that Lydia is a volunteer also; she attaches herself to the Commission,
and insists on serving the sick and wounded. She is on duty to-night at
the College Hospital. I think she will have her hands full."

"Why, you will see Willis; will you be in his ward?" I asked, looking my
admiration.

"I don't know that I am in his ward," she replied, "but I can easily see
him if you wish."

"Then please be so good as to tell him that I shall come to see
him--to-morrow, if possible."

Lydia started off down the hill.

"She will find a buggy at our stable-camp," said Dr. Khayme; "it is but
a short distance down there."

The Doctor smoked. I thought of many things. His view of war was not
new, by any means; of course, in the abstract he was right: war is
wrong, and that which is wrong is unwise; but how to prevent war? A
nation that will not preserve itself, how can it exist? I could not
doubt that secession is destruction. If the Union should now or ever see
itself broken up, then farewell to American liberties; farewell to the
hopes of peoples against despotism. To refuse war, to tamely allow the
South to withdraw and set up a government of her own, would be but the
beginning of the end; at the first grievance California, Massachusetts,
any State, could and would become independent. No; war must come; the
Union must be preserved; the nation was at the forks of the road; for
my part, I could not hesitate; we must take one road or the other; war