 CHAPTER VIII. THE TURNING OF THE TIDE. I have stated that as the immediate result of the new, and for the most part evil, environment in which the Australians and New Zealanders found themselves, many of them cast off temporarily the restraints by which they had been held in check in the more favoured homelands. Those of us who were labouring for their spiritual welfare became, however, increasingly conscious that the tide of pleasure and sin-seeking, which was at its full in January of 1915, was commencing to turn. The undue pursuit of pleasure, if that pleasure be a doubtful one, invariably produces a surfeit. The most disappointed of men is that man who has his lower longings satisfied. In all the strength of youth, with all the natural instinct for pleasure, many of these men become conscious that sin and even pleasure could not satisfy the truer, deeper yearnings of their better selves. They become less disposed to visit Cairo, and more inclined to go to the YMCA's in the various camps. On the 14th February, the Ebb began. Men who had up to that time persistently and consistently avoided spiritual conversation with the chaplains and the YMCA secretaries began to welcome it. One man expressed to me, in somewhat quaint phraseology, the sentiments of many when he at this time said, I am fed up to the teeth with Cairo and the rotten life I have lived since I have joined the army. I want something that will satisfy a man, something solid. I have taken particular notice lately of some of the Christian blokes. They may be wowsers, a term applied to Christians, but they have got something. I'm hanged if I know what it is. They are different somehow. They seem to be satisfied and not to act like us blokes. We go rushing around after pleasure, like a lot of mad Tomcats chasing their blooming tails, and then meowing and grousing because they can't catch them. Look here, Captain. I feel now that what's good enough for them is good enough for me. How can I get it? It wasn't easy matter to lead such a man to the one who alone can satisfy the yearnings of the soul. One afternoon I was sitting at what I used jokingly to call my receipt of custom, which was, in other words, the chair in the YMCA tent behind the table upon which the stamps, postcards, etc. were exposed for sale. When a Lankenshire soldier came up and bought a half-Piestor stamp, he went away and in a few minutes returned and bought another one, and repeated this operation so often that I at first did not drop to it that this was perhaps the lad's peculiar and original method of showing his desire of speaking to me privately. At length, noticing that he only came to the table when no one else was there, and lingered near it unnecessarily, I broke the ice by asking him whether he wanted to speak to me. Yes, sir. I'll just do. Well, what's your trouble? I can't speak to your ears, sir. All right. Come to my tent. We went to my living tent, which was, for convenience in my work, pitched next to the big YMCA one. As soon as he had sat down, he said, with tears in his eyes and voice, Plesa, I don't want to be a Christian. Why? Plesa, my father and mother are real true Christians, Mithris. And I promise them, when I left Lancanshire, I would keep straight and won't swear or drink or go wrong. I meant to, but when I got with the boys, I couldn't say no. I was afraid of being laughed at in a bit and a bit or go worse and worse. And now I'm as bothered as to us. I want to get back to live like I used to. I'm fast sick of the life I'm living now. There's nothing in it. I don't know. I'll get back, for I've got a long way on the down truck. Can't you help me, sir? It is impossible for me, a colonial, to attempt to reproduce the strong Lancanshire dialect in which the men spoke. But I get the sense of his words as nearly as I recollected them, when I wrote down roughly that very evening a record of the conversation. I replied, No, I can't. You can't. Then what am I to do? You believe in Christ, don't you? Adolphe. Then come right now to him. He loves you as if you were the only one on earth he has to love. He died for you because he loved you. He rose again from the dead that you might know his sacrifice for you was accepted by God and therefore your sins, if you trust him, are forgiven and that he might be able to give you the Holy Spirit in order to give you the power to think, right, speak right, and do right. O cross, do all, all that for me, as well, terrible bod, unfair ashamed of my faults at all. How can I let him do all that for me? Put him to the test. Oh, would you believe me if I told you anything? O cross, I would, sir. If I promised to do something for you and you knew I was able to do it, shouldn't I have to fulfill my promise? Yes, sir. Look here. I turned up my Bible at those words of Christ in John chapter 10, verses 27, 28, and 29. Does not Christ say, I give unto you eternal life? To whom does Christ promise eternal life? To Emma, Aaron, Father. Have you heard his voice? Adore not, Lennar, sir. Have you never longed to be a Christian? Have you never been miserable because of your sins? Have you never wanted to lead a true life? Many, many times, sir. Are you prepared to follow Christ? It means persecution. Your tentmates will give you a rough time of it. You will have to let on whose side you are on. Are you willing? Emma, grant the strength to do it, sir. Amen to tell to other shops. I can't do it on my own. I know that. Now listen to what Christ says. I give to you eternal life. That life is different from the natural life you have. It is a higher life, a life that has blood, strengthen it. It is his own life. Christ gives himself to you so that you may win in the future where you have been beaten in the past, that you may conquer those sins which have conquered you in the past, that you may live by and in his power, a clean life. Will you here and now accept Christ as your Savior, confess him before your mates and live for him? It is not you so much who will have to stick to Christ. It is Christ who pledges himself to stick to you. I read verse 28. They, that includes you, shall never perish. Neither shall any, that includes you, pluck them out of my hand. Do you believe that? He promises to save you if you mean business. He interrupted me. A dole man business. Well, he promises