in detail. For our
first illustration, let us take the Y M C A hut in the Convalescent
Camp. We select this because it is the model of the new huts for the
American army which are now being constructed. It is a moving sight
simply to step inside its doors. Here are two parallel structures of
simple pine boards, each 120 by 30 feet. They may be used separately,
in eight different departments, including the lecture hall which will
seat 500, or with the partitions raised they may be thrown into one
large audience hall, holding 1,200 men.

A glance at the crowd within, or at the great city of white tents
without, shows that even this building is utterly inadequate for this
convalescent camp holding 4,000 men. It is a center for a dozen
surrounding hospitals, each containing from 1,000 to 4,000 patients.
As the men are cured in these hospitals they are sent up to the
Convalescent Camp to be made fit to return to the trenches. It is
worth remembering that every one of these 4,000 patients is a wounded
man, all of whom have seen service and suffering.

Let us enter first of all the large social hall. Several hundred men
are seated at the tables, playing games or chatting over a cup of tea.
At one end is the counter, where three women and five men take their
turn serving during the day and evening. Two or three thousand of
these men will pour in every day this winter. They will stand in a
long queue filing by the counter for more than two hours. Here are
large urns, each holding ten gallons of tea. Cup after cup is rapidly
pushed across the counter without turning off the tap; as 160 men are
served in ten minutes, and there is no stop save to place a fresh urn
full of tea. As fast as the workers can move, not only hot tea and
coffee, but bread and biscuits, cake and chocolate, tobacco, matches,
candles, soap, bachelor buttons are furnished, and every other need of
the soldier is supplied. The aim is to meet his every demand, so that
he will not have to go into the city to places of temptation and evil
resorts.

While these men are being served or are seated in the social room,
meetings and lectures are conducted at the same time on the other side
of the partition in the audience hall, which is occupied several times
a day, and is used for social purposes between the meetings. We now
pass into the lounge, which is filled with men, busy at their games.
Next is the Quiet Room, where no talking or writing is allow