Bible, distributing clean clothes, or apples, or tobacco; a
patient, helpful, reverend man, full of kind speeches.

His memoranda of this period are almost bewildering to read.
From one point of view they seem those of a district visitor;
from another, they look like the formless jottings of an
artist in the picturesque. More than one woman, on whom I
tried the experiment, immediately claimed the writer for a
fellow-woman. More than one literary purist might identify
him as a shoddy newspaper correspondent without the necessary
faculty of style. And yet the story touches home; and if you
are of the weeping order of mankind, you will certainly find
your eyes fill with tears, of which you have no reason to be
ashamed. There is only one way to characterise a work of
this order, and that is to quote. Here is a passage from a
letter to a mother, unknown to Whitman, whose son died in
hospital:-


"Frank, as far as I saw, had everything requisite in surgical
treatment, nursing, etc. He had watches much of the time.
He was so good and well-behaved, and affectionate, I myself
liked him very much. I was in the habit of coming in
afternoons and sitting by him, and he liked to have me -
liked to put out his arm and lay his hand on my knee - would
keep it so a long while. Toward the last he was more
restless and flighty at night - often fancied himself with
his regiment - by his talk sometimes seem'd as if his
feelings were hurt by being blamed by his officers for
something he was entirely innocent of - said `I never in my