University of Virginia Library

4. CHAPTER IV.
A NIGHT.

Being fond of the night side of nature, I was soon promoted
to the post of night nurse, with every facility for indulging in
my favorite pastime of “owling.” My colleague, a black-eyed
widow, relieved me at dawn, we two taking care of the
ward, between us, like the immortal Sairy and Betsey, “turn
and turn about.” I usually found my boys in the jolliest
state of mind their condition allowed; for it was a known fact
that Nurse Periwinkle objected to blue devils, and entertained
a belief that he who laughed most was surest of recovery. At
the beginning of my reign, dumps and dismals prevailed; the
nurses looked anxious and tired, the men gloomy or sad; and a
general “Hark!-from-the-tombs-a-doleful-sound” style of conversation
seemed to be the fashion: a state of things which
caused one coming from a merry, social New England town, to
feel as if she had got into an exhausted receiver; and the
instinct of self-preservation, to say nothing of a philanthropic
desire to serve the race, caused a speedy change in Ward
No. 1.

More flattering than the most gracefully turned compliment,
more grateful than the most admiring glance, was the sight of
those rows of faces, all strange to me a little while ago, now
lighting up, with smiles of welcome, as I came among them,
enjoying that moment heartily, with a womanly pride in their
regard, a motherly affection for them all. The evenings were
spent in reading aloud, writing letters, waiting on and amusing
the men, going the rounds with Dr. P, as he made his second
daily survey, dressing my dozen wounds afresh, giving last
doses, and making them cozy for the long hours to come, till
the nine o'clock bell rang, the gas was turned down, the day
nurses went off duty, the night watch came on, and my nocturnal
adventure began.

My ward was now divided into three rooms; and, under
favor of the matron, I had managed to sort out the patients in
such a way that I had what I called, “my duty room,” my
“pleasure room,” and my “pathetic room,” and worked for
each in a different way. One, I visited, armed with a dressing
tray, full of rollers, plasters, and pins; another, with books,
flowers, games, and gossip; a third, with teapots, lullabies,
consolation, and, sometimes, a shroud.

Wherever the sickest or most helpless man chanced to be,
there I held my watch, often visiting the other rooms, to see
that the general watchman of the ward did his duty by the
fires and the wounds, the latter needing constant wetting.
Not only on this account did I meander, but also to get fresher
air than the close rooms afforded; for, owing to the stupidity
of that mysterious “somebody” who does all the damage
in the world, the windows had been carefully nailed down
above, and the lower sashes could only be raised in the mildest
weather, for the men lay just below. I had suggested a summary
smashing of a few panes here and there, when frequent

appeals to headquarters had proved unavailing, and daily
orders to lazy attendants had come to nothing. No one seconded
the motion, however, and the nails were far beyond my
reach; for, though belonging to the sisterhood of “ministering
angels,” I had no wings, and might as well have asked for
Jacob's ladder, as a pair of steps, in that charitable chaos.

One of the harmless ghosts who bore me company during
the haunted hours, was Dan, the watchman, whom I regarded
with a certain awe; for, though so much together, I never
fairly saw his face, and, but for his legs, should never have
recognized him, as we seldom met by day. These legs were
remarkable, as was his whole figure, for his body was short,
rotund, and done up in a big jacket, and muffler; his beard
hid the lower part of his face, his hat-brim the upper; and all
I ever discovered was a pair of sleepy eyes, and a very mild
voice. But the legs! — very long, very thin, very crooked
and feeble, looking like grey sausages in their tight coverings,
without a ray of pegtopishness about them, and finished off
with a pair of expansive, green cloth shoes, very like Chinese
junks, with the sails down. This figure, gliding noiselessly
about the dimly lighted rooms, was strongly suggestive of the
spirit of a beer barrel mounted on cork-screws, haunting the
old hotel in search of its lost mates, emptied and staved in
long ago.

