The Birmingham age-herald., 1918-04-28

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 total destruction by Austrian airmen, coming from Pola, 66 miles across the Adriatic, during the period of the war preceding last October and more lat terly from enemy airmen coming not only from Pola but from the Isonzo by valorous squadrons of Italian airmen.
 While the saving of Venice has alt along played an important part in the strategic movements of the army her actual physical preservation to date must be attributed to the untiring vigil lance of the navy's sailors and partfcu- larly of the navy's air squadrons Fur ther along l shall tell of their wonderful exploits in fighting off the diabolic ene- my airmen, seeking to turn to powder, to mass of dead stone the creations of architecture as yet untouched. For example, during the terrible days Of panic and sorrow of November last, when Italy seemed about to lose the fruit of 30 months of war, three enemy airmen flew beyond the Piave river and headed for Venice
 Two Italian aviators in their turn rose from the marshes, forced the enemy to drop into the marshes and there them selves alighting, took them all prison ers-all within the course of a few min- utes. A few minutes later the prisoners, aboard the Italian machines, were de- livered safely to navy headquarters. The Italian navy squadron worked so hard during this month that they were aloft on an average of three times a day and always bringing down their prey To understand how patiently these air. men have labored, it may suffice to give the cold figures of the navy department, which states that on offensive raids they have flown to date 192,000 miles, or a distance nearly eight times around the earth and this distance does not count practice flights.
 WORK OF ART REMOVED
 To make clear the religious care eXer- cised toward Venice requires the de- scription of the long and hard work carried on during the past three years to preserve from dangerous bombs the architectural beauties. of the city. When war was declared by Italy-indeed, on the very day-Ugo Ojetti was hurried to Venice by ltaly's director of fine arts. with directions immediately to ship to other places in Italy the lighter works of art, to take down hundreds of fres- coes painted on canvas, to put protect ing mattresses on the roofs of those buildings whose frescoes were worked on the walls themselves, and, finally, to place protecting woodwork and sand. bags on the outside of monuments such as the DOgeS' palace.
 Overnight the work of wrapping up the city began. Venice, the city of silences, of birds, of flowers, of gondolas and moonlight songs, rich in picturesque vis- tas beginning and ending in rare ex- terior marbles, was turned into a vast workshop. Not only the citizens lent a hand. but thousands of Venice's sailors, the last race of sailors of olden times, adept in handling ropes and scaffolds, were engaged to help in one of the most novel and complete engineering feats of the war.
 In the United States we have durins this war regarded the Austrians al harmless people, led around by the nose by their stronger German brothers, but the people of the Venetian plains know differently, so heavily and so often has the Austrian hand been laid upon them in its effort to enslave and subjugate the rich cities of the plains.
 The destructive ire of the Austrians began in Venice on the morning of May 24. 1915. war having been de- clared by Italy the night previous. On that morning, at 5 o'clock to be pre- else. two Austrian seaplanes flew over from Pola and dropped four bombs of the city, the very first of which struck the church of San Ciriaco.
 WORK OF SALVATION
 Thenceforth the work of salvation went at feverish pace Within a few brief weeks the most urgent work had been accomplished. No less than 500,- 900 sand sacks of two bushels each had been placed so as to shelter or bolster up countless architectural beauties.
 As in war one must always prepare for the worst and as the Italian navy had not vet prepared it's careful de-' fense just two days after Italys dec laration of war many treasures had already left the island city for safer places on the mainland Among these were the four famed golden bronze horses adorning the main portal of St. Marks church, life-size horses that originally graced the triumphal arches of Nero and Trajan in Rome. that were taken by Constantine to Constantinople when he was despoiling the ancient imperial city. that were removed to Venice in 1204. that were collared by Napoleon later, taken to top an arch of triumph in Paris in 179T. and yet later restored to Venice Now, after scme 10 centuries of travel, these horses are once more in Rome.
 In the same fashion was disposed of the Colleoni statue. consisting of a figure of the famous Venetian soldier on a bronze horse. which Rus- kin has described as one of the noblest monuments ever set up on the face of the earth. Horse and rider were removed while the base of the monu- ment was housed in with the sand