One hundred and fifty-two thousand cups of tea and coffee are given away
monthly at one railway-station. I once happened to be at a railway-station
on the main lines of communication. There are women working there, women
of position and means, working at their own expense. I have seen rough
fellows go up to a British woman behind a counter—the first time they have
seen a British woman for months—and I have heard them say, “Madam, will
you shake hands with me?” I saw an Australian do that. He got her hand—and
his was like a leg of mutton—and he thought of his mother and his
home-folk. He forgot his tea. It was a benediction to have that woman
there.

Well, on this occasion two of these ladies said to me, “Gipsy, we’re
having a relief train pass through to-morrow, and one comes through up and
one comes through down.”

“I’ll be there,” I said.

The train that was coming from the front we could hear before we could see
it. And it wasn’t the engine that we heard, because that came so slowly,
but I could hear the boys singing as they came round the curve,

“Blighty, Blighty is the place for me.”

We served them with tea and coffee, French bread a yard long, and candles
and matches and “Woodbines,” and then we got that crowd off—still singing
“Blighty.”

They had been gone about five minutes when the other train _from_ Blighty
came in. We couldn’t hear them singing. They were quiet and subdued. We
served them with coffee and tea, candles, bootlaces, and smokes, and then,