The Daily Ardmoreite. [volume] (Ardmore, Okla.) 1893-current, 1918-05-05
THE RELIGIOUS RAMBLER
By WILLIAM T. ELLIS

Nobody casts an official gaze on you
or takes your statistics. Light
warmth, cheerfulness, and over all
the buzz of soldiers conversation.
Sometimes, too, men argue too loud
ly, whereupon there are other sol
diers to advise them to hire hall
Clearly, this place belongs to the
men in uniform. | was never in it
when there were not hundreds pres
ent and sometimes there seemed
more than a thousand More than
$500 meals are served every day.
Every man could do as he pleased.
II he dozed off by the fire in big
chair, as if he were at home, there
was nobody to say him nay. There
were plenty of helpers about, but
none was intrusive. Talk about the
attractiveness of the saloon-there
was more brightness and cheer and
good fellowship on any given eve
ming in the Eagle Hut than in all
the smelly, stutfy, beery public
houses OF London put together.
Here a man could wash up, have
his razor blades sharpened. get rid
OF his kit. buy tobacco, and use it,
or chewing gum and candy, or write
home. or read, or get square meal,
waited upon by ladies in uniform
who count no service too humble in
the ministry to the soldiers. | saw
a California heiresS in the blue uni
form of the mattresses at the Eagle
Hut. When business is dull at a
table, it is easy and natural to talk
with the soldiers. There are booths
where all the questions Il soldier on
leave is likely to ask may be an
swered, and there are motherly
women to sew on buttons for the
men.
AS | size it up, the religion of the
home folk, as expressed to the army
through the Y. NJ. c. A., consists
largely in "mothering" the men
keeping the touch of home upon
them, and not nagging them about
wiping their feet every time they
come through the door. The actions
OF the association, toward even the
most erring, more loutTy than
words, you cannot do anything
that will ALLEVIATE us from you, or
shut our door against YOU" Is it
any wonder, then, that the BOYS
would rather gather around the
piano in the Eagle Hut and sing
noisy rag-time, or the old home
songs, than go down the line in
London?
Where Sleep the Brave.
Any man who has come back from
France on leave is certainly en-
titled to Il comfortable bed Be
cause he has endured incredible
hardship is no reason why he should
be deprived of the luxury of clean
sheets and a soft mattress and plcn-
ty of covering. Like good home
maker or loving mother, Mrs. Y.
NJ. c. A., as ! should like to call the |
London hostess of the men, pro-
vides beds of just this sort. There
are two hundred and seventy-threc
of them in the Eagle Hut, costing a
or thereabouts a night. |
They are so fine and fresh and airy
that it would be quite proper to ill
them with congressman and sena-
tors; though | am not sure that the
British house of lords would be
quite comfortable in such demo-
cratic surroundings.
These beds are all full every night, /.
as are most of the twenty-three
other huts with lodgings conducted /
in the city by the y. NJ. c. a. | .
have last weeks official report be
fore me, and it shows that lodgings
were provided for 18,4lS men. IN
der the general Y. M. c. A. direc-
ton is the house of the Jewish Nav
al and Military Association. There