Another goblin who frequently appeared to me, was the
attendant of the pathetic room, who, being a faithful soul, was
often up to tend two or three men, weak and wandering as
babies, after the fever had gone. The amiable creature beguiled
the watches of the night by brewing jorums of a fearful beverage,
which he called coffee, and insisted on sharing with
me; coming in with a great bowl of something like mud
soup, scalding hot, guiltless of cream, rich in an all-pervading

flavor of molasses, scorch and tin pot. Such an amount of
good will and neighborly kindness also went into the mess,
that I never could find the heart to refuse, but always received
it with thanks, sipped it with hypocritical relish while he
remained, and whipped it into the slop-jar the instant he
departed, thereby gratifying him, securing one rousing laugh
in the doziest hour of the night, and no one was the worse for
the transaction but the pigs. Whether they were “cut off
untimely in their sins,” or not, I carefully abstained from
inquiring.

It was a strange life — asleep half the day, exploring
Washington the other half, and all night hovering, like a
massive cherubim, in a red rigolette, over the slumbering sons
of man. I liked it, and found many things to amuse, instruct,
and interest me. The snores alone were quite a study, varying
from the mild sniff to the stentorian snort, which startled the
echoes and hoisted the performer erect to accuse his neighbor
of the deed, magnanimously forgive him, and, wrapping the
drapery of his couch about him, lie down to vocal slumber.
After listening for a week to this band of wind instruments, I
indulged in the belief that I could recognize each by the snore
alone, and was tempted to join the chorus by breaking out
with John Brown's favorite hymn:

I would have given much to have possessed the art of
sketching, for many of the faces became wonderfully interesting
when unconscious. Some grew stern and grim, the men
evidently dreaming of war, as they gave orders, groancd over
their wounds, or damned the rebels vigorously; some grew sad
and infinitely pathetic, as if the pain borne silently all day, revenged
itself by now betraying what the man's pride had concealed
so well. Often the roughest grew young and pleasant

when sleep smoothed the hard lines away, letting the real nature
assert itself; many almost seemed to speak, and I learned to
know these men better by night than through any intercourse
by day. Sometimes they disappointed me, for faces that looked
merry and good in the light, grew bad and sly when the shadows
came; and though they made no confidences in words, I
read their lives, leaving them to wonder at the change of manner
this midnight magic wrought in their nurse. A few talked
busily; one drummer boy sang sweetly, though no persuasions
could win a note from him by day; and several depended on
being told what they had talked of in the morning. Even my
constitutionals in the chilly halls, possessed a certain charm,
for the house was never still. Sentinels tramped round it all
night long, their muskets glittering in the wintry moonlight as
they walked, or stood before the doors, straight and silent, as
figures of stone, causing one to conjure up romantic visions of
guarded forts, sudden surprises, and daring deeds; for in
these war times the hum drum life of Yankeedom has vanished,
and the most prosaic feel some thrill of that excitement which
stirs the nation's heart, and makes its capital a camp of hospitals.
Wandering up and down these lower halls, I often heard
cries from above, steps hurrying to and fro, saw surgeons
passing up, or men coming down carrying a stretcher, where
lay a long white figure, whose face was shrouded and whose
fight was done. Sometimes I stopped to watch the passers in
the street, the moonlight shining on the spire opposite, or the
gleam of some vessel floating, like a white-winged sea-gull,
down the broad Potomac, whose fullest flow can never wash
away the red stain of the land.

The night whose events I have a fancy to record, opened
with a little comedy, and closed with a great tragedy; for a
virtuous and useful life untimely ended is always tragical to

those who see not as God sees. My headquarters were beside
the bed of a New Jersey boy, crazed by the horrors of that
dreadful Saturday. A slight wound in the knee brought him
there; but his mind had suffered more than his body; some
string of that delicate machine was over strained, and, for
days, he had been reliving, in imagination, the scenes he could
not forget, till his distress broke out in incoherent ravings,
pitiful to hear. As I sat by him, endeavoring to soothe his
poor distracted brain by the constant touch of wet hands over
his hot forehead, he lay cheering his comrades on, hurrying
them back, then counting them as they fell around him, often
clutching my arm, to drag me from the vicinity of a bursting
shell, or covering up his head to screen himself from a shower
of shot; his face brilliant with fever; his eyes restless; his
head never still; every muscle strained and rigid; while an
incessant stream of defiant shouts, whispered warnings, and
broken laments, poured from his lips with that forceful bewilderment
which makes such wanderings so hard to overhear.

