h my own incessant cares to hear the cough, as the rest had
done. I never realised how I felt about our country till I found the
terror of losing, a link out of that little golden chain that encircles
my sweetest joys, was a _kindred_ suffering. Have the times ever looked
so black as they do now? We seem to be drifting round without chart or
pilot.

Two weeks later, August 17th, she writes to her cousin, Miss Shipman:

G. is really up and about, looking thin and white, and feeling hungry
and weak; but little H. has been sick with the same disease these ten
days past. I got your letter and the little cat, for which G. and I
thank you very much. I should think it would about kill you to cook all
day even for our soldiers, but on the whole can not blame any one who
wants to get killed in their service. I am impressed more and more
with their claims upon us, who confront every danger and undergo every
suffering, while we sit at home at our ease. However, the ease I have
enjoyed during the last five weeks has not been of a very luxurious
kind, and I have felt almost discouraged, as day after day of
confinement and night after night of sleeplessness has pulled down my
strength. But, what am I doing? Complaining, instead of rejoicing that I
am not left unchastised.

After a careworn summer at Newport, she went with the children to
Williamstown, where a month was passed with her brother-in-law,
Professor Hopkins. The following letters relate to this visit:

_To her Husband, Williamstown, Sept. 19, 1862._

I am glad to find that you place reliance on the reports of our late
victory, for I have been in great suspense, seeing only The World, which
was throwing up its hat and declaring the war virtually ended. I have no
faith in such premature assertions, of which we have had so many, but
was most anxious to know your opinion. Do not fail to keep me informed
of what is going on. The children are all out of doors and enjoying
themselves. The Professor has gone on horseback to see about his
buckwheat. He took me up there yesterday afternoon, and I crawled
through forty fences (more or less) and got a vast amount of exercise,
which did not result in any better sleep, however, than no exercise
does. Caro. H. read me yesterday a most interesting letter from her
brother Henry, describing the scene at Bull Run when he went there five
days after the battle. It is very painful to find such mismanagement as
he deplores. He gave a most t