the crashing,
tramping of men--the yelling--close quarters--hand-to-hand conflicts.
Each side stands up to it, brave, determined as demons; and still the
wood's on fire--still many are not only scorched--too many, unable to
move, are burned to death. Who knows the conflict, hand-to-hand--the
many conflicts in the dark--those shadowy, tangled, flashing,
moon-beamed woods--the writhing groups and squads--the cries, the din,
the cracking guns and pistols, the distant cannon--the cheers and calls
and threats and awful music of the oaths, the indescribable mix, the
officers' orders, persuasions, encouragements--the devils fully roused
in human hearts--the strong shout, 'Charge, men--charge!'--the flash of
the naked swords, and rolling flame and smoke? And still the broken,
clear, and clouded heaven; and still again the moonlight pouring
silvery soft its radiant patches over all."

There is a description vivid as lightning, though there is not a
properly-constructed sentence in it. Gruesome, cruel, horrible! Is it
not enough to make the women of our sober sensible race declare for ever
against the flaunting stay-at-homes who would egg us on to war? By all
means let us hold to the old-fashioned dogged ways, but let us beware of
rushing into the squalid vortex of war. And now let us see what follows
the brilliant charge and bayonet fight. How many ladies consider what
the curt word "wounded" means? It conveys no idea to them, and they are
too apt to stray off into the dashing details that tell of a great
wrestle of armies. One eminent man--whom I believe to have uttered a
libel--has declared that women like war, and that they are usually the
means of urging men on. He is a very sedate and learned philosopher who
wrote that statement, and yet I cannot believe it. Ah, no! Our ladies
can give their dearest up to death when the State calls on them, but
they will never be like the odious viragoes of the Roman circus. At any
rate, if any woman acts according to the dictum of the philosopher after
reading my bitterly true words, we shall hold that our influence is
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 tw