We have given nothing as long as we have not given everything."
M. Guynemer said no more. He felt that he had probed his son's soul to
the depths, and his pride in his hero did not diminish his sorrow. When
they parted he concealed his anguish, but he watched the boy, thinking
he would never see him again. His wife and daughters, too, stood on the
threshold oppressed by the same feelings, trying to suppress their
anxiety and finding no words to veil it.
In the Iliad, Hector, after breaking into the Greek camp like a dark
whirlwind unexpectedly sweeping the land, and which the gods alone could
stop, returns to Troy and stopping at the Scaean gates waits for
Achilles, who he knows must be wild to avenge Patroclus. Old Priam sees
his son's danger, and beseeches him not to seek his antagonist. Hecuba
joins her tears to his supplications. But tears and entreaties avail
little, and Hector, turning a deaf ear to his parents, walks out to meet
Achilles, as he thinks, but indeed to meet his own fate.
On September 4, Guynemer was at the flying field of Saint-Pol-sur-Mer
near Dunkirk.
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