But the medical department is unquestionably the greatest institution in the whole army. I will not attempt to answer all the questions I have been asked concerning it, but will say that there are many true stories, and some false ones, circulated with regard to that indispensable fraternity.
I think I may freely say that there is a shadow of truth in that old story of “whiskey” and “incompetency” which we have so often heard applied to individuals in the medical department, who are intrusted with the treatment, and often the lives of our soldiers.
There is a vast difference in surgeons; some are harsh and cruel—whether it is from habit or insensibility I am not prepared to say—but I know the men would face a rebel battery with less forebodings than they do some of our worthy surgeons.
There is a class who seem to act upon the principle of “no smart no cure,” if we may be allowed to judge from the manner in which they twitch off bandages and the scientific twists and jerks given to shattered limbs.
Others again are very gentle and tender with the men, and seem to study how to perform the necessary operations with the least possible pain to the patients.
But the young surgeons, fresh from the dissecting room, when operating in conjunction with our old Western practitioners, forcibly reminded me of the anecdote of the young collegian teaching his grandmother to suck an egg: “We make an incision at the apex and an aperture at the base; then making a vacuum with the tongue and palate, we suffer the contained matter to be protruded into the mouth by atmospheric pressure.” “La! how strange!” said his grandmother; “in my day we just made a hole in each end, and then sucked it without half that trouble.”
I once saw a young surgeon amputate a limb, and I could think of nothing else than of a Kennebec Yankee whom I once saw carve a Thanksgiving turkey; it was his first attempt at carving, and the way in which he disjointed those limbs I shall never forget.
CHAPTER XXX.
CLOSING INCIDENTS—PROFESSOR LOWE’S BALLOON—FITZ JOHN PORTER’S ADVENTURE—HIS UPWARD FLIGHT—RECONNOITERING FROM A DANGEROUS POSITION—COOL COURAGE—ENTHUSIASTIC GREETING—AN EARNEST INQUIRER—A BAPTISM IN THE ARMY—PREACHING BY MOONLIGHT—A MAGNIFICENT SCENE—A WEDDING IN CAMP—GAY TIMES—A CONTRAST—HOSPITAL IN WINCHESTER—SPIRIT OF REVENGE—SABLE HEROINE—A WHITE DARKEY—COLORED SOLDIERS—CONCLUSION.