departed. Therefore with ruthless composure I follow my observer--a man
whose pure and holy spirit upheld him as he ministered to sufferers for
year after year.

"Then the camps of the wounded. Oh, heavens, what scene is this? Is this
indeed humanity--these butchers' shambles? There are several of them.
There they lie, in the largest, in an open space in the woods--from two
to three hundred poor fellows. The groans and screams, the odour of
blood mixed with the fresh scent of the night, the grass, the
trees--that slaughter-house! Oh, well is it their mothers, their
sisters, cannot see them, cannot conceive, and never conceived such
things! One man is shot by a shell both in the arm and leg; both are
amputated--there lie the rejected members. Some have their legs blown
off, some bullets through the breast, some indescribably horrid wounds
in the head--all mutilated, sickening, torn, gouged out, some in the
abdomen, some mere boys." Alas, I have quoted enough--and may never such
a task come before me again! The picture is sharp as an etching; it is
drawn with a shudder of the soul. Is that grim sedate man right when he
says that women are the moving influence that drives men to such
carnage? Would you wantonly advocate war? Never! I reject the solemn
philosopher's saying, in spite of his logic and his sententiousness.

Who shall speak of the awful monotony of the hospital camps, where men
die like flies, and where regret, sympathy, kindness are blotted from
the hardened soldier's breast? People are not cruel by nature, but the
vague picturesque language of historians and other general writers
prevents men and women from forming just opinions. I believe that, if
one hundred wounded men could be transported from a battle-field and
laid down in the public square of any town or city for the population to
see, then the gazers would say among themselves, "So this is war, is it?