It was past eleven, and my patient was slowly wearying
himself into fitful intervals of quietude, when, in one of these
pauses, a curious sound arrested my attention. Looking over
my shoulder, I saw a one-legged phantom hopping nimbly
down the room; and, going to meet it, recognized a certain
Pennsylvania gentleman, whose wound-fever had taken a turn
for the worse, and, depriving him of the few wits a drunken
campaign had left him, set him literally tripping on the light,
fantastic toe “toward home,” as he blandly informed me,
touching the military cap which formed a striking contrast to
the severe simplicity of the rest of his decidedly undress uniform.
When sane, the least movement produced a roar of
pain or a volley of oaths; but the departure of reason seemed
to have wrought an agreeable change, both in the man and his

manners; for, balancing himself on one leg, like a meditative
stork, he plunged into an animated discussion of the war, the
President, lager beer, and Enfleld rifles, regardless of any
suggestions of mine as to the propriety of returning to bed,
lest he be court martialed for desertion.

Anything more supremely ridiculous can hardly be imagined
than this figure, scantily draped in white, its one foot
covered with a big blue sock, a dingy cap set rakingly askew
on its shaven head, and plaeid satisfaction beaming in its
broad red face, as it flourished a mug in one hand, an old
boot in the other, calling them canteen and knapsack, while it
skipped and fluttered in the most uncarthly fashion. What to
do with the creature I didn't know; Dan was absent, and if I
went to find him, the perambulator might festoon himself out
of the window, set his toga on fire, or do some of his neighbors
a mischief. The attendant of the room was sleeping like a
near relative of the celebrated Seven, and nothing short of
pins would rouse him; for he had been out that day, and whiskey
asserted its supremacy in balmy whiffs. Still declaiming,
in a fine flow of eloquence, the demented gentleman hopped
on, blind and deaf to my graspings and entreaties; and I
was about to slam the door in his face, and run for help, when
a second and saner phantom, “all in white,” came to the rescue,
in the likeness of a big Prussian, who spoke no English,
but divined the crisis, and put an end to it, by bundling the
lively monoped into his bed, like a baby, with an authoritative
command to “stay put,” which received added weight from
being delivered in an odd conglomeration of French and German,
accompanied by warning wags of a head decorated with
a yellow cotton night cap, rendered most imposing by a tassel
like a bell-pull. Rather exhausted by his excursion, the member
from Pennsylvania subsided; and, after an irrepressible

laugh together, my Prussian ally and myself were returning
to our places, when the echo of a sob caused us to glance along
the beds. It came from one in the corner — such a little bed!
— and such a tearful little face looked up at us, as we stopped
beside it! The twelve years old drummer boy was not sing
ing now, but sobbing, with a manly effort all the while to stifle
the distressful sounds that would break out.

“What is it, Teddy!” I asked, as he rubbed the tears
away, and checked himself in the middle of a great sob to
answer plaintively:

“I've got a chill, ma'am, but I aint cryin' for that, 'cause
I'm used to it. I dreamed Kit was here, and when I waked
up he wasn't, and I couldn't help it, then.”

The boy came in with the rest, and the man who was taken
dead from the ambulance was the Kit be mourned. Well he
might; for, when the wounded were brought from Fredericksburg,
the child lay in one of the camps thereabout, and
this good friend, though sorely hurt himself, would not leave
him to the exposure and neglect of such a time and place;
but, wrapping him in his own blanket, carried him in his arms
to the transport, tended him during the passage, and only
yielded up his charge when Death met him at the door of
the hospital which promised care and comfort for the boy.
For ten days, Teddy had shivered or burned with fever and
ague, pining the while for Kit, and refusing to be comforted,
because he had not been able to thank him for the generous
protection, which, perhaps, had cost the giver's life. The
vivid dream had wrung the childish heart with a fresh pang,
and when I tried the solace fitted for his years, the remorseful
fear that haunted him found vent in a fresh burst of tears, as
he looked at the wasted hands I was endeavoring to warm:

“Oh! if I'd only been as thin when Kit carried me as I am

now, maybe he wouldn't have died; but I was heavy, he was
hurt worser than we knew, and so it killed him; and I didn't
see him, to say good bye.”

This thought had troubled him in secret; and my assurances
that his friend would probably have died at all events,
hardly assuaged the bitterness of his regretful grief.

