this they do once a week at least.

V

Madame Waddington, knowing that I was very anxious to see one of the
cantines at the railway stations about which so much was said, took me
late one afternoon to St. Lazare. Into this great station, as into all
the others, train after train hourly gives up its load of
permissionnaires--men home on their six days' leave--; men for the
eclope stations; men from shattered regiments, to be held at Le
Bourget until the time comes to be sent to fill other gaps made by the
German guns; men who merely arrive by one train to take another out,
but who must frequently remain for several hours in the depot.

I have never entered one of these _gares_ to take a train that I have
not seen hundreds of soldiers entering, leaving, waiting; sometimes
lying asleep on the hard floor, always on the benches. It is for all
who choose to take advantage of them that these cantines are run, and
they are open day and night.

The one in St. Lazare had been organized in February, 1915, by the
Baronne de Berckheim (born Pourtales) and was still run by her in
person when I visited it in June, 1916. During that time she and her
staff had taken care of over two hundred thousand soldiers. From 8 to
11 A.M. cafe-au-lait, or cafe noir, or bouillon, pate de foie or
cheese is served. From 11 to 2 and from 6 to 9, bouillon, a plate of
meat and vegetables, salad, cheese, fruits or compote, coffee, a quart
of wine or beer, cigarettes. From 2 to 6 and after 9 P.M., bouillon,
coffee, tea, pate, cheese, milk, lemonade, cocoa.

The rooms in the station are a donation by the officials, of course.
The dining-room of the St. Lazare cantine was fitted up with several
long tables, before which, when we arrived, every square inch of the
benches was occupied by poilus enjoying an excellent meal of which
beef a la mode was the piece de resistance. The Baroness Berckheim and
the young girls helping her wore the Red Cross uniform, and they
served the needs of the tired and hungry soldiers with a humble
devotion that nothing but war and its awful possibilities can inspire.
It was these nameless men who were saving not only France from the
most brutal enemy of modern times but the honor of thousands of such
beautiful and fastidious young women as these. No wonder they were
willing and grateful to stand until they dropped.

[Illustration: A RAILWAY DEPOT CANTINE]

It was evident, however, that their imagination carried them bey