Utility and Kgonomy of Birds 
brought wanted news then; so do the 
CARRIER PIGEONS of the war zone bring 
their messages now’’ (New York American, 
28.iv.18). A recruiting message from Lady 
Reading was carried in May 1918 from 
Washington by three CARRIER PIGEONS to 
New York, where it was read at a mass 
meeting under the auspices of the British 
and Canadian Recruiting Committee (The 
Times, 30.v.18). In the pageant of the 
Lord Mayor’s Show of 1918 a travelling 
pigeon-loft took part in the procession to 
remind the public of the splendid achieve- 
ments performed by members of the Carrier 
Pigeon Service, which has been not inaptly 
dubbed the ‘First Flying Corps” (Bird 
Notes and News, vol. vill. p. 25). Before 
April 1919 the demobilisation of the PIGEONS 
and their attendants in France had taken 
place with the exception of birds and men 
selected for the Army of Occupation. Some 
g,000 to 10,000 birds that had served their 
country well had to be disposed of. They 
would have been a drug on the English 
market if they had been sent home and the 
20 
