Bovia McLain, an American secretary, gives us a glimpse of a night on a hospital barge, with a cold wind and rain-storm sweeping down the river.  The canvas tarpaulin began to leak like a sieve and most of the wounded were cold and drenched to the skin.  Soon the men were lying not only under wet blankets, but actually in two or three inches of water on the undrained decks.  They were packed in like sardines, without pillows or comforts.  “The whole thing was ghastly and terrible.  Men wanted to change their position or have a broken limb slightly moved, and a dozen other wants seemed to demand attention all at once.  At times I felt the strain so that it seemed to me I could not control myself longer, but must break down and weep, it was so appalling.”  After the men had been made comfortable, the workers were ready in the morning with supplies of chocolate and tobacco and other luxuries.  It is no wonder that up at the front when the secretary invites the men to remain for evening prayers sometimes nearly the whole battalion stays, and one can understand the new interpretation given by some soldiers to the letters Y. M. C. A.—­“You Make Christianity Attractive.”

When the war broke out the Association was ready to enter Africa also.  With the first contingent of 60,000 South African troops a number of Y M C A secretaries were sent.  They erected large marquees in local training camps, and there prepared the way for the even greater opportunity which was to follow in the East African campaign under the Northern Army.  The military authorities cabled the Association headquarters at Calcutta, offering to hand over the army canteens of East Africa to the Y M C A and to cut out liquor if the Association would take them over and be responsible for the welfare work among the troops, looking after their physical, social, and moral needs.  Instantly, Mr. E. C. Carter, the National Secretary of India, cabled back accepting the offer.

The first score of men were sent over to open up nineteen centers with the advancing column in the jungles of Africa.  The 20,000 troops were then occupying Swakopmund, a desolate little town surrounded by a sea of burning sand.  There were no trees, not a blade of grass, nor even the song of a solitary bird to relieve the monotony.  The men called it “the land of sin, sand, sorrow, and sore eyes.”  Soon, however, the large hall of the Faber Hotel was procured, with accommodations for a thousand men.  It became the social center of the whole camp.  So popular was the place that the men fairly fought and struggled to get into the building.  Every night at 7:30 the war telegrams were read, and as it was the only way to hear the news from the front, each tent appointed one man to be at the Y M C A at that hour.  On the occasion of the opening of the work, one man wrote home:  “Two great events have happened today—­the Y M C A has commenced and I have had a bath.”  The story will never be written as to what the Association