dition to these cares, she ministers to their souls by gathering them in an audience room and providing a speaker to tell them of Christ and heaven.

"From Chattanooga, whither she has gone to minister in the hospital, filled with patriots lately brought in from the mountains, she writes: I have seen more horror, agony and death here than in all my experience in the East. Think of Golgotha, the valley of Hinnom, and all other dark places of the earth, and you may dimly realize the condition of this region. Yet I find the wounded full of hope, and I hear them talk more of the victory than of any thing else. I almost cried for vexation when the ball hit me,' says a tall, broadshouldered hero, 'for we were just half-way up the Ridge.' 'Well, the colors went to the top if I didn't,' rejoined another, 'for I bore them within sight of it.' 'I reached the crest, and saw the grey backs running down the other side,' adds a third. Gangrene, a fatal inflammation of the wounds, has appeared and spread so rapidly, that a tent ward has been established, to prevent the poison from spreading. Whoever is borne thither knows that his next removal will be to the grave.

"As I sit in our own clean, sunny ward," wrote Aunt Ellen, "with my patients, full half of whom are convalescents, and all wearing a look of entire content, I doubt whether any woman in the land is happier than myself, except those whose power to do

In conversation with first led to think of

good is greater. Last week we had a charming visit from a really gifted worker in the good cause. Had you been here to see her you would have cheered with the men, I'm sure. She is a young lady who having a rich, sweet voice, goes about to the various hospitals to sing, and is also active in other ways for the benefit of our soldiers. her she told me that she was thus using her voice by a friend who asked her one morning if she would be willing to cheer some wretched exchanged prisoners with a song. She consented with hesitation, and accompanying her friend to the group, sang a verse of the 'Star Spangled Banner.' I could fancy the effect of it upon the poor, disheartened men, so dispirited with suffering that even liberation and return could give them no joy; yet the old life kindled afresh at the sound of her voice. 'Make a stand for her,' said one, and in a moment fifty knapsacks were piled to shape a rude platform whence the singer could be seen by those outside the circle, while she sang the remaining verses. Since that day she has given herself untiringly to this beautiful service. I heard of her last summer, ministering to a dying boy who wanted to hear a hymn, and who passed into eternity while she sang,

"One sweetly solemn thought

Comes to me o'er and o'er ;

I'm nearer heaven this day

Than I have been before.'

"For us she sung 'The Young Recruit,' 'The Battle Cry of Freedom,' and other well known airs. One strain, wild and sweet as the music of a mountain horn, still echoes in my ears; the words were new to me, but this verse was an inspiration to us all, not soon to be forgotten:

They fight and bleed and die,

On hill-side, plain and sea,

That the old flag, cleansed from every stain,
May yet float fair and free.'

"Hardly had she ceased when a strong bass voice from one of the cots began the chorus, 'Glory, Glory Hallelujah, Praise God forever more,' and from the long rows and gathered groups went up a grand volume of melody, while tuneful and unfaltering above the manly voices, rose the lady's soprano. Are you smiling at my enthusiasm? But truly I expect never to hear finer music till round the earth is sung that other chorus, 'Glory to God in the highest, peace on earth, good will to

men.

"I have heard of a soldier lying on one of our fields who, as he saw the colors of a passing regiment, shouted, 'Hurrah for the old Flag yet, the old Fag yet.' And again, mustering his remaining force for the effort, he repeated the salutation. The sergeant

drooped the banner, that its folds might touch the dying man, who pressed it to his lips, whispering still, The old Flag yet, the old Flag yet.' Such are the refrains from hospital and field. Can we ever behold our banner it in days of peace, and cease to remember those who have saved it for us with their lives? I think not."

CHAPTER XI.

THE FAR WEST.

"FRANK," said Roger one afternoon when the two were on their way to school," do you remember the rebel father told us about, that took a trip to Indiana, and was put in the Penitentiary for vagrancy? Well, he has burrowed his way out, he and seven of his cronies; did you know it?"

"What, Morgan the guerrilla?" asked Frank opening his eyes wide, and curving his eye-brows into interrogation marks.

"Yes, that same scamp; if you don't believe it, ask father. The guards and the keepers are all in a fluster about it, and search has been made in every direction; for after the runaways changed their clothes

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