ever given to the soldier, and one which he estimates at its full value.

During the mobilisation days these Homes were crowded to the utmost of
their capacity, and chaplains and Scripture readers vied with each other
in their earnest efforts to benefit the men. In those solemn times of
waiting, with war before them, and possibly wounds or death, hundreds of
soldiers decided for Christ, or, as they loved to put it, 'enlisted into
the army of the King.'


=Barrack Room Life.=

Somehow or other the average Englishman never thinks of the soldier as a
Christian, and soldier poets bring out almost every other phase of the
soldier character except this. As a matter of fact the recruit when he
comes to us is little more than a lad. He has been brought up in the
village Sunday school, and been accustomed to attend the village church
or chapel. He has all his early religious impressions full upon him. He
is excitable, emotional, easily led. If he gets into a barrack room
where the men are coarse, sensual, ungodly, he often runs into riot in a
short time, though even then his early impressions do not altogether
fade. But if we lay hold of him, bring him to our Homes, surround him
with Christian influences, by God's help we make a man of him, and the
raw recruit, the 'rook' as they call him, not only develops into a
veteran ready to go anywhere and do anything for Queen and country, but
into a Soldier of the Cross, ready to do and dare for his King.


=An Aldershot Sunday.=