character and the quality of the airmen. They were
youths from nineteen to twenty-three or twenty-four.
They were drawn largely from the great public schools
of England. They gave an impression not only of
extraordinary physical fitness, but of detachment from
ordinary human affairs. They seemed of a superior
breed who had come from some greater race; they
stood there detached and remote.

The airmen of the belligerents have retained the
older professional ideas of chivalry. On the way back
to London the compartment I was in was filled with
the wives of workingmen whom interest or curiosity
had brought to the funeral. They spoke of experi-
ences of their neighbors or friends with the Zeppelins.
They were indignant at the woman who had thrown
an egg. They said the members of the Zeppelin crew
had only obeyed the orders of their Government. Then
they talked of their poor mothers and wives in Ger-
many. They discussed the ethics of Zeppelin raids.
Some thought they were legal and proper, while others
thought they were illegal. One woman, evidently of
a higher class, stated that it was quite right so long as
only property was destroyed, but if civilians were
killed, it was illegal. She herself had suffered the loss
of a house, but she felt that the Germans were within
their rights in destroying it.

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