"The days of youth are the days of gladness."

"Dear Mother," wrote Howard, "I forgot to write last week, but then there wasn't the first thing to tell, so it don't matter. We're just loafing here in camp waiting for the next move. We had a little scrap with the Johnnies ten days ago, but it didn't come to anything on either side. They are sulking in their tents and we are dittoing in ours. But what I began this letter to tell is really funny, and I don't want to forget to write it. The other day a slabsided old woman (you never did see such a funny looking creature. She was worse than the mountaineer class in Virginia, or even than those Hoosiers out there on that farm near ours.) Well, she came to our camp from some place back in the country and asked to see our 'doctor man.' She seemed to think there was but one.

"One of the surgeons had a talk with her, and it turned out that her 'ole man,' as she called her husband, was 'mighty bad off with breakbone fever,' and she had come to see if the Yankee doctor man wouldn't have some kind of stuff that would cure him the first dose. These kinds of folks think our officers and doctors are about omnipotent, because our men are so much better fed and clothed and equipped than the Johnnies are.

"'Ef yoh can't gimme sumpin' fer my ole man, doctah, he's jes boun' ter die,' she kept saying over and over. Well, the doctor questioned her, and came to the conclusion that a good sweat would be about the proper caper to recommend, and he told her to cover him up well, and then to take some sage—they all have that in the garden and mighty little else—and, said he, 'take about so much and put it in something and then measure out exactly one quart of water and boil it and pour over the sage. Then make him drink it just as hot as he can. Now don't forget so much sage and exactly a quart of water.'

"'Yeh think thet's agoin't' cuah (cure) my ole man, doctah?' says she.

"'I think it is the best thing for him now. Be sure to make it as I told you—so much sage and a quart of water.'

"'You kin bet I'll fix her up all right, doctah, ef thet's a goin't' cuah my ole man.' Then she tramped back home. The next day she appeared bright and early, and wanted that doctor man again. 'Well, my good woman, I hope your husband is feeling a good deal easier after his sweat. I——

"'Naw 'e hain't nuther. My ole man, he hain't scooped out on the inside like you Yanks is, I reckon.'

"She looked pretty worried. 'How's that? How's that?' asked the doctor.

"'Wal,' says she, 'I jest hoofed hit home es quick es ever I could, an' I tuck an' medjured out thet there sage an' the water—jest edzactly a quat—an' I fixed her up an tuck hit t' the ole man. I riz his head up, mister—fer he's powerful weak—an' he done his plum best t' swaller hit, but the fust time he didn't git mo'n halft down till he hove the hull of hit up agin. I went back and I medjured up thet there sage agin an' the water an' tried him agin, but he hove her up 'fore he got haift down. But I never stopped till I tries her agin, an' that time, doctah, he didn't git halft down. Now, doctah, thet there ole man er mine he don't hold but a pint. I reckon you Yanks is scooped out thinner than what we alls is.'

"We boys just yelled, but the poor soul loped off to her pint-measure old man without seeing a bit of fun in it. She was mad as a wet hen when the doctor told her she needn't make him drink it all at one fell swoop. She vowed he had told her that the first time, and it's my impression that she now suspects the Yankees of trying to burst her old man. I've laughed over it all day, so I thought I'd write it to you, but it don't seem half so funny in writing as it was to hear it.

"Give little Margaret this ring I put in. I cut it out of a piece of laurel root. I expect it is too big for her, but she can have some fun with it I reckon. There isn't any more news, only one of our cannons exploded the other day. It didn't do much damage. I'm not sure that I've spelled some of these words right, but my unabridged is not handy and I'm not sorry.

"I always hated to look for words. I wish you'd tell some of the town boys to write to me. Letters go pretty good in camp and some fellows get a lot. I don't get many. It's hard to answer them if you get many, though, so I don't know which is worst. This is the longest one I ever wrote in my life. I forgot to tell you to tell Aunt Judy I met a fellow from Washington and he said the twins were in jail, but they were let out to work on some Government intrenchments near by. I don't know what they were in for. The fellow didn't know about our other niggers. Said he thought Mark and Phillis were dead because he used to see them but hadn't for a long time. Said Sallie worked for his mother sometimes and that is how he knew so much about them. Two or three of the boys got shot last night putting cartridges in the fire to monkey with the other fellows. None of'em hit yours truly. My hand is plum woah out, as Aunt Judy would say, holding this pen—and the thing has gone to walking on one leg. I guess I broke the point off the other side jabbing at a fly. Good-bye. Write soon,

"Howard,

"P.S.—I forgot to say I am well, and send love. I wish I had some home grub.

"Foxy Leathers got a bully box last week. He gave me nearly half of his fruit cake. The other boys didn't know he had one. They got doughnuts—but even doughnuts are a lot better than the grub we get. H."

The box of "home grub," was speedily packed and sent, and while it lasted it made merry the hearts of his mess. Howard said in one of his letters that he was growing very tall. He said that the boys declared that "if it had not been for his collar he would have been split all the way up, as he had run chiefly to legs." Howard, however, expressed it as his own unbiased opinion that it was jealousy of his ability to walk over the fences that they had to climb which prompted the remark. "Foxy has to climb for it and I put one leg over and then I put the other over—and there you are," he said. Camp life agreed with him, and the restraints of home no longer rasping his temper, he seemed to be the gayest of the gay. Nothing troubled him. He slept and ate wherever and whenever and whatever fell to his lot; lived each day as it came and gave no thought to its successor. He counted up on his fingers when he wrote home last, and tried to remember to write about once a week, because his mother begged that he would, and not at all because the impulse to do so urged him or because he cared especially to say anything. He liked to get letters, but he knew he was sure of those from home whether he wrote or not, and so his replies had that uncertainty of date dependent upon luck. No sense of responsibility weighed upon him, and his mother's anxiety impressed him—when he thought of it at all—as a bit of womanish nonsense; natural enough for a woman, but all very absurd. He had no deeper mental grasp upon it, and indeed the whole ethical nature of this boy seemed embryonic; and so it was that his camp life was the happiest he had ever known—the happiest he would ever know.