ith their little
belongings, infants in arms, to old people who had not walked a mile for
years. It was a great opportunity for rendering a truly Christian
service. The other day we lent one of our large lorries for a whole day
for the purpose of carrying these people in some degree of comfort to a
place of safety.'

Thus by every device that resourcefulness and experience could suggest
the workers of the Y.M.C.A. in France ministered to the comfort of the
men who were so bravely sustaining that terrible onslaught. The
organisation of the Red Triangle is the embodied goodwill of the British
people towards its beloved army. An emergency like the one in the spring
of 1918 was just the time when the services of the Red Triangle were
most sorely needed by our soldiers.

Fortunately, all the Y.M.C.A. workers got away safely. Sixty from the
Fifth Army took refuge at Amiens, whilst more than eighty from the area
of the Third Army found sanctuary at Doullens.

A few months later, thanks to the arrival of the Americans in France,
and the brilliant strategy of Foch and Haig; thanks above all to the
mercy of God, the tide turned, and the Huns were once more in full
retreat. A distinguished war correspondent wrote his impressions of
Bapaume a day or two after it had again been captured by the British.
Said he, 'I prowled about the streets of Bapaume through gaping walls of
houses, over piled wreckage, and found it the same old Bapaume as when I
had left it, except that some of our huts and an officers' club, and
some Y.M.C.A. tents and shelters have been blown to bits like everything
else.' A ruined town without a Y.M.C.A.! Could anything be more
desolate?

CHAPTER VIII

THE BARRAGE AND AFTER

The problem of dealing with conditions, at such a
time, and under existing circumstances, at the
rest camps has always been a most difficult one;
but the erection of huts by the Young Men's
Christian Association has made this far easier.

The extra comfort thereby afforded to the men, and
the opportunities for reading and writing, have
been of incalculable service, and I wish to tender
to your Association, and all those who have
assisted, my most grateful thanks.--FIELD-MARSHAL
VISCOUNT FRENCH.

IT was on the afternoon of July 30, 1917, that we reached Bailleul in
Flanders. Proceeding directly to the Headquarters o