At this juncture, the delirious man began to shout; the one-legged
rose up in his bed, as if preparing for another dart;
Teddy be wailed himself more piteously than before: and if
ever a woman was at her wit's end, that distracted female was
Nurse Periwinkle, during the space of two or three minutes,
as she vibrated between the three beds, like an agitated pendulum.
Like a most opportune reinforcement, Dan, the bandy,
appeared, and devoted himself to the lively party, leaving me
free to return to my post; for the Prussian, with a nod and a
smile, took the lad away to his own bed, and lulled him to
sleep with a soothing murmur, like a mammoth humble bee.
I liked that in Fritz, and if he ever wondered afterward at the
dainties which sometimes found their way into his rations, or
the extra comforts of his bed, he might have found a solution
of the mystery in sundry persons' knowledge of the fatherly
action of that night.

Hardly was I settled again, when the inevitable bowl
appeared, and its bearer delivered a message I had expected,
yet dreaded to receive:

“John is going, ma'am, and wants to see you, if you can
come.”

“The moment this boy is asleep; tell him so, and let me
know if I am in danger of being too late.”

My. Ganymede departed, and while I quieted poor Shaw, I
thought of John. He came in a day or two after the others;
and, one evening, when I entered my “pathetic room,” I

found a lately emptied bed occupied by a large, fair man,
with a fine face, and the serenest eyes I ever met. One of
the earlier comers had often spoken of a friend, who had
remained behind, that those apparently worse wounded than
himself might reach a shelter first. It seemed a David and
Jonathan sort of friendship. The man fretted for his mate,
and was never tired of praising John—his courage, sobriety,
self-denial, and unfailing kindliness of heart: always winding
up with: “He's an out an'out fine feller, ma'am; you see
if he aint.”

I had some curiosity to behold this piece of excellence, and
when he came, watched him for a night or two, before I made
friends with him; for, to tell the truth, I was a little afraid of
the stately looking man, whose bed had to be lengthened to
accommodate his commanding stature; who seldom spoke,
uttered no complaint, asked no sympathy, but tranquilly
observed what went on about him; and, as he lay high upon
his pillows, no picture of dying statesman or warrior was ever
fuller of real dignity than this Virginia blacksmith. A most
attractive face he had, framed in brown hair and beard, comely
featured and full of vigor, as yet unsubdued by pain; thoughtful
and often beautifully mild while watching the afflictions of
others, as if entirely forgetful of his own. His mouth was
grave and firm, with plenty of will and courage in its lines,
but a smile could make it as sweet as any woman's; and his
eyes were child's eyes, looking one fairly in the face, with a
clear, straightforward glance, which promised well for such as
placed their faith in him. He seemed to cling to life, as if it
were rich in duties and delights, and he had learned the secret
of content. The only time I saw his composure disturbed,
was when my surgeon brought another to examine John, who
scrutinized their faces with an anxious look, asking of the

elder: “Do you think I shall pull through, sir?” “I hope
so, my man.” And, as the two passed on, John's eye still
followed them, with an intentness which would have won a
clearer answer from them, had they seen it. A momentary
shadow flitted over his face; then came the usual serenity, as
if, in that brief eclipse, he had acknowledged the existence of
some hard possibility, and, asking nothing yet hoping all
things, left the issue in God's hands, with that submission
which is true piety.

The next night, as I went my rounds with Dr. P., I
happened to ask which man in the room probably suffered
most; and, to my great surprise, he glanced at John:

“Every breath he draws is like a stab; for the ball pierced
the left lung, broke a rib, and did no end of damage here and
there; so the poor lad can find neither forgetfulness nor ease,
because he must lie on his wounded back or suffocate. It
will be a hard struggle, and a long one, for he possesses great
vitality; but even his temperate life can't save him; I wish it
could.”

“You don't mean he must die, Doctor?”

“Bless you, there's not the slightest hope for him; and
you'd better tell him so before long; women have a way of
doing such things comfortably, so I leave it to you. He
won't last more than a day or two, at furthest.”

