Page:The Story of Aunt Becky's Army-Life .djvu/123

Rh could to mitigate the misery of the wounded, and no such privations as stared us in the face at Fredericksburg took away our good spirits. Still we were losing our men very fast, and what fearful wounds we saw, and what groans of agony we heard, and how they suffered tenfold more than death, no tongue can tell.

The hospital, clean and neatly kept—the occupants of its beds freshly dressed, presents no view of the tents, when the first tide of wounded pours in, and torn and gory uniforms, and powder, and dirt hide the features which are as familiar as a brother's, and yet he is a stranger till the grim mask is washed away.

With sleeves rolled up, and dress pinned back, it was no delicate task to bring them to a state of comfort and comparative cleanliness. I was passing through the tents one day, and a soldier asked to see me.

"Are you the nurse they call Aunt Becky?" he said, as I stood at his side.

I replied affirmatively, and he wished me to sit by him, and let him talk of home and friends, which even if he lived he could never see again, for a rifle ball had passed through both eyes, destroying the sight forever.

It grieved him most that he could not go back to his regiment—he would give his life for his country if God so willed it, or living, he would bear cheerfully to be sightless, if only for her sake. He was a Massachusetts soldier, and how often I looked upon her