Caring for Our Boys.

Levin Daily Chronicle, 25 September 1917, Page 4

Caring for Our Boys.

LONDON, July 20, 1917. When as a stranger in this city of strange contrasts you surge with the human tide down the Strand or wander by night through the region of Piccadilly Circus you are apt to judge London by tho excessively garish show of the footways. But a fuller acquaintance with the Empire's capital tempers disappontment with fairness, and you realise that for every dark spot there are many bright ones. How to make these latter accessible to the soldiers who are rushed in on four days' leave is the big task that the Y.M.C.A. has tackled with distinct success. Last week no less than 2500 New Zealanders were in town, and the peaked hats and the coloured pugarees were bobbing up everywhere. One draft alone consisted of 1800 men who had been called to France from Sling, and the New Zealand Y.M.C.A. workers in London were only warned of their arrival on the previous day. How the telephones buzzed in anticipation of the rush. There were special entertainments to arrange, brakes to order for tours, honorary guides to commission, hospitality to bespeak in private homes, and many etceteras which are understood only by specialists. In due course the troop train deposited its lively freight at Waterloo Stat'..on, and hundreds of men were piloted by Y.M.C.A. secretaries through tho mysteries of the "tube" to the Shakespeare and other accommodation huts. For many a man those four days of sight-seeing and entertainment will form a life-long memory; hundreds were taken to places of foremost interest, introduced to the homes of charming people, and provided with tickets for places of wholesome amuse- ' ment. : THE WAR WINNERS. "What do tho fellows most appreciate?" some may ask. Why, the atmosphere of a home and association with wholesome women. Here is a case , in point. A few days ago a big strapping corporal over from France was , asked by one of "the principal lady workers at the Shakespeare Hut —New [ Zealand Y.M.C.A. headquarters—to visit her home for dinner. After dej clining with thanks, he confided to a male worker that as he had been away , from home for nearly three years he j felt nervous of mingling with company. ( Almost against his will he found himi self at a home over the week-end, and before returning to the grim work of i the trenches he confessed that not for i worlds would he have missed those few days of homely hospitality. This young , New Zealander, like scores of others, has come to realise that back from the false glitter of the London streets are hosts of worthy men and women who are not only helping to win the war, but are desirous of extending kindly hospitality to the men who have come 12,000 miles to champion the same cause. Over half a million of English women are engaged in war work and more than 20,000 are rendering voluntary service of the constant energetic kind. Time and again a soldier on leave from France goes into raptures over the qualities of these English women, particularly on the first day of liis arrival here. '' The finest sight since leaving home," lie will say, and by the far-away gaze you can tell in which direction his thoughts are moving. It is impossible to place on paper ) an estimate of tho far-reaching service which these splendid women-folk are rendering to the men of the Overseas Dominions and indirectly to the nation as a whole. "Long and happily may they live," is tho wish of all New Zealand soldiers.