Page:The Story of Aunt Becky's Army-Life .djvu/153

Rh the knowledge of wife and children only soon enough to save herself from a desperate heart-break.

I was laughed at for a little incident which occurred one day, testifying to one man's faithfulness to his wife—even in thought.

One morning the doctor called for me to go and cheer up a man in Ward B, who was so low-spirited he was in danger of running down and dying soon, and I must do something to rally him, if possible. I went to his side, and said, "Now I have got you—the doctor says if I can raise you, I can have you all to myself, and it will be so nice, when the war is over, to take a father back to my children."

I will never forget the look which staggered me as he opened his weary eyes, and said faintly, but firmly, "My good woman, I have got a wife at home." The poor fellow's thoughts were with her even then, and his sinking spirits longing for her presence. I wondered if that wife knew how true and noble her husband was, and then fell to thinking how strange a thing was the human heart, and that the great want of truth of which people complain lies in their own souls. Be true to ourselves, and no one will do us great harm by being false to us.