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Published online by Cambridge University Press: 04 July 2016
When I was invited to deliver the Lanchester Memorial lecture, I wondered why the great honour of being the first Frenchman selected for the celebration of the deeds of a great engineer was conferred on me. However, I am well aware that the Council of the Royal Aeronautical Society cannot make a mistake and there is good reason to choose, after so greatly famed professors, an engineer of the French Navy to illustrate, using a slightly different point of view, the influence of Lanchester on the development of aeronautics. This way, I do not have to apologise for a possible inadequacy which then would not be my own responsibility. I have only to do my best, so as not to betray the confidence of the Society.
Answering so plainly this first question, I had to find out how to fulfil my task. Possibly, my contribution to the intrepretation of the vortex sheets starting from the thin leading edges of a delta wing is more in the Lanchester line of thought than it is an extension of Prandtl’s inferences.