Drake, who long ago had spent his little hoard, had received this terrible blow in entire silence, and turned to go without comment or answer to Corny's vociferations. But eyes were dim, or head was reeling; for a few paces on he stumbled, and would have fallen over a soldier lying in his path, but for Corny, who was close behind him, and who at once assailed the man over whom Drake had tripped, and who still lay quietly, without even a stir or motion of his head.
"Ye lazy spalpeen! what the Divil are ye stretched out there for, to break dacent folk's necks over the length of ye? Stir yourself, or I'll"——Then with a sudden and total change of tone, as he looked more closely into the quiet face, "The Saints pity us! it's Cap'n Ireland; and in the name of Hiven, how came yer Honor here on the——Och! Lord forgive me! Talking to a dead corpse! Och! wurra! wurra! Musther Talcott, it's dead he is, sure! kilt this time intirely!"
"You may well say killed," said a soldier who had joined them. "If ever a man committed murder, then that man did that kicked him out of the hospital to die."
"What is that?" demanded Drake, who had seemed in a sort of stupor, but roused out of it fiercely at the man's last words. "Do you know what you are saying?"
"I think I ought," returned the soldier. "I was in the hospital at the time; I'm only just out; and I saw it myself. The assistant surgeon stops at his bed, where he laid only just breathing like, and says he, 'What man is this? I've seen him before'; and says some one, 'His name is Ireland'; and says the surgeon, like a flash, 'Ireland? Ireland of the —th? Do you know what that is? It is a colored regiment, and this Abolition scoundrel is the captain of it. I knew I had seen him. Here! put him out; let him go and herd with the rest'; and when some one said he was dying any way, said the surgeon, with a string of oaths, 'Put him out, I tell you; the bed is too good for him'; and then, Sir, when the poor young gentleman, who was dizzy-like, and didn't understand, fell down beside the door, from weakness, that—that infernal brute kicked him, and swore at him, as vermin that cumbered the ground; and the men brought him away here, Sir, it's two days back, and he's just passed away"; and kneeling beside the body, and lifting the poor wasted hands, "I swear, if ever I get back, to revenge his death, and never to let sword or pistol drop while this cursed Rebellion is going on."
"Amin!" said Corny, solemnly, and "Amen" formed itself on Drake's white lips; but by some curious mental process his thoughts would wander away from the stiffening body before him to a vision of home, and Sabbaths when sweet-toned bells called quiet families to church, and little children playing about the doorsteps, and peaceful women in sunny houses, and gay girls waving on men to battle through glittering streets, and prayers, and looks of love, and songs, and flowers, and Alice; and in on this rolled suddenly a sense of what was actually around him, as under a calm sky and out of a still sea swoops sometimes suddenly some huge wave in on the quiet beach. He saw about him rags, filth, men sick, men dying, men dead, men groaning, men cursing, men gibbering. There rose up before him the grim succession of days of hunger, pain, sorrow, and loneliness, already past; there came upon him a terrible threatening of days to come, yet worse,—without hope or relief, unless at the dead line. He rose, staggering, and with a wild and desperate look that startled Corny.
"Fur the Lord's sake, wud ye desthroy yerself?" cried the faithful fellow, throwing his arms about him to hold him fast. "Och, honey! ye're a heretic, and the good Lord's a Catholic; but thin He made us all, and He has pity on the poor crathurs that's sufferin' here, or His heart's harder nor Corny's: the Saints forgive me fur such a spache! Pray, Musther Talcott, pray"——
"Pray!" exclaimed Drake; "is there a God looking down here?"—and dropping on his knees, he gasped out,—
"O God! if Thou dost yet hear, save me—from going mad!" and fell forward at Corny's feet, senseless.
He was carried to the hospital, and lay there weeks, lost in the delirium of a fever; and every morning there peered in at the inner door of the stockade a huge shock of hair, and a red, anxious face, with,—