and gave
offense by airs of independence.

Good women would come long distances to see dying husbands, brothers and
sons, and fill the wards with alarm by their hoops. When any one was
hurt by them they were very sorry, but never gave up the cause of
offense, while their desire to look well, and the finery and fixings
they donned to improve their appearance, was a very broad and painful
burlesque. Women were seldom permitted to stay in a hospital over night,
even with a dying friend, and the inhabitants were generally glad when
they started for home.

It was the dress nuisance which caused nuns to have the preference in so
many cases; but I could not see or hear that they ever did anything but
make converts to the church and take care of clothing and jellies.

One thing is certain, _i.e._, that women never can do efficient and
general service in hospitals until their dress is prescribed by laws
inexorable as those of the Medes and Persians. Then, that dress should
be entirely destitute of steel, starch, whale-bone, flounces, and
ornaments of all descriptions; should rest on the shoulders, have a
skirt from the waist to the ankle, and a waist which leaves room for
breathing. I never could have done my hospital work but for the dress
which led most people to mistake me for a nun.

CHAPTER LVIII.

SPECIAL WORK.

In the wilderness of work I must choose, and began to select men who had
been given up by the surgeons, and whom I thought might be saved by
special care. Surgeon Kelly soon entered into my plan, and made his ward
my headquarters. To it my special patients were brought, until there was
no more room for them. That intuitive perception of the natural position
of muscles, and the importance of keeping them in it, which came to me
on first seeing a wound dressed, gave me such control over pain that I
used to go through the wards between midnight and morning and put
amputation cases to sleep at the rate of one in fifteen minutes.

In these morning walks I saw that the nurses were on duty and had
substantial refreshments, saw those changes for the worse, sure to come,
if they came at all, in those chill hours. Seeing them soon was
important to meeting them successfully, and I succeeded in breaking up
many a chill before it did serious damage, which must have proved fatal
if left until the morning visit of the Surgeon. Also, in those walks I
chose special cases; have more than once sat down by a man and
ca