seeing him laid carefully upon the comfortable bed so kindly prepared
by the ladies of the Soldiers' Rest, exhausted, but evidently not
worse for the change.

Right here began my career as a nurse of Confederate soldiers. This
was my first patient,--_my very own_,--to have and to hold until the
issues of life and death should be decided. All facilities were
accorded me by the ladies. Dr. Little gave his most careful attention
and his greatest skill, but the nursing, the responsibility, was mine.

I may as well state that I came off with flying colors, earning the
precious privilege, so ardently desired, of being enrolled among those
ready for duty and _to be trusted_. My patient recovered, and returned
to his command, the ---- Mississippi Regiment. His name was D. Babers,
and twenty years after the war I met him once more,--a stalwart,
bearded man, as unlike as possible the pale young soldier who had
lived in my memory. His delight and gratitude and that of his family
seemed unbounded, and so I found the bread once cast upon the waters
very sweet when returned to me "after many days."

Finding that my desultory wanderings among the larger hospitals were
likely to result in little real usefulness, and that the ladies
attached to the Soldiers' Rest would be glad of my help, I became a
regular attendant there. This delightful place of refuge for the sick
and wounded was situated high up on Clay Street, not very far from one
of the camps and parade-grounds. A rough little school-house, it had
been transformed into a bower of beauty and comfort by loving hands.
The walls, freshly whitewashed, were adorned with attractive pictures.
The windows were draped with snowy curtains tastefully looped back to
admit the summer breeze or carefully drawn to shade the patient, as