think they would do it without remonstrance.

Yet their religious spirit grows more beautiful to me in living longer
with them; it is certainly far more so than at first, when it seemed
rather a matter of phrase and habit. It influences them both on the
negative and the positive side. That is, it cultivates the feminine
virtues first,--makes them patient, meek, resigned. This is very
evident in the hospital; there is nothing of the restless, defiant
habit of white invalids. Perhaps, if they had more of this, they
would resist disease better. Imbued from childhood with the habit of
submission, drinking in through every pore that other-world trust
which is the one spirit of their songs, they can endure everything.
This I expected; but I am relieved to find that their religion
strengthens them on the positive side also,--gives zeal, energy,
daring. They could easily be made fanatics, if I chose; but I do not
choose. Their whole mood is essentially Mohammedan, perhaps, in its
strength and its weakness; and I feel the same degree of sympathy that
I should if I had a Turkish command,--that is, a sort of sympathetic
admiration, not tending towards agreement, but towards co-operation.
Their philosophizing is often the highest form of mysticism; and our
dear surgeon declares that they are all natural transcendentalists.
The white camps seem rough and secular, after this; and I hear our men
talk about "a religious army," "a Gospel army," in their
prayer-meetings. They are certainly evangelizing the chaplain, who was
rather a heretic at the beginning; at least, this is his own
admission. We have recruits on their way from St. Augustine, where the
negroes are chiefly Roman Catholics; and it will be interesting to see
how their type of character combines with that elder creed. It is time
for rest; and I have just looked out into the night, where the eternal
stars shut down, in concave protection, over the yet glimmering camp,