CHAPTER IV
WAR CALLS GAY-NECK
y the first week of August, just after the children were born, Hira and Gay-Neck had gone from Calcutta to Bombay, setting sail with Ghond to serve in the world-war. I sent that bachelor bird Hira with Gay-Neck because the army had need of both.
I was very glad that Gay-Neck had some knowledge of his little ones before he sailed for the battle-field of Flanders and France. The chief reason of this happiness was because I knew that a pigeon whose wife and new-born children are waiting at home rarely fails to return. That bond of love between Gay-Neck and his family assured me that he would do his work of carrying messages very well. No sound of gun-fire, nor bullets, as long as he lived, could keep him from returning home at the end.
But here one may raise the question that home was in Calcutta and the war was thousands of miles away. That is true. But all the same, because he had left his wife and children at home, he would do his utmost to fly back to his temporary nest with Ghond.
It is said that Gay-Neck carried several important messages between the front and general headquarters where the Commander-in-chief and Ghond waited for him. Of course Gay-Neck was attached to Ghond first. But in the course of the following months he became very fond of the Chief.
Ghond and not I went to the front with the two pigeons for I was under age and ineligible for any kind of service, so the old fellow had to take them. During the voyage out from India to Marseilles, Hira and Gay-Neck and the old hunter became fast friends. I have yet to see any strange animal resist Ghond's friendship long, and since my pigeons had known him before, it was easy for them to respond to him.
During the stay of the Indian Army in Flanders from September 1914 till the following spring, Ghond remained near General Headquarters with his cage, while Hira or Gay-Neck was taken by different units to the front. There from time to time messages were written on thin paper weighing no more than an ounce and were tied to his feet; then he was released. He, Gay-Neck, invariably flew to Ghond at the general headquarters of the Army. There the message was deciphered and answered by the Commander-in-Chief himself. It is rumoured that the latter personage loved Gay-Neck and valued his services highly.