that house?'

"'Large enough, Captain; thirty by fifty at least.'

"'How many rooms?'

"'About three, I reckon, on first floor, and I guess the upper story is
all in one, from its looks through the window. Plenty of room. Bully
place, and what is more, plenty of ladies to nurse the poor boys.

"The noses of the women not naturally cocked, became upturned at this
last remark of the sergeant's. But they had become silent, and looked
anxious.

"'Sergeant, here's paper and pencil, just note down the names of the
sick, and the rooms we'll put them in, so as to avoid confusion.'

"The sergeant ran the sharp end of the pencil half an inch in his mouth,
and on the palm of his horny hand commenced the list, talking all the
while aloud--slowly, just as if writing--'Let me see. My mem'y isn't
more than an inch long, and there's a blasted lot of 'em.

"'Jim Smith, Bob Riley, Larry Clark, got small-pox; Larry all broke out
big as old quarters, put 'em in back room down stairs.' The women got
pale, but small-pox had been common in those parts. 'George Johnson,
Bill Davis, got the mumps.' 'The mumps, Sally, the mumps, them's what
killed George, and they're so catchin'--whispered one of the women--and
continued the sergeant, 'Bill Thatcher, George Clifton the
chicken-pox.' 'O Lord, the chicken-pox,' said another woman, 'it killed
my two cousins before they were in the army a week.'--'Put them four,'
said the sergeant, 'in the middle room down stairs. Save the kitchen for
cookin', and up stairs put Jim Williams, Spooky Johnson, Tom Hardy, Dick
Cramer, and the little cook boy; all got the measles.' 'The measles!'
screamed out half-a-dozen together. 'Good-Lord, we'll be killed in a
week.' 'They say,' said another black eye, 'that that crack Mississippi
Brigade took the measles at Harper's Ferry, and died like flies. They
had to gather them from the bushes, and all over. Brother Tom told me.
He said our boys were worked nearly to death digging graves.'

"'That was a good thing,' observed the sergeant.

"'You beast!' said the little old woman advancing towards him, and
shaking her fist in his face.

"'And what will become of us women?' screamed she.

"'A pretty question for an old lady; we calculate that you ladies will
wait on the sick,' drily remarked the sergeant.

"At this the women, thinking their case hopeless, with downcast looks
quietly filed into the house.

"The boys by this time had about done loading the teams. A