to save you and to keep you. Won't you put him to the test by asking him to save and keep you now? There in that tent, the man knelt down and accepted Christ's word at its full value and rose as his life afterwards proved a changed man. He was the first whom after six long weeks of an empty ministry, I had the privilege of leading to the master. Two nights after, he came in, his face beaming with holy joy and insisted on seeing me in my private tent. We were busy, but I handed over my share of the work to my colleague, the Reverend Kenneth Maiver, whose faithful service of love, hundreds of our mounted men will remember and went with him to the tent. I have got twelve chops here or just like our war yesterday. They want to be Christians, just as I did. You tell them, just as you'll tell me, I can't remember exactly what you says. I am not thick in the head. He told me hurriedly as we walked the few yards between the tents. These men, before many minutes had elapsed, saw the truth and became true followers of the Lord. Thus the work commenced and before a week had passed, several more of the Lankenshire Territorials had made the great decision. These in their turn told some of their friends among the New Zealanders of the new and strange joy and power that had come into their lives and the results of their testimony were seen the following Sunday evening. I had been speaking on the three great words in Ephesians chapter two, verse eight, grace, faith and salvation and asked all those men who really wanted to live the Christian life and were willing to pay the price, the delisette, quitting everything that they knew to be sin and openly acknowledging Christ to be their savior, to meet me after the service in my private tent, adjoining the YMCA. It was a little time before I was able to get there as two men intercepted me on the way to ask me to help them in their spiritual difficulties. When at last I reached the tent, I, to my glad surprise, had considerable difficulty in getting in. Every available spot was packed with men. Four or five were on my bed and the rest were perforce standing. For nearly two hours I spoke to them individually and with only one exception, they decided that henceforth they would, by God's good grace, live for him who died for them. All the men who came into my tent were New Zealanders. Several belonged to my brigade, the New Zealand mounted rifles. Paul said when speaking of the success which had attended his ministry, I labored yet not I but the grace of God which was with me. No true Christian worker can say anything else when God has been graciously pleased to crown his labor with an abundant harvest of souls. No man, however brilliant, however gifted an orator, however learned, can ever of himself lead one of his fellow creatures out of the darkness into the wondrous light, life and liberty of Christ bestowal. I have many times been asked to account for the wonderful in gatherings of soldiers into the master's kingdom which I have been privileged to see in Egypt and leader in England and Wales. I have only one answer. God was answering the prayers of his children in New Zealand, Australia and Great Britain. I have been so conscious of that time and again when so wearied in body and mind by my labors in the hospitals during the day and in the slums, three and sometimes five nights a week that I have found it impossible to have the quiet waiting on God which is usually essential before preaching. I felt certain that God would answer the prayers of believing parents and friends of these men and never have I been disappointed. In tens of thousands of homes in New Zealand and other lands, prayer was going up for the welfare and salvation of these men. Is it therefore wonderful that God should honor their requests? No, to my mind, God being what he is, it would have been infinitely more wonderful if he had not. Although my motives in writing of this aspect of my work may be misinterpreted, I am conscious that so far as I know myself, my one aim is to glorify the infinite love and mercy of the great Father. In a ministry of many years, I have been conscious of what to a large number of Christians may seem a strange fact, but Delacet, that I have never yet seen one case in which the person who has been brought into a new and conscious relation to Christ can trace his or her conversion to one particular person. Many do, or rather think they do, but when inquiry is made, I've always found that unknown perhaps to them, someone or some others have been praying for them. How many are the influences that God brings to bear upon the soul? The godly example of parents or friends, the word of the preacher, the silent voice of conscience, a text which has been impressed upon the mind by the Holy Spirit, the lessons taught in the hard school of failure, the yearning for purity and peace, the consciousness of some special sin. All these lead up to and culminate in that psychological crisis, which we term conversion. One sows, often not knowing that he has done so, another reaps. The reaping is impossible unless the plowing, the harrowing, and the sowing have preceded it. The reaping is the act of a moment. The preparation extends over months. The reaping, men see and glorify, if so be they are not taught of God to realize that neither is he that soweth anything, nor he that reapeth, but God that giveth the increase. The faithful sowing, few remark. One man with the gift of the evangelist, people are inclined to forget it is God's gift, reaps largely, but his work would go for nothing unless many others had been used to do the preparation. All glory, praise, and honor be to God. The devil generally overreaches himself. He is wise, but not all wise. Hundreds of soldiers told me that one of the main reasons which led them to become Christians was that under the pressure of the temptations of Cairo, they realized as never before how weak they were and how undreamt of until then were the possibilities of evil they discovered in themselves. That therefore, which at first sight seemed to be a lure to the devil and sin, proved to be a friendly beacon, beckoning them to God and goodness. Let me give you a practical illustration of this. One night, a fine, well-set-up soldier of about 35 years of age came to me in the YMCA and asked