Birds as Messengers 



of wild birds in the night, of a coming attack 

 of poisonous gas. Before the smell of the 

 fumes could be perceived in the trenches, the 

 soldiers were awakened to their danger by 

 the noise of birds which had detected the first 

 fumes of the vile infection (Bird Notes and 

 News, vol. vi. p. 102). CANARIES and other 

 cage birds were extensively used by both 

 our own and the German miners at the front, 

 when tunnelling, to detect the presence of 

 subterranean gas (Daily Mail, 2g.v.i8). A 

 soldier, writing of his company's CANARY, 

 says : " Many were the nights on which he 

 was rudely disturbed from his slumbers, 

 dumped unceremoniously into a sandbag, 

 and carried through rain and snow up to the 

 trenches. Here he would do his job under- 

 ground, and as often as not reach the surface 

 again a limp little form lying at the bottom 

 of his cage; he never failed us, though " 

 (Bird Notes and News, vol. viii. p. 26). In 

 many cases the CANARIES, issued as tests for 

 the presence of poisonous gas, were made 

 pets of by our soldiers and placed by them 

 fn the safest places (Daily Mail, lo.i 



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