Men, Women and Guns by H.C. McNeile

However, to be serious. It was as he came away from this scene of alarm and despondency that Jim met an old pal who boasted the gunner badge, and whom conversation revealed as the proud owner of an Archie, or anti-aircraft gun. And as the salient is perhaps more fruitful in aeroplanes than any other part of the line, and the time approached five o'clock (which is generally the hour of their afternoon activity), Jim went to see the fun.

In front, an observing biplane buzzed slowly to and fro, watching the effect of a mother[1] shooting at some mark behind the German lines. With the gun concealed in the trees, a gunner subaltern altered his range and direction as each curt wireless message flashed from the 'plane. "Lengthen 200 -- half a degree left. " And so on till they got it. Occasionally, with a vicious crack, a German anti-aircraft shell would explode in the air above in a futile endeavour to reach the observer, and a great mass of acrid yellow or black fumes would disperse slowly. Various machines, each intent on its own job, rushed to and fro, and in the distance, like a speck in the sky, a German monoplane was travelling rapidly back over its own lines, having finished its reconnaissance.