whether he could speak to me privately. We immediately adjourned to my private tent and I said, tell me what is the matter? Then I may be able to help you. Last Sunday night, I went with some of my mates down the fish market, perhaps the worst slum in Cairo. I have been what you would call a fairly decent sort of fellow, drank when I felt inclined, but rarely got drunk. I kept myself fairly clean. You know what I mean. I nodded. Well, three of my mates went into one of the houses upstairs and I sat down in the room beneath. I give you my word, Captain. I never till then realized what a devil I really was. I was sure frightened at myself. It, the temptation, came upon me so suddenly that it had nearly downed me before I knew where I was. I didn't know what to do. I felt all my good resolutions slipping away from me and nothing but low, mean, dirty thoughts taking their place. I was certain I should go under. And then, like a flash, I said to myself, they say God answers prayer. I'll see whether he really does. So I just says, God keep me from making a beast of myself. And would you believe me, Captain? In a minute, I had got something from somewhere. It must have been God, wasn't it? To think like I ought to. I tell you, Captain, I am afraid of myself now. I can't trust myself as I did. I want to get a power from outside myself into myself so as to always listen so that I need not be ashamed of myself. It was an easy matter to lead such a man in that frame of mind to trusting the keeping power of a loving, living, risen Christ. Night after night, for weeks after, in fact, every night that I was not working in the slums, men used to come and see me. And, as I have said, sought to receive the power to live above the new and evil environment in which they found themselves. End of chapter eight. Chapter nine of With the Anzacs and Cairo by Guy Thornton recorded by Adam Bielka. This is a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please visit LibriVox.org. Chapter nine, the glorious work of the YMCA. It is impossible to praise too highly the great and beneficial effect produced upon the Australian, British, and New Zealand soldiers as the result of the labors of the various secretaries of the YMCA tents. Mr. William Jessup, the organizing secretary of the Cairo YMCA rose splendidly to the occasion and sees the opportunity with both hands. Almost without any warning, Cairo had become alive with troops. Indians, Gurkhas, Lankenshire Territorials, Australians, and New Zealanders followed one another in quick succession. YMCA tents were established in every camp. The magnitude of the work demanded more secretaries than were immediately available. The local American mission supplied temporary secretaries to the Mountain Brigade tent. The Reverend Mr. Galloway and the Reverend Mr. Acheson filling the positions most ably and with great acceptance to the troops. The Reverend Kay McIver took up at the end of January, 1915 the secretarial duties in the tent in which I was more particularly interested. Mr. Bell, secretary of the Glasgow YMCA in the Eredrome camp among the Australian station there, Dr. Jays of North Nigeria in the Lankenshire tent and Mr. Oates in the other New Zealand YMCA tent. The Salvation Army labored splendidly for the men in the fine hut which, with characteristic promptitude, they had erected. The Anglican church also had a small tent. Thus for the New Zealand troops, no less than four recreation tents were provided. In addition to which, Mr. Logan of the Egyptian general mission practically threw his house open to our voice. Each night of the week, there was something of interest, a popular lecture, a concert, a competition going on in one or other of these institutions. The soldiers increasingly found that their legitimate wants and their wholesome desire for pure recreation were catered for in the camp and felt this disposed after a hard day's toil to go to Cairo. They found by experience that a soldier's life is no sinecure. It was drill, drill, drill from morning to night. Fatigue duties demanded their daily quota of victims. Guards always had to be kept, maneuvers tax their strength to the utmost. Roat marches made them desire to go to bed early and made sleep so sweet, even though the bed were sand. Some of the mounted men were even heard to envy the foot sluggers or beetle crushers since the latter had no horses to look after. As the months slipped by, these duties were not slackened but rather increased and occasionally the grocers voice would be lifted up and the query heard to what purpose is all this training? The OCs knew and the steep slopes of Gallipoli would never have been surmounted had our gallant lads been one witless sound of wind and limb. The stern route marches, the miles trudged over the shimmering sands of the deserts, the daily toil of guard and fatigue parties weeded out the unfits. And it can be questioned whether any men were better fitted physically for the sternest campaign in which perhaps the British had ever been engaged than our fine boys. Picked men in the beginning, they were on that long looked four day in April when they left their desert home to face the foe trained to the last ounce and fit for anything. What flesh they had on was muscle. Their faces were tanned by the hot rays of the eastern sun and to use the stock military phrase and to mean it, which is in another matter, they were indeed a fine body of men. Many a spectator's heart throbbed and his face flushed with pride when our boys of the main body marched through the four centers before leaving New Zealand. But if he could have seen those same men after nearly five months of strenuous desert training and noted the improvement in physique and discipline, he would indeed have been more and more proud of his representatives at the front and more confident of their manifestability to uphold the honor and dignity of New Zealand upon the field of battle. The heroes of Anzac have made a name that will never die as long as history remains to tell the epic of their gallant landing, of their heroic charges, of their patient endurance in the trenches. And that day when defeated but not disgraced, they made that marvelous evacuation with all the precision and martial skill of the best troops the world has ever seen. The old proverb