Page:The Story of Aunt Becky's Army-Life .djvu/163

Rh made all necessary changes in their clothing, I felt like sitting beside them and rocking them to sleep.

They were gathered from different States, and had succumbed to the hardships of war. Delicate boys, with faces fair as a maiden's, with soft, curling hair, and eyes so bright, and truthful, and loving, I could not think of them as learning the hard lessons of battle, standing in the front ranks of soldiers, meeting without shrinking the deadly charges.

I wished only for the power to nurse them into health, and send them to the mothers who loved them, till the smooth lip should grow downy, and the fair brow bronzed with the winds which manhood's prime must face, and leave them there till years should mature them ready for the next great conflict.

Oftimes I found them all in tears—poor homesick hearts pining for their native hills—longing to lay their heads in a mother's lap, and forget that they had ever thought of onslaught on to any greater game than the squirrels and blackbirds which frequented well-known haunts. Then I laughed them into spirits again—told them I should order baby-jumpers for the next offender, and left them a little brighter for the day. They called me "mother," and drifted into it so naturally, that as one by one they convalesced, and were sent away, I felt like a mother weeping for the loss of her bright, beautiful boy—knowing into what hardening scenes they were passing, and trembling for the purity of the young brave hearts.