ifferent parts of the country forty workrooms in which women
thrown out of work by the war found employment. We established bureaux
for the registration of voluntary workers and gradually our work
spread in all directions; help for the Belgian refugees, the starting
of clubs and canteens for soldiers and sailors, clubs for soldiers'
wives, work in connection with the Sailors' and Soldiers' Families
Association, patrol work in the neighborhood of soldiers' training
camps, Red Cross work, conducting French classes for our men in
training. A very large number of our societies concentrated on
maternity and child welfare work; others in country districts took up
fruit picking and preserving in order to conserve the national food
supplies. It is really impossible to mention all our various
activities. These were included under a general heading adopted at a
Provincial Council meeting held in November, 1914, urging "our
societies and all members of the Union to continue by every means in
their power all efforts which had for their object the sustaining of
the vital energies of the Nation so long as such special efforts may
be required."

The war work with which the name of the N.U.W.S.S. is most widely
known was the formation of the Scottish Women's Hospitals for Foreign
Service. This was initiated and organised by the Hon. Sec. of our
Scottish Federation, Dr. Elsie Inglis, and was backed by the whole of
the N.U.W.S.S. (See Life of Dr. E. Inglis by Lady Frances Balfour.)
Meeting at first with persistent snubbing from the Royal Army Medical
Corps and the British Red Cross, Dr. Inglis formed her first hospital
at the Abbaye de Royaument about thirty miles from Paris, officered
entirely by women. Other units on similar lines quickly followed in
France and Serbia. Their work was magnificent and was rapidly
recognised as such by the military authorities and by all who came in
contact with it. These hospitals probably produced by the example of
their high standard of professional efficiency and personal devotion a
permanent influence on the development of the women's movement in
those countries where they were located. They received no farthing of
government money but raised the 428,856 pounds, which their audited
accounts show as their net total to August 3, 1919, entirely by
private subscription from all over the world including, of course, the
United States.

The N.U.W.S.S. were very early in the field of women's national work