says, distinctions are invidious and to contrast our boys with or even hint that they were superior to the gallant Australians and British who shared with them the stress and strain of the shot, shell and trapinal and the still more trying infinite torment of flies day and night for month after month would be vain glorious and foolish. It is sufficient to say that they won for New Zealand a renown which every inhabitant of the Dominion delights to remember. The sadness of those who have lost their near and dear ones buried thousands of miles from the island home which they loved and for which they died is mitigated to some degree by the glory of their achievements and the imperishable renown they won. The story of that campaign will doubtless be written by many who will be able to speak from their own experience and observation of the facts. This I cannot do, but this little book will, I feel not be written in vain if it vindicates the character of those men whose death was so heroic and brings comfort to relatives who will learn from its pages how many of our soldiers learned during the last few months of their lives not only to be soldiers of the king but what is a hire, a nobler, a more enduring honor? Soldiers of the cross. I can only write of my own experiences and I do so with no desire of ignoring the self-sacrificing and successful labors of the other Padres. My work was but a fraction of what was accomplished and if it were so honored, many more of our men were led in other ways and by other means to the central hope of weak and airing humanity, Jesus Christ. What little I was able to do was entirely or almost entirely due to the facilities afforded by that splendid institution, the YMCA. I cannot write of the assistance so freely and graciously extended to our men without alluding to the labors of Reverend Mr. McGill of the American Mission at Heliopolis in providing for their comforts and needs physically, mentally and spiritually. He honored me by permitting me to cooperate with him on several occasions in his manifold labors of love. The Red Cross and the YMCA under the able leadership of Mr. James Hay conducted a most successful enterprise in the very heart of Cairo, the Esbequia Gardens. Providing refreshments and clean amusements. The work of Mrs. Dicastro, Mrs. Stewart and many other ladies in the tea rooms had undoubtedly a most beneficial effect upon those men who went to that part of the city. I cannot speak too highly of the magnificent hospitality extended to our men by all the denominations of Cairo. The missionaries of the American Mission without exception placed their houses at the virtual disposal of our troops. Their kindness is beyond all praise. Hundreds of men were, I firmly believe, saved from the sins of Cairo by the gracious hospitality of these fine people. The Presbyterian, Methodist and Anglican church people did all that was humanly possible to provide our boys with a home away from home. The directors of the Egyptian General Mission, Mr. Swan and Mr. Logan, who lived at Zaytun spent and were spent in their endeavors to help our soldiers. Many a convalescent man has found in their homes the sympathy and cheer which more than anything else contributed to his perfect recovery. The general European population, irrespective of nationality and creed, excelled themselves by the kindness and consideration they extended to the troops. It would be but a gracious act if in consideration of the unbounded self-sacrifice of those good Cairo folk on behalf of some small monument to be erected as a lasting memorial of our gratitude. The Young Men's Christian Association at its central office and by its more than a score of tents proved itself to be indeed and in truth the Young Men's friend. It rose to each new call for the much needed extension of its multifarious activities. Mr. Jessup, ably helped by his worthy helpmate, Mrs. Jessup, toiled as few could toil to provide for the mental, social and spiritual needs of scores of thousands of troops in Egypt. I can only speak of that which I know and testify to that which I have seen in the many tents where I was privileged to assist. Real solid spiritual work done by spiritual men, rarely, if ever, fails to affect permanent spiritual results. The effects of the united endeavors of the churches and the YMCA were increasingly apparent. I am by no means certain that I should separate them for, as I understand, they are one. The church is the heart which prompts the work and which sustains the hand, the YMCA in the uplifting of the young manhood of our land. For nearly a year I preached from three to five times a week and often six times on Sundays in hospitals, camp clearing stations and YMCA tents and on only one occasion failed to see immediate decisions for the Lord Jesus Christ. The smallest number that I ever saw decide as the result of a Sunday's work was 10 and sometimes I have been privileged to witness over a hundred men proclaim their allegiance to their savior at a single Sunday service and several hundred during the whole week's meetings. I, of course, was able only to see the work of grace as exemplified before my own eyes and that was but a small part of the whole. The YMCA secretaries could tell of hundreds upon hundreds of men who in their tents have made the great decision. To the best of my knowledge, thousands of men were reached, benefited and in many cases won to Christ in a year by the various agencies of the Church of God. To him be all the praise. Such a work, however, could only be accomplished by the aid of the many noble self-sacrificing Christian soldiers in the ranks. The following incident will serve to show how their influence reached many who could not have been won by any other agency. One night after an address in a colonial YMCA tent, I noticed among those who had expressed their desire to lead a new life. A man whose face was not only unusually ugly but also really bad, Vice had left its indelible mark on his continence. I asked a new convert who was standing near me who he was. He replied, Do you mean that bloke standing near the door? Yes. That bloke whose dial is the dizzy limit? Yes. I don't know him, but he's a waster from his looks. Was all the information he could give me? I went over to the bloke whose dial was the dizzy limit and found