silence. He sat up, propp'd--was much wasted--had lain a long time
quiet in one position (not for days only but weeks,) a bloodless,
brown-skinn'd face, with eyes full of determination--belong'd to a
New York regiment. There was an unusual cluster of surgeons, medical
cadets, nurses, &c., around his bed--I thought the whole thing was
done with tenderness, and done well. In one case, the wife sat by
the side of her husband, his sickness typhoid fever, pretty bad. In
another, by the side of her son, a mother--she told me she had seven
children, and this was the youngest. (A fine, kind, healthy, gentle
mother, good-looking, not very old, with a cap on her head, and
dress'd like home--what a charm it gave to the whole ward.) I liked
the woman nurse in ward E--I noticed how she sat a long time by a poor
fellow who just had, that morning, in addition to his other sickness,
bad hemorrhage--she gently assisted him, reliev'd him of the blood,
holding a cloth to his mouth, as he coughed it up--he was so weak he
could only just turn his head over on the pillow.

One young New York man, with a bright, handsome face, had been lying
several months from a most disagreeable wound, receiv'd at Bull Run.
A bullet had shot him right through the bladder, hitting him front,
low in the belly, and coming out back. He had suffer'd much--the
water came out of the wound, by slow but steady quantities, for many
weeks--so that he lay almost constantly in a sort of puddle--and there
were other disagreeable circumstances. He was of good heart, however.
At present comparatively comfortable, had a bad throat, was delighted
with a stick of horehound candy I gave him, with one or two other
trifles.


PATENT-OFFICE HOSPITAL