I did not go back to Peppersville that summer—I had had enough of school teaching; and I returned to the relatives with whom I had become disgusted, on promises of better behavior from them for the future. They were not near relatives—I had none; and I had rebelled at being tutored and watched like a child. Having fully asserted my independence, I was treated with more respect; but, while they supposed that I was nestling down in quiet content, I was busily casting about in my mind the practicability of another venture.
I burned to do something for my country; I could not do as meek women did, and sit down and sew for it; the monotonous motion of the needle, which some people call so soothing, fairly distracted me; and, in spite of the low diet of Latin and mathematics on which I had been kept all winter, I entertained vague visions of myself, in cropped hair and army blue, following the drum.
Just at this critical juncture, when common sense was spreading her pinions for flight, I received a letter from a darling Mentor of a friend, who was spending the golden sunshine of her life as her Saviour spent His, in doing good; and she ordered me to the hospitals.
'You have youth and health,' she wrote; 'spend them in the service of your country. Many a brave soldier lies stiffening in his gore on the bloody field of Manassas; many as brave are writhing in agony in the hospitals that received the wounded of that disastrous day; go among them with words of comfort, and smooth the pillow of those brave defenders whose blood has been freely poured out to enable you to sleep in peace.'
I could wait no longer; in spite of protestation, I put my chattels in order, and was off with a noble band of women, who were all bent on the same errand.
I had heard nothing from Mr. Summers since his departure: he might have been killed at Manassas, or have fallen, side by side with the noble Winthrop, at Big Bethel, or have perished, as the lamented Ellsworth perished, by the hand of the assassin. I never expected to behold him again in this world; and I began to think that I had not appreciated him.
I cannot describe my life as hospital nurse: it was just passing from one scene of suffering to another; and I had not realized that there could be so much misery in this bright, beautiful world. At first I used to tremble and faint; but finally the intense desire to do something for these poor, mutilated wrecks of humanity conquered the weakness; and I even wondered at my own self-control.
There were pleasant gleams, too, in this life, of utter self-abandonment; blessings from fever-parched lips; grateful looks from dying eyes; pleased attention to holy words; and, wrapping all like a halo, the thought that I was working in very deed, ay, and battling, too, for the glorious flag that floated over my head.
They were constantly bringing in fresh patients, and the sight roused no curiosity; but one day, such a ghastly face was upturned to view, as they placed the shattered body tenderly on a cot, that, involuntarily, I bent closer.