the poor fellow in deep distress. He acknowledged with an oath every third word that he was a goddamn waster always on the blasted booze, couldn't live clean but wanted strength to live as in his better moments he felt he should live. He knelt down and prayed and in the strongest and worst possible language told God all he knew against himself. It was not a pretty tale and was garnished with such frightful oaths that when he got off his knees, I said, Look here, name left blank. I believe God was pleased to hear you pray, but he would have been better pleased if you hadn't sworn so much. He looked at me in surprise and said, I can't blasted well make out what you are driving at. I'm damned if I swore. I only spoke to God just as I always speak. What did I say wrong? I recapitulated all the various oaths that I could remember he had used and told them that the Christ who alone could save him had said, swear not at all and suggested that we should get down on our knees again and ask God to cure him of that habit. He consented and prayed something like this. God, you know what a blasted fool I am. I can't open my mouth without cussing. Just wash my mouth out and make it clean for Christ's sake and do it quick so the blokes in my tent won't think me a damned hypocrite. The following Thursday night I was just back from my work in Especaia when name left blanks, head was put through my tent door and in suppressed tones of excitement he said, I have got a bloke here as wants to do the square thing with God. Just talk to him as you did to me last Sunday night and I think it will do the trick. He's a decent sort of bloke he is. I asked him to bring his friend in and then leave so that I could speak to him privately. In a minute the bloke appeared. I asked him what he wanted to see me about. To my surprise he was an educated man, an undergraduate of a well-known New Zealand university. He said, as a child I jibbed on the miracles. I couldn't understand them and thought there was nothing in religion. But I have been thinking more about religion the last few weeks than ever I thought before and name left censored, made me think more. I don't suppose you know, I smiled, I did know. But he was the foulest mouth brute in the whole regiment and I have to share the same tent with him. He never told a yarn but it was full of filth from beginning to end. Well, since Sunday last I have seen a miracle. He hasn't sworn once and it's not the fault of the boys he hasn't. They've ragged him enough and instead of being the most selfish man I have ever known he is always trying to do something for the very chaps who rag him. Now I know I am not as bad as he was but I am worse than I want to be. And God knows that if, as name left censored says, Christ cured him of his sins, I am willing to be a Christian, to be quit of mine. Scores of men in a quiet, unaustentatious way by their lives so recommend the gospel of Jesus Christ that their comrades were induced by their example to follow the same Lord. Swearing is undoubtedly the besetting sin of troops. Some commence it because they think it manly and soldier-like. Others because they have contracted the habit and cannot give it up. Others because they are so ignorant that they do not know how to emphasize their remarks in any language other than swear words. Here again I found that many men became Christians in order to overcome this senseless habit. One night a soldier came into my tent and said, Captain, my people are good Christian people but I commence swearing as a lad simply out of bravado and now I can't trust myself not to swear even when I am in the company of women. I have tried my damnedest to give it up but it's no good. I am swearing before I am able to stop myself. Can I get cured of that and have foul thinking? I of course had but to point him to the one who is mighty to save. One night several of the new converts were gathered for prayer in my tent and the conversation turned upon what was the greatest difference Christ had made in their lives. This boy said, greatest difference I notice in myself is this. In our route marches we all, as you know. The others nodded sympathizingly. Get choked full of dust and sand. It gets in our eyes, our ears, our mouths and before I became a Christian I was always cursing it. The man riding in front of me, the army, myself for having been such a fool as to join and everything. Today as you chaps know, the wind was awful. The sand was as bad as it could be but I was just as happy as if there was nothing wrong. My heart was singing and my lips had to sing too. I could weary the reader with countless stories similar to the above but I forbear. However, I must tell of one man who came to see me in my private tent. Tears were in his eyes and all he could do was to sit on my bed and repeat over and over again. I can't get away from it. What can't you get away from? Again he repeated, I can't get away from it. At last he told me that his whole family were earnest Christians. He had wanted to lead his own life and at an early age had run away from home so as to escape what he called the endless talk about Christ and salvation. After being away for years during which he had lived an absolutely wicked and godless life, war broke out and he had been induced to go home to say goodbye to his people before leaving New Zealand. They told him that morning and evening they would pray for him. He got mad and told them not to waste their breath and then to use his own words, I knew they were praying for me and each day for weeks past I have been afraid their prayers would be answered. Against my own will I have felt compelled to think of my past and to long to be a Christian. Whilst you were speaking tonight I felt that tonight I must yield. I cannot get away from their prayers. There you have in seven words the secret of the salvation of so many of the soldiers. They could not get away from the prayers of God's people in distant lands. Against their own will they were drawn by the spirit of love to their parents God. No power can avail against prayer. It is the mightiest of all known factors and always prevails. One evening at the conclusion of a meeting I had been holding in the Reverend Mr. McGill's YMCA building a tall, broad-shouldered, dissipated Australian non-commissioned officer