When the lever flies off, it releases a strong spring, which forces
the firing pin into a percussion cap. This ignites the fuse, which
burns down and sets off the detonator, charged with fulminate of
mercury, which explodes the main charge of ammonia.

The average British soldier is not an expert at throwing; it is a new
game to him, therefore the Canadians and Americans, who have played
baseball from the kindergarten up, take naturally to bomb throwing and
excel in this act. A six-foot English bomber will stand in awed
silence when he sees a little five-foot-nothing Canadian out-distance
his throw by several yards. I have read a few war stories of bombing,
where baseball pitchers curved their bombs when throwing them, but a
pitcher who can do this would make "Christy" Mathewson look like a
piker, and is losing valuable time playing in the European War Bush
League, when he would be able to set the "Big League" on fire.

We had had a cushy time while at this school. In fact, to us it was a
regular vacation, and we were very sorry when one morning the Adjutant
ordered us to report at headquarters for transportation and rations to
return to our units up the line.

Arriving at our section, the boys once again tendered us the glad
mitt, but looked askance at us out of the corners of their eyes. They
could not conceive, as they expressed it, how a man could be such a
blinking idiot to join the Suicide Club. I was beginning to feel sorry
that I had become a member of said club, and my life to me appeared
doubly precious.

Now that I was a sure enough bomber, I was praying for peace and