REMARKABLE.

Feilding Star, Volume XII, Issue 2858, 1 February 1916, Page 2

REMARKABLE.

WOMAN WITHOUT NERVES

THE DEATH OF MISS TK«B-

HAWKE DA VIES,

In a. cable message from London a few days ago the death was reported of Miss Trebjawke Dnvies, a,via<tor.

Vivacious and venituresome as ever, Miss Treha/wke Dalies left London for Paris to buy another monoplane (stated a> London paper not long a.go). Her startling escape has already been recorded—how, when flying near L lie, the machine swooped down to e-arth, and she and her pilot (Mr J. D. Astlcy) gazed '•■with surprise above the wreckage.of the machine, each wondering that the other was alive. "Hut, .is 1 always say to airmenj" remarks Miss Da-vies, "those who ar© born to be 'hainged will never he killed in an, -aeroplane accident. If my machine had mot come to such a horrid, smash I should he flying in it. again, to-day. No tiling heats ilyiaig. It is the ohaaiipagne of .motion-. I do not thijik I shall over tire of it. "How did 1 come to take <to the p-risstirne? By-accident. A friend persuaded 'mo to go and.see the start of the Dfl.il,v Mail, race- for the circuit of Great Britain. Tihait was the first t.imo I had seeji an acrophuie. I liked the look of ,it. j. induced Mi , Graliaimo White to give me a passenger ilight, and 1 have been, ilying ever since—with intervals of illness, for which the flying was not responsible, it is the niosb exhilarating delight in the world, even better than being thrown, out of a racing motor car, which -also 1 have experienced. "There is, I believe, only one woman who has flown, more than 1 have. 1 intend to break her record. Not as a pilot,- no; just as a passenger and observer. I am appallingly ignorant aibout engineering aaid its mathematics. I just fly because I like it. "You ask me if the smash at Lille smashed my nerves. My only reply is that 1 am not conscious of tiie pospessiou- of nerves. All 1-know is I love Hying. . I have h«d more aikrmiug experiences than the tumble at Lille, though the troubles, happening in the air and not on 11)$, "ground,, were unnoticed, i try to analyse myfeelings. 1 have had u.uailm,s abo.ut the .safety of my pilot. I have had qualms aibout the safety of xuy innchine. 1 have, honestly, never had. ii.ny -about the safety of myself. Thiswish alone has "flashed through my mind in a- moment of da.uge)': If tin:end is to come. Jet it come at once* and not after a week iji hospital. "My conviction is that it will not come by means of a-n aeroplane. And? Hying is so very, very jolly! "P-loase express my extreme attain--a-tio-n for the coolness a\nd skifl of Mr Astley duri,ng the perilous niomeiit tut Lille. And 1 will teJt a- story. As a souvenir lie took one part of the broken propeller and J tho othea , . "When we arrived at Charing Cross we had the broken fragments in our arms. 'Been breaking up the 'appy 'omer" -asked a porter." The fascination of danger while rocked i,u vii aeroplane in a furious wind was described not long ago by M j-ss Trelunvko Davies, \vho mis M-iih ifr G'lxsfav Ham el in her 70-h.p. Bleliot l.andem moJioplane in a fiO-mile ; \s iud.

"Every moment was a- fhriJ)./' utio said. "We were up three minutes, and Mr Hainel was lighting for our lives all the time. Once ho was jerked violently nut of his ,sea-t, but lie recovered marvellously. There wa,s diimgor in every motion of tli<* machine. We toswd and fell, and wero shaken almost breatliless. It was glonioiLsly exciting. You never knew what was going lo happen next. Tho most exciting time, f ever experienced was in. flying with the lateMr As Hey ovor Germany, Hqlland. and Belgium, when I watched one ol tlii' wires getting .slack and was tina.ble to <lo a.nything— even wa.ni " ll ' , pilot. 1 once wrot<? iti the dairy 4 keep while (lying: 'This i.s our lait momeii.l, alive in the air: it will be our first moment dead on hhe ground.' "T hope- when death does come J. shall fall several thousand feet- and be killed inLsta>ntly, rather than drop from ■«■ short height and stand the cliance of being Ijorribly maimed and yet still alive. I won't wear a lifebelt or a, helmet, because 1 like lo fee! Tree to fling myself clear of the <'ii~ gine when the crash conies."