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(Continued from page 249)

Then there might come legal damages caused by the shutting off of "light, air and access" to property. We have had similar cases in reference to the elevated structure, and in some of them heavy awards have been made. 

Proped condemnation proceedings constitute the mode of procedure whenever injury is done to property bordering on highways over which that stations are built. There would also be problems of fire control in this connection. Hydroaeroplanes used commercially (as well as pleasure craft) would be compelled to co-ordinate in obeying port regulations. Damage in connection with the operation of airplanes at the stations would simply fall within the negligence cases we already have. 

I can't conceive of local aerial transportation——transportation for instance, which will take the commuter from Forty-second Street, New York, to his residence in Jersey City——at this time. Inter-city transportation, however, carrying passengers long distances, will be with us commercially before we realize it.

There undoubtedly will be a conflict of municipal ordinances, but this will not be consequential. For the aviator can obey one set in Chicago and another set when he has brought his passengers within New York territory. The Inter-State Commerce Commission will have the right to fix rates on such a line. There will also be municipal and State regulations of aircraft. 

In crossing a man's land, a railroad has to acquire a right of way. Whether a corporation engaged in aerial traffic can send machines over a man's land without his consent is a question which gives rise to interesting speculation. It will not be considered here. But it is of importance, for the time is near when we shall have a regularly organized system of air lines——branches, trunk lines and network. 

Consideration of aerial collision brings us to the point where we jump from the automobile to the vessel in seeking something in law which we can apply adequately to flying machines. There will be damage suits arising from such accidents, but it seems to me that, with the superior mobility of aircraft and the almost unlimited space which they enjoy, personal or property injuries should be rarer from this cause than is the case with steamships.

Where airplanes converge for landing places, the chance of collision is obviously greater. Also, in places like New York City the development of local air traffic would increase risks. In such a contingency the hazard would be much greater than that involved when ships came into port, for the airplane cannot slow down to the extent of which a ship is capable. In instances of this sort the law already established could be applied with very slight modification. 

When airplanes have their transcontinental lines and systems, and unite to form trusts, they will perhaps bring down on themselves the same sort of intensive and hostile legislation that has been directed toward other monopolies. But this possibility lies beyond our present vision. Possibly, by the time it is a reality our legislative tendency will be to encourage co-ordination on a large scale and to content ourselves with preventing extortion and other abuses by vigilant regulation. 

In conclusion, I may reiterate that the law is merely "codified common sense;" that it never has stood in the way of discovery or progress, that it will not place subordinate rights over the general good and that it will not cast prohibitions or too righteous restrictions about the development of an industry and an aerial commerce which every day are making us rub our eyes to reassure ourselves that what we see actually is true. 

For my own part, I welcome cordially every stage of progress in an evolution which is at once sportsmanlike, practical, serviceable and spectacular. Many times have I seen mountain sheep high above me and wished that I might have an airplane that would obviate for me a five-mile climb. Indeed, I like to profess my open sympathy with the great outdoors, which is peculiarly the dominion of the airplane——one of our nearest approaches to free nature. 

LET WOMEN FLY

(Continued from page 250)

I was disappointed because he would make no exception in this case of the air service, but I was not discouraged. Personally, I felt that it was a question of training and experience, rather than sex, and that the world was at its old game of developing, speeding up and training its man power, while disregarding, passing over and wasting its woman power.

There is a world-old controversy that crops up again whenever women attempt to enter a new field: Is woman fitted for this or that work? It would seem that a woman's success in any particular line would prove her fitness for that work, without regard to theories to the contrary. Women have demonstrated their ability to fly by doing it, by performing stunts and accomplishing difficult feats in the air. They have the alertness, the verve and the endurance necessary to make good aviators. They do not lack courage, and they respect authority, so that they execute commands carefully, efficiently and with precision. 

WOMEN have flown; women have thrown bombs and fired guns——yes, even cannon! Then who can say that women cannot fly and fight? It is true, men do not like to think of women as fighters, but that is no proof that there are no women who are fitted to fight.

Might not a modern Polly Pitcher fly over a German town in a reprisal raid? Or a twentieth century Joan of Arc command a submarine? Or a present-day Boadicea bag a German in No Man's Land? Or a death-dealing Valkyr drive a tank crashing across tranches and villages? What of those brave and eager women warriors, the Legion of Death, who strove to re-animate the courage of the Russian host? And that was trench-warfare——the most terrible kind of conflict known——that they were waging! Though no one appears to question either their bravery or their endurance, not one of the warring nations has seemed any more disposed to test the ability of its women as fighters. 

 But trench warfare is another story. I feel sure that the time will come when women will be welcomed in the air service, just as the time came when they were permitted to enter business and the professions. Now that woman is turning her hand to everything and taking over so many kinds of "man's work," it seems strange indeed that the air should be closed to her.

To-day women are building the airplanes that the men are flying. Is it too much to hope and to believe that a to-morrow will come when the women will fly as skillfully as they now build?