“Oh! nothing, miss; I beg your pardon, only there’s a young fellow, just brought in, who, the doctor thinks, can’t live over the day, and I hate to have them dying on my hands, that’s all.”
“Wounded or sick?”
“It’s the typhoid, and as bad a case as ever I saw yet, and I’ve seen a heap of them, too. There he is, but he’s past speaking; he’ll never rouse again.”
I approached the bed, where lay a “young fellow,” truly: a boy, scarcely more than sixteen; his long, thick hair matted and tangled; his clothing torn and soiled; his eyes half closed; his lips dark and swollen; a bright flush on his cheeks, and his breath coming in quick, short, feverish pantings, as though much oppressed. I saw it was quite in vain to speak to him, and merely tried to make him swallow the beef tea, which had been ordered to be given him at certain intervals.
He swallowed with much difficulty, but still it was something that he could do even this; and I found that although unable to speak, he understood and endeavored to obey, directions. I therefore ventured to doubt Wilson’s verdict, and continued to administer the stimulants as directed. Towards afternoon there was a perceptible improvement in his swallowing; he roused partially, and attempted to turn. I begged Wilson to watch him closely through the night, keeping up the nourishment and stimulants; urging as a motive that, as he wasn’t fond of deaths, this was the best mode of preventing them.
He shook his head. “I’ll watch him as close as you could, miss, but it’s no use. I’ve seen too many cases to think that poor lad can weather thro’ it; I reckon you’re new to this sort of thing, or you would know it too.”
“Did you ever hear a saying, Wilson, ‘Duties are ours, events are God’s?’ Try, I only ask you to try.”
The next morning, when I walked in, I scarcely recognized our patient; in addition to clean clothing, combed and cut hair, his eyes were open, large, bright, and sparkling with a feverish brilliancy. He was talking in a loud, excited tone; evidently the stupor had passed off; whether a favorable change, or denoting increase of fever, I was not competent to decide.
As I drew near, I was a little startled by the abrupt question, “Are you the woman gave me the drinks yesterday?”
I assented, sure that no discourtesy was intended by the use of the good old Anglo-Saxon term. Strange, that by some singular freak of language or ideas, which, I think, it would puzzle even the learned Dean of Westminster himself to explain, this once honored title has, at the present day, come to be almost a term of reproach; certainly, as I have said, of discourtesy. Were this the place to moralize, I might see in this change a proof of the degeneracy of modern days; and question, whether in yielding this precious name,—sacred forever, and ennobled by the use once made of it,—Woman is not in danger of yielding also the high and noble qualities which should ever be linked with its very sound.