came up to me and said, Do you think God could do anything with a waster like myself? I know he can if you will but give him a chance. Irrelevantly he next said, Were you not holding evangelistic services in censored place name in Australia? In 1899? I was. Weren't you at censored name mentioning a certain mission? Yes. Do you remember the leader of the mission? I looked at him more carefully and to my surprise recognized in this waster the man who had at the time he spoke of been in charge of the mission and said, Yes. And you're the man. I am. Where can we go to have a quiet talk? I took him to the place where the pots, pans and coal were stored the only spot available as the other two rooms were filled with inquirers. He sat down and told me his story. He had been a great religionist a tremendous sectarian an omnivorous reader indefatigable worker but nevertheless a poor Christian. On joining the AIF he hadn't the pluck to show his colors and had inevitably commenced to go on the downgrade. As is usually the case with men of that type of religious character his drift to absolute infidelity and in his case flagrant immorality when once he lost his sectarian moorings had been extremely rapid. He was also a blasphemer and a persistent drunkard. I read to him, Hosea 14 and explained it and then suggested that we should pray together. He agreed. We knelt down. I prayed and he followed. I have rarely heard such a prayer. At first it seemed as if the heavens were as brass but on he prayed. Still it seemed as if the prayer only reached the ceiling. Then the prayer stopped. No answer. The silence seemed intermitable and was only broken by more prayer. The prayer of a man who had hope for now he was pleading God's promises of forgiveness and healing. Again, there was a silence that could be felt broken by the man, standing up with tears streaming down his face and a look of indescribable awe upon his countenance. As in hushed, solemn yet glad words he said. Oh God, you've forgiven me. God, you've forgiven me. Me, me, me. His voice grew lower and lower until the last me was but a whisper. And then again he said, Me, you've forgiven me. And now the prayer sounded like a song of wondering love. God, I promise you I'll do anything for you. Anything. Oh God, you're wonderful, just wonderful. Oh, how wonderful to forgive me. His afterlife and changed face were eloquent testimony to the reality of his conversion. End of chapter nine. Chapter 10 of With the Anzacs in Cairo by Guy Thornton. This LibriVox recording is in the public domain. Chapter 10 in the military hospitals. One of a chaplain's chief duties is, of course, to visit the sick and wounded in the hospitals in order to ensure the systematic visitation that alone can be productive of good, a roster is drawn up. And until the troops left for Gallipoli, two of the chaplains were detailed to visit the New Zealand hospital each day. After the main body of Australian and New Zealand troops had proceeded to Anzac, which, by the way, is not, as some assume, a Turkish or Arabic name, but the initial letters of Australian, New, Zealand, Army, Corps. The chaplains who did not accompany them were attached for duty at Malta, Alexandria, Port Said, Cairo, and for a time at Helwan. I was sent to the last place to act as New Zealand resident chaplain at the Great El Hayat Hotel, which had been converted into an Australian and New Zealand convalescent hospital. Helwan is perhaps the oldest Spain in the world and for thousands of years has been the resort of rheumatic and gaudy patients who have sought to obtain relief by bathing in its naturally hot and medicinal springs. I had many interesting talks with the men, the majority of whom had been wounded during the early days of the fighting at Gallipoli. Visiting the wounded on the Great Stone Piazza of the hospital, I remarked a young man who was apparently not more than 22 years of age. He wore dark spectacles and the whole of his right cheek was seamed and scarred by livid lines which marked the track of two machine gun bullets. Pale his death and attenuated in form he was to judge from appearances the most unlikely of men to win the coveted DCM, which he had earned. So his comrades vowed half a dozen times over by the deeds of splendid heroism. I said to him, I'm sorry to see you've been so badly knocked about my boy. Thank you captain, but I'm no worse off than thousands of my mates and much better off than thousands of those poor beggars who are worse hit than I was. I'm glad to have been able to do my bit. It must make a chap think pretty seriously over there, I said. My word it does, when I went there I had never given a thought to religion, but I hadn't been long on the peninsula before I found myself compelled to think mighty hard. I had always lived a fairly decent life and with the exception of swearing had very little to reproach myself with. But there I just felt I needed strength. And so I just gave myself to Christ and God did enable me to conquer swearing. He took the desire for it away and only once since the day I decided to be a Christian have I sworn it happened something like this. We were in action and at a critical moment the machine gun jammed. I lost my self control and swore at one of my mates and do you know Captain, I am sometimes inclined to think the reason I got this wound in my jaw was a punishment for my sin. I was real sorry though, the very moment after I swore. Do you think that it was a punishment? I was deeply touched and replied, he has not dealt with us after our sins nor rewarded us according to our iniquities. No my boy, I scarcely think so. Well sir, I'm glad you don't think so. Personally I don't regret it very much. It was worth going over to the peninsula and being wounded to become a Christian. I'm a better and happier fellow now than I was before. It's grand to have your conscience at rest. It's worth anything. Before I left him, he said very quietly, I am glad too to be able to take back with me the DCM. My people will be so pleased. There are many who as they read the casualty lists are stricken to the heart to see recorded therein as killed in action. Some loved relative or friend who as far was known had never definitely accepted Christ as his savior and consequently Christian friends have been disposed to