Chapter 69
A gentleman, knowing the parties in his boyhood, rehea.r.s.ed to me the following anecdote:--
Old Dr. Gallup, of ----, N. H., was an excellent physician, whose failing lay in his propensity to imbibe more spirits then he could carry off.
"Are you drunk, or sober?" was no unusual question, put by those requiring his services, before permitting the old doctor to prescribe.
[Ill.u.s.tration: "PUMPING" AN OLD LADY.]
[Ill.u.s.tration: A DANGEROUS PRESCRIPTION.]
"Sober as a judge. What--hic--do you want?" he would reply.
Mr. B., who had been a long time confined to his house, under the care of an old fogy doctor, one of the "G.o.ds of Medicine," with whom all knowledge remains, and with whom all knowledge dies, after taking nearly all the drugs contained in his Materia Medica, decided to change, and sent for Dr.
Gallup.
"Are you drunk, or sober, doctor?" was the first salutation.
"Sober as a judge. What's wanted?" was the reply, omitting the "hic."
"Can you cure me? I've been blistered and parboiled, puked and physicked, bled in vein and pocket for the last three months. Now, can you cure me?"
Gallup looked over the case, and the medicine left by the other doctor, threw the latter all out of the window, ordered a nouris.h.i.+ng diet, told Mr. B. to take no more drugs, took his fee, and left. Mr. B. recovered without another visit.
[Ill.u.s.tration]
XXI.
SCENES FROM HOSPITAL AND CAMP.
"HE FOUGHT MIT SIEGEL."--A HOSPITAL SCENE AT NIGHT.--ADMINISTERING ANGELS.--"WATER! WATER!"--THE SOLDIER-BOY'S DYING MESSAGE.--THE WELL-WORN BIBLE.--WARM HEARTS IN FROZEN BODIES.--"PUDDING AND MILK."--THE POETICAL AND AMUSING SIDE.--"TO AMELIA."--MY LOVE AND I.--A SCRIPTURAL CONUNDRUM.--MARRYING A REGIMENT.
I met him again; he was trudging along, His knapsack with chickens was swelling; He'd "blenkered" these dainties, and thought it no wrong, From some secessionist's dwelling.
"What regiment's yours, and under whose flag Do you fight?" said I, touching his shoulder; Turning slowly about, he smilingly said,-- For the thought made him stronger and bolder,-- "I fights mit Siegel."
The next time I saw him, his knapsack was gone, His cap and his canteen were missing; Sh.e.l.l, shrapnell, and grape, and the swift rifle-ball, Around him and o'er him were hissing.
"How are you, my friend, and where have you been?
And for what, and for whom, are you fighting?"
He said, as a sh.e.l.l from the enemy's gun Sent his arm and his musket a-kiting, "I fights mit Siegel."
We sc.r.a.ped out his grave, and he dreamlessly sleeps On the bank of the Shenandoah River; His home and his kindred alike are unknown, His reward in the hands of the Giver.
We placed a rough board at the head of his grave, "And we left him alone in his glory,"
But on it we cut, ere we turned from the spot, The little we knew of his story-- "I fights mit Siegel."--GRANT P. ROBINSON.
If any of the little "life stories" which I here relate in this brief chapter, have perchance before met the reader's eye, I can only say that they cannot be read too often. We need no longer go back to remotest history--to Joan d'Arc, Grace Darling, Florence Nightingale, nor to revolutionary scenes--to find "cases of courage and devotion, for no annals are so rich as ours in these deliberate acts of unquestioning self-sacrifice, which at once enn.o.ble our estimate of human nature, and increase the homage we pay to the virtues of women."
A HOSPITAL SCENE AT NIGHT.
Night gathered her sable mantle about earth and sky, and the cold, wintry wind swept around the temporary hospital with a mournful wail, a rude lullaby, and a sad requiem to the wounded and dying soldier boys who crowded its rankling wards. Through the dark, sickly atmosphere, by the flickering lamp-lights, are just discernible the long rows of suffering, dying humanity. As the wind lulls, the sighs and groans of the unfortunate sufferers greet your ears
Every moment new ones are added to the mangled and suffering throng, as they are brought in from the battle-field and the amputating-room. The surgeons are busily at work. Every able-bodied soldier must be at the front, for the emergency is great. Ah! who shall give the "water" which raging thirst momentarily demands? Who is to soothe the fearful anguish, from lacerated nerve and muscle, by cruel shot and sh.e.l.l? And who shall smooth the dying pillow, hear the last prayer, for self, and for loved ones far away in the northern homes? And who will kindly receive the dying messages for those dear ones,--wife, children, father, mother,--whom he never will see again, and kiss the pallid cheek, commend the soul to G.o.d, and close the eyes forever of the poor soldier boy, who died away from home and friends, in the hospital?