I could have sat down on the spot and cried heartily, if I
had not learned the wisdom of bottling up one's tears for
leisure moments. Such an end seemed very hard for such a
man, when half a dozen worn out, worthless bodies round him,
were gathering up the remnants of wasted lives, to linger on
for years perhaps, burdens to others, daily reproaches to
themselves. The army needed men like John, earnest, brave,
and faithful; fighting for liberty and justice with both heart

and hand, true soldiers of the Lord. I could not give him
up so soon, or think with any patience of so excellent a nature
robbed of its fulfiment, and blundered into eternity by the
rashness or stupidity of those at whose hands so many lives
may be required. It was an easy thing for Dr. P. to say:
“Tell him he must die,” but a cruelly hard thing to do, and
by no means as “comfortable” as he politely suggested. I
had not the heart to do it then, and privately indulged the
hope that some change for the better might take place, in spite
of gloomy prophesies; so, rendering my task unnecessary. A
few minutes later, as I came in again, with fresh rollers, I saw
John sitting erect, with no one to support him, while the
surgeon dressed his back. I had never hitherto seen it done;
for, having simpler wounds to attend to, and knowing the
fidelity of the attendant, I had left John to him, thinking
it might be more agreeable and safe; for both strength and
experience were needed in his case. I had forgotten that the
strong man might long for the gentler tendance of a woman's
hands, the sympathetic magnetism of a woman's presence, as
well as the feebler souls about him. The Doctor's words
caused me to reproach myself with neglect, not of any real
duty perhaps, but of those little cares and kindnesses that
solace homesick spirits, and make the heavy hours pass easier.
John looked lonely and forsaken just then, as he sat with bent
head, hands folded on his knee, and no outward sign of suffering,
till, looking nearer, I saw great tears roll down and drop
upon the floor. It was a new sight there; for, though I had
seen many suffer, some swore, some groaned, most endured
silently, but none wept. Yet it did not seem weak, only very
touching, and straightway my fear vanished, my heart opened
wide and took him in, as, gathering the bent head in my arms,
as freely as if he had been a little child, I said, “Let me
help you bear it, John.”

Never, on any human countenance, have I seen so swift
and beautiful a look of gratitude, surprise and comfort, as that
which answered me more eloquently than the whispered —

“Thank you, ma'am, this is right good! this is what I
wanted!”

“Then why not ask for it before?”

“I didn't like to be a trouble; you seemed so busy, and I
could manage to get on alone.”

“You shall not want it any more, John.”

Nor did he; for now I understood the wistful look that
sometimes followed me, as I went out, after a brief pause
beside his bed, or merely a passing nod, while busied with
those who seemed to need me more than he, because more
urgent in their demands; now I knew that to him, as to so
many, I was the poor substitute for mother, wife, or sister,
and in his eyes no stranger, but a friend who hitherto had
seemed neglectful; for, in his modesty, he had never guessed
the truth. This was changed now; and, through the tedious
operation of probing, bathing, and dressing his wounds, he
leaned against me, holding my hand fast, and, if pain wrung
further tears from him, no one saw them fall but me. When
he was laid down again, I hovered about him, in a remorseful
state of mind that would not let me rest, till I had bathed his
face, brushed his “bonny brown hair,” set all things smooth
about him, and laid a knot of heath and heliotrope on his
clean pillow. While doing this, he watched me with the satisfied
expression I so liked to see; and when I offered the
little nosegay, held it carefully in his great hand, smoothed a
ruffled leaf or two, surveyed and smelt it with an air of
genuine delight, and lay contentedly regarding the glimmer of

the sunshine on the green. Although the manliest man among
my forty, he said, “Yes, ma'am,” like a little boy; received
suggestions for his comfort with the quick smile that brightened
his whole face; and now and then, as I stood tidying the
table by his bed, I felt him softly touch my gown, as if to
assure himself that I was there. Anything more natural and
frank I never saw, and found this brave John as bashful as
brave, yet full of excellencies and fine aspirations, which,
having no power to express themselves in words, seemed to
have bloomed into his character and made him what he was.

After that night, an hour of each evening that remained to
him was devoted to his ease or pleasure. He could not talk
much, for breath was precious, and he spoke in whispers; but
from occasional conversations, I gleaned scraps of private
history which only added to the affection and respect I felt for
him. Once he asked me to write a letter, and as I settled pen
and paper, I said, with an irrepressible glimmer of feminine
curiosity, “Shall it be addressed to wife, or mother, John?”

“Neither, ma'am; I've got no wife, and will write to
mother myself when I get better. Did you think I was
married because of this?” he asked, touching a plain ring he
wore, and often turned thoughtfully on his finger when he lay
alone.

