Page:Nurse and spy in the Union Army.djvu/174

158 God?" He replied, "My trust is in Christ; He was mine in, life, and in death He will not forsake me"—almost the very words I heard a dying Federal soldier say, a few days before, at the hospital in Williamsburg. A few weeks previous these two men had been arrayed against each other in deadly strife; yet they were brethren; their faith and hope were the same; they both trusted in the same Saviour for salvation.

Then he said, "I have a last request to make. If you ever, pass through the Confederate camp between this and Richmond inquire for Major McKee, of General Swell's staff, and give him a gold watch which you will find in my pocket; he will know what to do with it; and tell him I died happy, peacefully." He then told me his name and the regiment to which he had belonged. His name was Allen Hall. Taking a ring from his finger he tried to put it on mine, but his strength failed, and after a pause he said, "Keep that ring in memory of one whose sufferings you have alleviated, and whose soul has been refreshed by your prayers in the hour of dissolution." Then folding his hands together as a little child would do at its mother's knee, he smiled a mute invitation for prayer. After a few moments' agonizing prayer in behalf of that departing spirit, the dying man raised himself up in the bed and cried out with his dying breath, "Glory to God! Glory to God! I am almost home!"