doubt whether God had heard and answered their prayers. To such God's message comes, be not faithless but believing. God being what he is must for his own honor's sake hear and answer every believing prayer. I will now give in the words of the narrators several instances of men who had they been killed would naturally have been supposed to have died impenitent. However, before doing so, I will repeat the statement of a man who made no profession of Christianity. In one of the English papers, a clergyman of high standing was reported to have said that those men who gave their lives for the country would receive mercy and salvation from God since. Greater love hath no man than he giveth his life for his friends. In the tent, this subject was being discussed and the strong common sense of the majority of disputants was voiced and evidenced by one of them finally saying as reported to me by a soldier who was present. I don't hold myself up to be a plaster saint. Everybody smiled. He certainly did not look like one. And if those blooming Parsons think any sane chap would swallow that lie, they are bigger fools than I took them for. And that's saying a lot. Here's Jay here, mentioning one of his mates. We all know that the sort of bloke he is and why he had to get out of New Zealand. He had made his place of residence. Too damned hot to hold him. Here I am. I swear like blazes. There is not a blamed thing that the Bible is up against that I don't do. And I say that we, if we get a bullet through our heads go straight to heaven is more than I can swallow. I am fed up with the wowsers slang for ministers or Christians who say one thing and say to try to please us when the book they say they try to follow just says the opposite. The book says I don't set up to know much about it but I remember this much. He that believeth not shall be damned. There's no blessed chili shalling there. It's straight to the point. Do Jay and me believe? Of course we don't. Or we couldn't live like we are living. If wowsers like that bloke lived among men and knew what they were really they wouldn't talk such blooming rot. An Australian who took part in the now historic landing at Gallipoli told me the following. As we climbed up the hill it seemed as if I was going to certain death. My mate on my left had his head blown clean off his shoulders. Two others on my left fell. One dead the other severely wounded. I knew and had known for years that I should be a Christian. My parents are real Christians, Presbyterians. I felt I must pray and ask God to save me. I did so. I asked God to take me and I promised there and then that I would serve him. Then something whispered to me through all the noise. It's a cowardly thing to ask God to save you when you are only afraid of being killed. And for a moment I thought it was. Then came this thought into my mind. It's never too late to do right and so I prayed again and my word. It fairly surprised me how God answered it so quickly. And I knew he had answered it for I felt at perfect rest and I didn't care much whether I was killed or not. For I knew I was at last right with God. Another soldier from South Australia said in almost the same words. The fire was terrible. How any of us got through to life was a miracle. I was with a bunch of men climbing the cliff and I never expected to get to the top alive. My people are Christians. I knew that they were praying for me and that sort of comfort me for a bit. But I knew enough to know that if I was to be saved I should have to pray for myself. We sheltered in a hollow for a few minutes and the bullets were whizzing just over our heads. There I give myself right up to Christ, told him what a rather I had been and promised him that if he would save me I would do anything I could for him. And he did. Had these two men been killed who would have thought that they had in the heat of the conflict made the great decision. Yet they had done so and their afterlife showed that the decision had been real. Another man, a Christian told me his experience in the following words. As the boats drew nearer and nearer the shore I was afraid that I should be afraid and by my cowardice bring disgrace upon the name of Christ for all my mates knew me to be a professing Christian. In maneuvers I knew that I was apt to get excited and very nervous. And so I asked God to give me courage and peace so that I might not dishonor my savior or seem to be flurried. Immediately it seemed as if the words of the hymn were spoken to me and I used them as an addition to my prayer. Hold thou my hand, I am so weak and feeble. I dare not take a step without thine aid. And then a strange indescribable peace possessed me. My fears vanished and I was much cooler and more collected than in any sham fight. All through that long and terrible charge I felt as if God's hand indeed held me. We flung ourselves down and dug ourselves in under heavy fire. We had advanced too far and when night fell the Turks almost surrounded us firing continuously from three sides of our hastily dug trench. Man after man fell. We had determined to die rather than surrender so it seemed as if death was certain. Still I had perfect peace. Then the OC asked me to crawl out under fire to take a look out duty. I got there safely and never in all my Christian life had such a glorious experience of God's presence feeling absolutely assured that all was right whether I lived or died. At last a stray bullet hit me in the head. But I still retained the sense of the Father's presence and felt absolutely assured that all was right whether I lived or died. I was wounded at night and was not discovered until the next morning. Through it all I had peace. A wounded Highlander, a private who before he enlisted had been a school master told me of two men in his regiment who were great chumps. One was a decided Christian, the other was not. The Highlanders were preparing to charge and a feeling of deadly nausea crept over the non-Christian. He looked at his Christian friend and saw that he at any rate possessed a peace and power to which he personally was a stranger. In his fear and desire to be brave there was rung from him a cry to God for salvation. The answer came and he said he seemed to hear a voice saying fear not for I am with thee. His fear vanished and he was by