As every good beachcomber knows, it pays to have sharp eyes. When scanning the sand dunes of Wedge Island, Perth, off the coast of Australia, Tonya Illman noticed an old gin bottle — which turned out to contain the world's oldest message in a bottle, the Western Australian Museum confirmed Tuesday. "It just looked like a lovely old bottle, so I picked it up, thinking it might look good in my bookcase," Illman said.