Part 30 (1/2)
I continued to talk, in a sing-song croone, to stroke his head, and hold his hand, until he slept, which was but a few moments after settling that transfer, and the last time I saw him, which was in '79, he got over the ground and up and down stairs, as fast as most people, his new bone being quite as good as any of the old ones, except being a little short and decidedly crooked, although the crook did not effect its usefulness or general appearance.
CHAPTER LXIII.
A HEROIC MOTHER.
James Bride, who drew me to Campbell, by asking for ”something to quench thirst,” was one of the thousands who died of flesh-wounds, for want of surgical trap doors, through which nature might throw out her chips. His wound was in the hip, and no opening ever was made to the center of the injury, except that made by the bullet which had gone in and staid there.
His mother came three days before he died, and being minus hoops and finery, the ward surgeon was anxious she should remain with her son, and we arranged that she should sleep in my room. There was just s.p.a.ce between the cot and wall for the breadth of a mattress, and when the door was shut, that s.p.a.ce was long enough, for me to lie between the door and the stand. I have never entertained a guest more cheerfully, or one by whose presence I felt more honored; yet the traveling costume was a short calico dress, strong leather shoes and blue woolen stockings, visible below the dress, a gingham sunbonnet and double-bordered cap tied under her chin.
Several richly dressed ladies came from Eastern cities to see dying relatives, but to none of them were the surgeons so thoroughly respectful, as to this plain, strong, clean, high-souled country-woman, who staid with her son, and was hailed with joy by all the men in his ward, to every one of whom she was sympathetic and helpful.
Her case was hard. She and her husband, who was old and feeble, had just three sons, two strong and vigorous, one a cripple. Their two vigorous sons enlisted together, and fell in the charge on Marie's Hill, within ten feet and ten minutes of each other. William was buried on the battle-field, and she had come to see James die in hospital.
When all was over and her boy was carried to the dead house, they brought her to me, and I have never heard such pathetic, eloquent expressions of grief as those she poured forth in that little, rough, barrack-room.
”Oh, William! William!” she sobbed, ”You are lying, to-night, in your b.l.o.o.d.y grave, and your mother will never know where it is! and you, James! you were my first-born, but I cannot go to you now, where you lie in the darkness among the dead! Oh, but it is a sad story I must carry to your old father, to bring his gray hairs in sorrow to the grave. Who can we lean upon, in our old age? Who will take care of Johnny when we are gone? Oh, it is a hard, hard lot.”
She wrung her hands, bowed over her knees, in a paroxysm of tears, then raised herself, threw back her head, and exclaimed. ”But oh! boys dear, wouldn't I rather you were where you are this night, than that you had thrown down your guns and run!”
CHAPTER LXIV.
TWO KINDS OF APPRECIATION.
Looking down the long vista of memory, to the many faces turned to me from beds of pain, I find few to which I can attach a name, and one I seem never to have looked upon but once. It is a long, sallow face, surmounted by bushy, yellow hair; it has a clear, oval outline, and straight nose, brown eyes and a down of young manhood on the wasted, trembling lips; I knew it then, as the face of a fever patient, but not one to whom I had rendered any special service, and felt surprised when the trembling lips said, in a pitiful, pleading way.
”We boys has been a talkin' about you!”
”Have you, my dear--and what have you boys been saying about me?”
”We've jist been a sayin' that good many ladies has been kind to us, but none uv 'em ever loved us but you!”
”Well, my dear, I do not know how it is with the other ladies, but I am sure I do love you very, very dearly! You do not know half how much I love you.”
”Oh, yes, we do! yes, we do! we know 'at you don't take care uv us 'cause it's your juty! you jist do it 'cause you love to!”
”That is it exactly--just because I love to, and because I want you to get well and go to your mothers.”
”Yes! but the boys says you don't care about 'em when they get well.”
”They do not need to have me care for them when they are well.”
”Oh, yes, they do! yes, they do! an' if that's the way you're a goin' to serve me, I'll stay sick a long time.”
When hospital stores came to me so fast that there was great trouble in getting them wisely distributed, Campbell lent me an ambulance to go around, see where they were needed, and supply as many as I could. I had a letter from an old Pittsburg neighbor, asking me to see his brother in Douglas Hospital, and went in an ambulance well supplied with jellies and fruit.
Douglas Hospital was an inst.i.tution of which the city was proud. It had much finer buildings than any other in the city, occupied the finest residence block in the city, and had a wide reputation for grandeur and beauty and superb management. I found the halls and rooms quite as elegant as I had any reason to expect, but was surprised to find that elegance undisturbed by the presence of sick or wounded men. In one back room a wounded officer looked lonely, and they said there were other rooms used for sick soldiers, but all I saw were parlors, reception rooms, offices and sleeping apartments for surgeons, and the Lady Abbess, with her attendant Sisters of Mercy or Charity.