song and ends with song. Morning and evening little parties of boys and girls take it in turn to walk up and down the beautiful avenue of sal trees singing the morning and evening hymns. One of the evening hymns has, fortunately, been translated by Mr. Edward Thompson, and if the reader will think of it as sung to an Indian melody in the twilight under the trees he will catch a little of the atmosphere that the poet has woven about this place: |