divine grace able to play the man. The longer I worked in the hospitals the more my admiration for the men increased. Their magnificent patience, wonderful endurance and uplifting cheerfulness was beyond praise. It was very rarely that a man was heard grousing and if he did his mates gave him such a time of it that he found it convenient to assume a more cheerful frame of mind although he might be far from possessing it. The following are two instances called from many which go to prove their unquenchable courage. One stifling summer afternoon I was visiting the New Zealand General Hospital. Lying on a cot in the veranda was a young New Zealand soldier intently watching the efforts of a small ant to carry away the corpse of a large fly and bursting into merry peals of laughter at the failures of the ant. As I drew near the bad I saw that the poor fellow had lost his leg below the knee. A shrapnel shell had burst near him killing his two mates and felling him to the earth. He did not lose consciousness and called to his friend by name asking him where he was hit. Receiving no answer he concluded that he was either dead or insensible and trying to rise to go to his comrades' assistance. He discovered to his great surprise that a foot in its boot was on the ground a few feet from him. Looking at himself for the first time he knew that he had lost part of his leg which had been blown clean off and that this limb he saw was or had been his own. This dear lad's eyes filled with tears as he spoke of the death of his mates but he was inclined to think little of his own great loss when he considered how many had got off worse than he had. But I think the most astounding example of patient endurance and cheerfulness was that evidenced by a British soldier to whom a friend of mine spoke on board a transport which was conveying wounded from Gallipoli to Alexandria. He was a big boned stalwart North Country men. My friend noticed him lying alone and asked him how he was. He in answer said that he had lost his sight from shell concussion and that the doctors held out no hope for its restoration. His right leg had been blown off near the hip and his left arm had also gone. When my friend offered his condolences the poor man simply said in the broadest of broad accents, well I thank God I have a little home to go back to, a good wife and six children. I may be a bit knocked about but my life is spared with many of my mates have gone under. I have a lot to be thankful for. Things might have been worse. What a lesson to those of us who are disposed to grouse if the bacon and eggs are a bit cold, if the weather is not what we wish for, if we have toothache, neuralgia or any kindred but trivial complaint. End of chapter 10. Chapter 11 of With the Anzacs and Cairo by Guy Thornton. This LibriVox recording is in the public domain. Chapter 11, Distributing Comforts to Sick Troops. It was in the middle of August, 1915 that I was called upon to assist chaplain captain A. McDonald in the distribution of gift goods to the New Zealand sick and wounded. Great battles had been fought at Gallipoli. Hundreds upon hundreds of wounded were pouring into the Cairo hospitals in an almost continual stream. There were not sufficient chaplains left in Cairo to cope with the work of visiting, distributing the needed comforts and taking services at the various hospitals and camps. This work was made a pleasure by the liberality and assistance received from all those who had the oversight. Nothing was grudge the men. We had instructions to procure anything that would conduce to their comfort and welfare. Many of the poor, wounded men had lost everything and had come over from the peninsula, wrapped in a blanket, no great privation considering the heat of the sun. I remember an amusing incident that happened in an Australian hospital where I was visiting a New Zealander who had been badly wounded and whose bloodstained clothes had been cut off him at Gallipoli. He was convalescent and that afternoon was being transferred to the New Zealand General Hospital. I was in the ward when the sergeant in charge informed him that he was to go away from the hospital and exactly what he came into it with. Of course, the sergeant thought that he had come with a full kit. Without a smile, the New Zealander calmly removed every single stitch of clothing, sat on his bed, fully dressed, in an identification disc and calmly announced that he was quite ready to leave. The sergeant glanced at him and said, Don't play the fool. Orders are to go in what you came in. That's just what I am doing, replied the patient. For men in that condition, it was the chaplain's duty to furnish shirt, braces, socks, anything, in fact, in the clothing line, save his uniform. In addition to this, each man received a razor. Some were blunt, very blunt. A strop, shaving brush, soap, a weekly issue of tobacco, New Zealand papers, et cetera, et cetera, besides which the sister in each ward received dainties to tempt the appetites of the influence. I may be biased, but I do not see how more could have been done for the men by any government. There were, of course, many complaints because the sick and wounded did not receive any pay. While sympathizing with the poor fellows, I could not but approve the reason why pay was stopped. Convalescence would in some cases, if given their pay, as soon as they were able to leave the hospital, get intoxicated and coming back in that condition would upset the rest of the patients. Were it not for the rotters, the army would be splendid, but since they unfortunately exist, the decent men have to suffer for the misdeeds of the few wasters. Later on arrangements were made whereby the patients were permitted to expend a few shillings a week at the hospital dry canteens. Chaplain Captain MacDonald had all the machinery incidental to the distribution of many and various comforts to over 1500 men in, at first, some 14 hospitals in such good running order that when I assumed a charge of this department, consequent on his departure to New Zealand through ill health, I had only to keep things going. Unfortunately, however, I shortly afterwards fell ill and was compelled to leave Egypt and recruit in England. End of Chapter 11. Recording by Adam Bielka. End of With the Anzacs and Cairo by Guy Thornton.