HELPFUL INVALIDS.

Manawatu Herald, Volume XXXVIII, Issue 1602, 24 August 1916, Page 4

HELPFUL INVALIDS.

A French village in the Argonne, >overal miles behind the living-line, is known as the “Depot lies Eclopos.” It is a. colony of invalided

and disabled men who work to supply needs of men at Ihe front. The eolony is a line example of the practical economy in the French army, and also of the humanitarian policy adopted toward* the soldiers. ’There are about 400 invalided men in a village. Some of them have been slightly wounded, others suiter from trench feed, rheumatism, bronchitis, and oilier ailments which place them temporarily on the sick list. There is a laundry in the village where the Eelopes wash and mend the linen received from the front. There are all sorts of Irades. There is hrickmaking, lo restore the houses in the village, camp-beds are made of wicker work and wired springs. There is basket-making, tinware work; army cooking utensils are repaired and sabots are made. Candles are made from fat received from the slaughter-houses, to he used in the trenches; also boxes which take the place of sandbags for trench defence, crutches for the lame, and croquet halls and mallets for the recreation of men in the rest camps. There is a carpenter’s and blacksmith’s shop, and in it every useful trade which provides things for the army is represented. Sometimes materials are scarce and are of a make-shift kind. “The business of the French army,” said an officer, “is to make everything- out of nothing, and the astonishing thingis that we succeed.”