urgeons and nurses had failed to heal; the
two windows were draped with sheets, the church hospital opposite being
a brick and mortar Argus, and the female mind cherishing a prejudice in
favor of retiracy during the night-capped periods of existence. A bare
floor supported two narrow iron beds, spread with thin mattresses like
plasters, furnished with pillows in the last stages of consumption. In
a fire place, guiltless of shovel, tongs, andirons, or grate, burned a
log inch by inch, being too long to to go on all at once; so, while the
fire blazed away at one end, I did the same at the other, as I tripped
over it a dozen times a day, and flew up to poke it a dozen times at
night. A mirror (let us be elegant!) of the dimensions of a muffin, and
about as reflective, hung over a tin basin, blue pitcher, and a brace
of yellow mugs. Two invalid tables, ditto chairs, wandered here and
there, and the closet contained a varied collection of bonnets,
bottles, bags, boots, bread and butter, boxes and bugs. The closet was
a regular Blue Beard cupboard to me; I always opened it with fear and
trembling, owing to rats, and shut it in anguish of spirit; for time
and space were not to be had, and chaos reigned along with the rats.
Our chimney-piece was decorated with a flat-iron, a Bible, a candle
minus stick, a lavender bottle, a new tin pan, so brilliant that it
served nicely for a pier-glass, and such of the portly black bugs as
preferred a warmer climate than the rubbish hole afforded. Two arks,
commonly called trunks, lurked behind the door, containing the worldly
goods of the twain who laughed and cried, slept and scrambled, in this
refuge; while from the white-washed walls above either bed, looked down
the pictured faces of those whose memory can make for us--

"One little room an everywhere."

For a day or two I managed to appear at meals; for the human grub must
eat till the butterfly is ready to break loose, and no one had time to
come up two flights while it was possible for me to come down. Far be
it from me to add another affliction or reproach to that enduring man,
the steward; for, compared with his predecessor, he was a horn of
plenty; but--I put it to any candid mind--is not the following bill of
fare susceptible of improvement, without plunging the nation madly into
debt? The three meals were "pretty much of a muchness," and consisted
of beef, evidently put down for the men of '76; pork, just in from the
street; arm