“Partly that, but more from a settled sort of look you
have, a look which young men seldom get until they marry.”

“I don't know that; but I'm not so very young, ma'am,
thirty in May, and have been what you might call settled this
ten years; for mother's a widow, I'm the oldest child she has,
and it wouldn't do for me to marry until Lizzy has a home of
her own, and Laurie's learned his trade; for we're not rich,
and I must be father to the children and husband to the dear
old woman, if I can.”

“No doubt but you are both, John; yet how came you to
go to war, if you felt so? Wasn't enlisting as bad as marrying?”

“No, ma'am, not as I see it, for one is helping my neighbor,
the other pleasing myself. I went because I couldn't help it.
I didn't want the glory or the pay; I wanted the right thing
done, and people kept saying the men who were in earnest
ought to fight. I was in earnest, the Lord knows! but I held
off as long as I could, not knowing which was my duty;
mother saw the case, gave me her ring to keep me steady, and
said `Go:' so I went.”

A short story and a simple one, but the man and the mother
were portrayed better than pages of fine writing could have
done it.

“Do you ever regret that you came, when you lie here
suffering so much?”

“Never, ma'am; I haven't helped a great deal, but I've
shown I was willing to give my life, and perhaps I've got to;
but I don't blame anybody, and if it was to do over again, I'd
do if. I'm a little sorry I wasn't wounded in front; it looks
cowardly to be hit in the back, but I obeyed orders, and it
don't matter in the end, I know.”

Poor John! it did not matter now, except that a shot in
front might have spared the long agony in store for him. He
seemed to read the thought that troubled me, as he spoke so
hopefully when there was no hope, for he suddenly added:

“This is my first battle; do they think it's going to be my
last?”

“I'm afraid they do, John.”

It was the hardest question I had ever been called upon to
answer; doubly hard with those clear eyes fixed on mine,
forcing a truthful answer by their own truth. He seemed a

little startled at first, pondered over the fateful fact a moment
then shook his head, with a glance at the broad chest and
muscular limbs stretched out before him:

“I'm not afraid, but it's difficult to believe all at once. I'm
so strong it don't seem possible for such a little wound to kill
me.”

Merry Mercutio's dying words glanced through my memory
as he spoke: “ 'Tis not so deep as a well, nor so wide as a
church door, but 'tis enough.” And John would have said
the same could he have seen the ominous black holes between
his shoulders, he never had; and, seeing the ghastly sights
about him, could not believe his own wound more fatal than
these, for all the suffering it caused him.

“Shall I write to your mother, now?” I asked, thinking
that these sudden tidings might change all plans and puposes;
but they did not; for the man received the order of the Divine
Commander to march with the same unquestioning obedience
with which the soldier had received that of the human one,
doubtless remembering that the first led him to life, and the
last to death.

“No, ma'am; to Laurie just the same; he'll break it to
her best, and I'll add a line to her myself when you get
done.”

So I wrote the letter which he dictated, finding it better
than any I had sent; for, though here and there a little ungram
matical or inelegant, each sentence came to me briefly worded,
but most expressive; full of excellent counsel to the boy,
tenderly bequeathing “mother and Lizzie” to his care, and
bidding him good bye in words the sadder for their simplicity.
He added a few lines, with steady hand, and, as I sealed it,
said, with a patient sort of sigh, “I hope the answer will
come in time for me to see it;” then, turning away his face,

laid the flowers against his lips, as if to hide some quiver of
emotion at the thought of such a sudden sundering of all the
dear home ties.

These things had happened two days before; now John
was dying, and the letter had not come. I had been summoned
to many death beds in my life, but to none that made
my heart ache as it did then, since my mother called me to
watch the departure of a spirit akin to this in its gentleness
and patient strength. As I went in, John stretched out both
hands:

“I knew you'd come! I guess I'm moving on, ma'am.”

He was; and so rapidly that, even while he spoke, over his
face I saw the grey veil falling that no human hand can lift.
I sat down by him, wiped the drops from his forehead, stirred
the air about him with the slow wave of a fan, and waited to
help him die. He stood in sore need of help—and I could
do so little; for, as the doctor had foretold, the strong body
rebelled against death, and fought every inch of the way,
forcing him to draw each breath with a spasm, and clench his
hands with an imploring look, as if he asked, “How long
must I endure this, and be still!” For hours he suffered
dumbly, without a moment's respite, or a moment's murmuring;
his limbs grew cold, his face damp, his lips white, and, again
and again, he tore the covering off his breast, as if the lightest
weight added to his agony; yet through it all, his eyes never
lost their perfect serenity, and the man's soul seemed to sit
therein, undaunted by the ills that vexed his flesh.

