She only smiled a little, but said nothing.

"I wish you would ever flare up, mother," I said.

She smiled again, and said she had nothing to "flare up" about.

"Then I shall do it for you!" I cried. To hear that namby-pamby
woman, who is about as capable of understanding you as an old cat,
talking about your being firm! You see what you get by being quiet
and patient! People would like you much better if you refused to be
comforted, and wore a sad countenance."

"Dear Katy," said mother, "it is not my first object in life to make
people like me."

By this time she looked so pale that I was frightened. Though she is
so cheerful, and things go on much as they did before, I believe she
has got her death-blow. If she has, then I hope I have got mine. And
yet I am not fit to die. I wish I was, and I wish I could die. I have
lost all interest in everything, and don't care what becomes of me.

Nov. 23.-I believe I shall go crazy unless people stop coming here,
hurling volleys of texts at mother and at me. When soldiers drop
wounded on the battle-field, they are taken up tenderly and carried
"to the rear," which means, I suppose, out of sight and sound. Is
anybody mad enough to suppose it will do them any good to hear
Scripture quoted sermons launched at them before their open, bleeding
wounds are staunched?

Mother assents, in a mild way, when I talk so and says, "Yes, yes, we