Page:The woman in battle .djvu/23

Rh , and endowed with a mimetic power that enables her to relate her anecdotes in the most telling manner. In New York, Philadelphia, and other Northern cities, as well as throughout the South and West, she has a large number of very warm friends, who hold her in the highest esteem on account of her eminent talents, her fascinating social qualities, and her unblemished reputation. It is to be hoped that the publication of the story of her checkered career will have the effect of increasing, rather than of diminishing, the number of these friends. Her story is a most remarkable one, in nearly every respect. During the war a number of women, on both sides, from time to time, performed spy duty, and several of them are said to have occasionally assumed male attire. Madame Velazquez, however, it is believed, is the only one of her sex, who, for any length of time, wore a masculine garb, or who participated as a combatant in a series of hard-fought battles. Narratives of the adventures of several hero ines on the Federal side have been published, but none of them will at all compare in extent and variety of interest with the volume now before the reader, which has an additional claim on the regards of the public as being the only authentic account of the career of a Confederate heroine that has issued from the press.