GUARDING THE EMPIRE'S SONS

Dominion, Volume 10, Issue 3004, 15 February 1917, Page 3

GUARDING THE EMPIRE'S SONS

TRIBUTE TO THE Y.M.C.A. The magio word "leave" should spell nothing but welcome! comfort, and happiness to our fighting men, and yofc there- aro thousands of them who como to London as utter strangers, not knowing where to look for a night's shelter. They have oxchanged the awful mud of the trenches in Frauce for the dark, wet streets of tho greatest motropolia in the world. They are "home" for a. rest. They see other mon greeted by mothors and wives and sweethearts, but for them there is no welcoming hand, no armchair set by a coey fireside waiting for them. The irony of it must strike them with bitterness. Bub there is a and the Young Men's Christian Association has bravely stepped into the gap and is coping with one of the biggest tasks which is the direct outcome of war. A dreadful fact that must.be faced is that at all railway termini there gather human vultures who are so lost to every sense of honour and honesty that they do not scruple to prey on the unsuspecting soldiers and sailors, who fall easy victims to the apparently kindly welcome extended to them by these despicable men and women. People living in comfortable circumstances have no conception of the evils that fly about the London streets by night, the tricks, tho disguises, the clover, crafty doings of men and women who have sunk to unspeakable depths. From them our men must be saved at any cost, and as a nation we should recognise the ■ marvellous work that the Y.M.C.A. is doing in systematising a scheme by which soldiers and sailors are tactlully rescued from all these snares and given a happy holiday, free from military discipline and full of clean, wholesome pleasures. At) about- 8 p.m. there assemble in the Y.M.C.A. headquarters every evening the voluntary helpers who lend and drive their own cars for this special "night transport" work. Telephones are ringing every moment and calls are coming from all the fifty huts and auxiliaries in London.

"We are crowded out," says one hut leader. "Can you- relieve us of a' hundred men?"

"Yes, we have some vacant cots," is the welcome remark of another leader.

Immediately a car is sent to take the men to huts, where they can be accommodated. That is the work of the earlier hours of the evening, but as midnight approaches all available cars go off to Waterloo to meet the men coming in from Southampton. Many of them are "on leave," and arrive tired, muddy, reckless. They have to be dealt with tactfully, but the Y.M.C.A. leader has a tremendous asset in being able to say those four well-known and much-boloved letters, for most • Tommies have learned that they mean warmth and welcome. The men ■ are packed into the cars and whisked through the dark streets to the bright huts, where they can have a comfortable bed and a good breakfast for Is. 3d., and a good hot supper at a nominal price. Then Paddington—a heavy job—must bo attended, and hundreds ■of men shifted from the hut thcro to others not so full. Often it happens that derelict women are picked up and cared for. An elderly woman and her daughter from Somerset we're going to Franco to see the woman's son who was dangerously wounded. They were simple country folk who had never moved out of their village. A kind-hearted Tommy was doing his best to pilot them across London, but did not know what to do with them for the several night hours they had to spend between arrival and departure. Tlio JMI.C.A. leader took charge of them, gave them food in one of the huts, and sent them by car to tho boat train in the early morning.

Numbers may not bo given, but a huge list of relatives of wounded have been conducted to and from France by tlie. Y.M.O.A. Imagine, for a moment, what it must mean to a poor woman, worn out with the shook of bad news, ■setting forth on the greatest adventure of her life, terrified at the thought of going to a foreign land, to find friends all along the way, who take all care from her and see her safely to the hospital, where lies' her loved one —surely that is a Christ-like work, carried out with beautiful simplicity and fine practicability.

But the cars are still running about London, for from Paddington they dash off to' Liverpool Street and then to King's Cross, where men jour down in hundreds from the North. It. is only natural tJiat they should run it fine in the matter of time, when it means having a few more hours in the old home. They arrive at one side of London with the "return leave" train «oin;: from the other side within so short a tinio that nothing but. a quick run in a car can save it for theui. It is a serious for Tommy to miss his leave boat, as the writer knows, having seen several worried inen on the trains in France, who had to own thai they were a day overdue! Hundreds of men have been saved from military punishment by the wonderful system of Y.AI.C.A. cars.

The "voluntary" chauffeurs, who lend their cars and give up many a night's rest, are weaving a magnificent bit of Uie whole design of Y.M.C.A. work, lliey give moro than the loan of their cars, more than their own loss of sleep; Li:o.y give the cheery word that means ail .the difference in the- world the lonely, homeless man Let us peep into the Shakespeare Hut which is close to tho Y.M.O.A. Headquarters, and is a wonderfully wellplaDned wooden building.. Mostly New Zealanders .congregate here, but many regiments are represented, as one passes through the big lounge and dining rooms, to.glance at the men playing billiards or writing home in the comiortablo. "silence" room. How upon row of cots are arranged in the great hall, whilst there are snug little cubicles for tho lucky men.'who arrive early. But the accommodation has to be continually • enlarged, and it is do unusual thing on a Saturday night for 800 men to be put, as a 'last' resource, in tho headquarters.Men are picked up from the streets by the Y.ALC.A. patrols and brought .to the huts; in fact, a hundred odd jobs are domj by these devoted workers —anything—everything that can be thought of to keep our men out of the hands of tlie sharks that, alar! infest our streets by night. Cars and more cars are needed if the work is to be carried on efficiently. Petrol is supplied free of change, so that what, is wanted ie the loau of cars and tho work of voluntary drivers. Fathers, who have boys of their own in the firing line, and who are engaged all day, can and do give up a certain number of nights, and find infinite joy in saving a lad whose people, maybe, are on the other side of the world. Fridays, Saturdays, Sundays, and Mondays are the heavy nights. Already there are ladies doing this particular work, to whom we must ever bo in debt, however much we may try to I repay it. —Thekla Bowser, in the ' "Queen."