Turks, flying low, came over and heavily bombed the place he had just left!
Of course the kerosene tins had been almost as useful as a heliograph, and
who would dream of looking for such a thing at the top of tree?

Another accident led to the discovery of a much more elaborate means of
sending information.

One night a trooper of the Light Horse was returning to his bivouac from a
visit to a friend in another squadron. Standing by a little mound was a
figure which he took to be the sentry, which gentleman he was rather
anxious to avoid, the hour being somewhat late. To his astonishment the
figure suddenly disappeared into thin air; the trooper rubbed his eyes and
advanced cautiously towards the spot: not a trace. He was just beginning
sorrowfully to think of the quantity of liquor he had consumed that
evening, and to ask himself: "Do I sleep, do I dream, or is wisions about?"
when he was challenged lustily from behind by the real sentry.

When he had sufficiently recovered from the shock the trooper described
what he had seen to the sentry, who urged him to go to bed and he would
probably be better in the morning. However, the trooper persisted in his
tale, and finally the sentry promised to keep a sharp look-out on the place
and to warn his relief to do the same. The next day the trooper, his
conviction still unshaken, collected a few friends and together they dug
round the mysterious spot. They found an underground chamber with telephone
apparatus complete, which was found to be connected with the Turkish
defences at Gaza! The trap-door leading down to it was hidden under sods of
earth indistinguishable from the surrounding soil and the place was
ingeniously ventilated by a pipe through the stump of a tree close by. The
two occupants had rations enough for a siege; only they knew how long they
had been installed and how much information they had gathered. The sublime
effrontery of the thing! It might have gone on for ever had not one of the
prisoners crawled out for a breather at the precise moment when the
convivial trooper was returning to home and friends.

After this episode there was a long and rigorous hunt for spies and several
more were captured, most of them carrying on very innocent-looking
pursuits. What made the risk of detection less for these people was the
British policy, in the main a sound one, of non-interference up to a
certain point with the natives of the country in which we were fighting;
an