On the Chickahominy, June 12th, 1862.
Impaired health, the result of the excessive labors of that battle summer, prevented Mrs. Howland from further active service in the field; but whenever her health permitted, she visited and labored in the hospitals around Washington, and her thoughtful attention and words of encouragement to the women nurses appointed by Miss Dix, and receiving a paltry stipend from the Government, were most gratefully appreciated by those self-denying, hard-working, and often sorely-tried women—many of them the peers in culture, refinement and intellect of any lady in the land, but treated with harshness and discourtesy by boy-surgeons, who lacked the breeding or instincts of the gentleman. Her genuine modesty and humility have led her, as well as her sisters, to deprecate any notoriety or public notice of their work, which they persist in regarding as unworthy of record; but so will it not be regarded by the soldiers who have been rescued from inevitable death by their persistent toil, nor by a nation grateful for the services rendered to its brave defenders.
Mrs. Robert S. Howland was the wife of a clergyman, and an earnest worker in the hospitals and in the Metropolitan Sanitary Fair, and her friends believed that her over-exertion in the preparation and attendance upon that fair, contributed to shorten a life as precious and beautiful as was ever offered upon the altar of patriotism. Mrs. Howland possessed rare poetic genius, and some of her effusions, suggested by incidents of army or hospital life, are worthy of preservation as among the choicest gems of poetry elicited by the war. "A Rainy Day in Camp," "A Message from the Army," etc., are poems which many of our readers will recall with interest and pleasure. A shorter one of equal merit and popularity, we copy not only for its brevity, but because it expresses so fully the perfect peace which filled her heart as completely as it did that of the subject of the poem:
IN THE HOSPITAL.
"S. S——, a Massachusetts Sergeant, worn out with heavy marches, wounds and camp disease, died in —— General Hospital, in November, 1863, in 'perfect peace.' Some who witnessed daily his wonderful sweet patience and content, through great languor and weariness, fancied sometimes they 'could already see the brilliant particles of a halo in the air about his head.'
"I lay me down to sleep,
With little thought or care.
Whether my waking find
Me here—or There!
"A bowing, burdened head,
That only asks to rest,
Unquestioning, upon
A loving Breast.
"My good right-hand forgets
Its cunning now—
To march the weary march
I know not how.
"I am not eager, bold,
Nor strong—all that is past:
I am ready NOT TO DO
At last—at last!
"My half-day's work is done,
And this is all my part;
I give a patient God
My patient heart.