Birds as Messengers 
back-handed: compliment: ‘“‘ Field Battery 
No. 36. Our telephone is out of order. 
Send us at once reinforcements. These ac- 
cursed Englishmen keep us busy. Muller, 
1st Lieutenant ’’ (Daily Mail, 5.iv.16). By 
observation plus instinct most of our birds 
rapidly learned their route from the trenches ; 
though shy at first, the PIGEONS got “‘ wise’”’ 
to shell fire and old birds made away 
from the dug-outs with knowing swiftness. 
PIGEONS proved hardy and recovered from 
exposure to gas. They were rarely shot dead 
while flying, and birds with shrapnel in the 
breast or with broken beaks gamely tried 
to carry their missives home. In the action 
which was fought in the region of the Menin 
Road on October 3rd, 1917, a PIGEON, No. 
2,709, was despatched with a message from 
the front line to divisional headquarters at 
1.30 p.m. During its passage it was struck 
by a German bullet which broke one of its 
legs, denuding the bone (the tibia) of all 
flesh, and drove the metal cylinder contain- 
ing the message into the side of its body, 
the bullet passing out of its back, In spite 
G 17 