One by one, the men woke, and round the room appeared
a circle of pale faces and watchful eyes, full of awe and pity;
for, though a stranger, John was beloved by all. Each man
there had wondered at his patience, respected his piety, admired
his fortitude, and now lamented his hard death; for the

influence of an upright nature had made itself deeply felt,
even in one little week. Presently, the Jonathan who so
loved this comely David, came creeping from his bed for a
last look and word. The kind soul was full of trouble, as the
choke in his voice, the grasp of his hand, betrayed; but there
were no tears, and the farewell of the friends was the more
touching for its brevity.

“Old boy, how are you?” faltered the one.

“Most through, thank heaven!” whispered the other.

“Can I say or do anything for you anywheres?”

“Take my things home, and tell them that I did my best.”

“I will! I will!”

“Good bye, Ned.”

“Good bye, John, good bye!”

They kissed each other, tenderly as women, and so parted,
for poor Ned could not stay to see his comrade die. For a
little while, there was no sound in the room but the drip of
water, from a stump or two, and John's distressful gasps, as
he slowly breathed his life away. I thought him nearly gone,
and had just laid down the fan, believing its help to be no
longer needed, when suddenly he rose up in his bed, and cried
out with a bitter cry that broke the silence, sharply startling
every one with its agonized appeal:

“For God's sake, give me air!”

It was the only cry pain or death had wrung from him, the
only boon he had asked; and none of us could grant it, for
all the airs that blew were useless now. Dan flung up the
window. The first red streak of dawn was warming the grey
east, a herald of the coming sun; John saw it, and with the
love of light which lingers in us to the end, seemed to read in
it a sign of hope of help, for, over his whole face there broke
that mysterious expression, brighter than any smile, which

often comes to eyes that look their last. He laid himself
gently down; and, stretching out his strong right arm, as if to
grasp and bring the blessed air to his lips in a fuller flow,
lapsed into a merciful unconsciousness, which assured us that
for him suffering was forever past. He died then; for, though
the heavy breaths still tore their way up for a little longer,
they were but the waves of an ebbing tide that beat unfelt
against the wreck, which an immortal voyager had deserted
with a smile. He never spoke again, but to the end held my
hand close, so close that when he was asleep at last, I could
not draw it away. Dan helped me, warning me as he did so
that it was unsafe for dead and living flesh to lie so long
together; but though my hand was strangely cold and stiff,
and four white marks remained across its back, even when
warmth and color had returned elsewhere, I could not but be
glad that, through its touch, the presence of human sympathy,
perhaps, had lightened that hard hour.

When they had made him ready for the grave, John lay in
state for half an hour, a thing which seldom happened in that
busy place; but a universal sentiment of reverence and
affection seemed to fill the hearts of all who had known or
heard of him; and when the rumor of his death went through
the house, always astir, many came to see him, and I felt a
tender sort of pride in my lost patient; for he looked a most
heroic figure, lying there stately and still as the statue of some
young knight asleep upon his tomb. The lovely expression
which so often beautifies dead faces, soon replaced the marks
of pain, and I longed for those who loved him best to see him
when half an hour's acquaintance with Death had made them
friends. As we stood looking at him, the ward master handed
me a letter, saying it had been forgotten the night before. It
was John's letter, come just an hour too late to gladden the

eyes that had longed and looked for it so eagerly: yet he had
it; for, after I had cut some brown locks for his mother, and
taken off the ring to send her, telling how well the talisman
had done its work, I kissed this good son for her sake, and
laid the letter in his hand, still folded as when I drew my
own away, feeling that its place was there, and making myself
happy with the thought, that, even in his solitary place in the
“Government Lot,” he would not be without some token of
the love which makes life beautiful and outlives death. Then
I left him, glad to have known so genuine a man, and carrying
with me an enduring memory of the brave Virginia blacksmith,
as he lay serenely waiting for the dawn of that long day
which knows no night.