AEROPLANING.

Wairarapa Age, Volume XXXII, Issue 10035, 8 July 1910, Page 3

AEROPLANING.

THE SECOND PRIZE OF £IO,OOO. The annoiincment that The Daily Mail will give a second £IO,OOO for the encouragement of aviation has brought a number of requests th'at this amount should be reserved for British aviators. Those, however, says the Editor, who urge such a course are, we venture to think, taking a very superficial view. Where is the national gain should an Englishman win the £IO,OOO, if a Frenchman is able to design a better machine and to handle it with greater skill? We do not want our countrymen to be content with anything but the best. We want them to be the very first. ||We wish to have British aviators who can challenge competition with any of their neighbours, and British flying machines superior to those of France. For this reason the contest or contests for the £IO,OOO will be open to all the world There will be no restrictions or reservations. Nothing would give us deeper'satisfaction than to see a British'citizen carry oft ' the prtee, but it must be ';in free competition with the best "flying men" of the world. Nor is%thatffideal hopeless. Four'years ago our country{.was £far behind its rivals in airmanship. The potentialities 'of aviation were not

understood. As a result of the great, competition for the Daily Mail's first £IO.OOO there has [already been a welcome awakening. Englishman in all directions are learning to fly. In Mr Grahame-White.Great Britain has a flying man who only lacks experience. And there are others who are preparing to follow his daring lead. The nation is no longer neglecting, as it did, thej problem of holding its own in the air. That, after all, means that very much has been accomplished, perhaps, wesmay be pardoned for 1 hoping that when the next £IO,OOO is"awarded to the victor a British£aviatorJwill prove bis mettle by arriving firßt at the winning post. As a nation we must remember that if ever the day of trial comes it will avail us nothing to be the "second best."