G.o.d himself had raised up those to fill this sacred office, in the form of frail women--woman, because no man could fill the hallowed sphere.
Flitting from couch to couch, like a fairy thing, noiselessly; like an angel of mercy, administering, soothing; but like a _woman_, beautiful, frail, and slender, with a cheering smile, and sympathy, as much expressed in the light of the eye as the sound of the voice, she moistened the parched lips, lightened the pillows, and the hearts, and seemed never to tire in deeds of love and kindness to the distressed soldiers.
Next to the soldiers, the physicians know how to appreciate the true women at the hospital couch. After the manifestations of skill, labor, anxiety, and devotion to the cause by the physicians, thousands of men would have perished but for the hand and heart of woman, and who now live to speak her praise and cherish her memory forever.
"Ain't she an angel?" said a gray-haired veteran, as she gave the boys their breakfast. "She never seems to tire; she is always smiling, and don't seem to walk, but flies from one to another. G.o.d bless her."
"Ma'am, where did you come from?" asked a fair boy of seventeen summers, as she smoothed his hair, and told him, with gleaming eyes, he would soon see his mother, and the old homestead, and be won back to life and health.
"How could such a lady as you come way down here to take care of us poor, sick, dirty boys?"
"I consider it an honor," she said, "to wait on you, and wash off the mud you have waded through for me."
Said another, "Lady, please write down your name, that I may look at it, and take it home, and show my wife who wrote my letters, combed my hair, and fed me. I don't believe you're like other people."
"G.o.d bless her, and spare her life," they would say, with devotion, as she pa.s.sed on.
(These things were written of Miss Breckenbridge by Mrs. Hoge, of Chicago.)
THE SOLDIER BOY'S DYING MESSAGE.
She sat by the couch of a fair-haired boy, who was that day mortally wounded. It was night now, and in the hospital before described. The poor boy knew he must go, but before he died he wanted to leave a message of love for his mother, away in the northern home.
"Tell me all you wish to have her know; I will convey your message to her," said the lady, as she bent her slender young form over the dying boy, and tenderly smoothed back the fleecy locks from his pallid brow.
[Ill.u.s.tration: THE DYING MESSAGE.]
"O, bless you, dear lady. You speak words of such joy to me. But it is this. I left a good mother, and sister Susie, in the dear old home in A.
O, so much I have longed to see them during these last few hours! to see them but for one moment! O G.o.d, but for one moment!" And while he took breath she turned away her beautiful face to hide the falling tears, which she must not let the poor boy see. "Tell her," he pursued,--"my mother,--that I never found out how much I loved her till I came away from her side to fight for my country. O, lady, tell her this, and Susie, and poor father. I see it all now. And the old home comes back to my mind as clear as though I left it but yesterday. There is the old house, with its gabled roof, and the porch, all covered with clinging jessamines, and the big house-dog lying under the porch, and the great old well-sweep; and off in the meadow are the trees I used to climb. O, I never, never shall see them again. I feel very weak. Can't I have some more of that drink?"
"Yes, poor, dear boy. Here; the surgeon said you could have all you wanted."
"O, thank you. I wish I could write. O, there; that is so refres.h.i.+ng. If I could but write and tell her how good you have been to me! But write your name to her, the whole of it. She will understand, if you don't tell her how good you are. Well, I won't say any more, for you shake your head; but tell her how I love her, and them all. Am I fainting?"
She arose from her knees, and taking some water, with her hand she moistened his brow and his silky hair, and offered him some more of the strengthening cordial. But he declined taking it. The boy was dying. He made one more effort, and said,--
"Mother! Tell her, too, how I have kept her little Bible; and she can see how it has been read, and marked, and worn. O for one sight of her dear face, one look from her loving eyes, one kiss from her lips! I'd then die in peace."
The beautiful lady softly smoothed his hair, wiped his face, whispered words too sacred for sterner hearts, and kissed away her own tears from his pallid cheeks.
"Mother! Was it you? Then good by. I die--happy, Mother!"
Thus he expired. The good lady wrote the above to the mother of the brave lad, and thus I obtained the original.