"Dear little Mother," wrote Beverly. "When I telegraphed you last night that Roy was wounded and that I was safe and unhurt, I feared, that to-day this letter would take you most terrible news—you who have the hardest part to bear, the silent, inactive part of waiting and uncertainty and inaction and anxiety—but to-day I feel so relieved that I can send you a very hopeful letter. The doctor says that Roy will surely live; and he hopes that the wounds will not prove so serious as we feared at first and as they looked. A piece of shell struck him in the breast but it must have been a spent shell, for although the place is considerably crushed in, the doctor now feels certain that no very serious damage is done his lung. That was what we feared at first. One of his legs is broken near the hip, but it is set and the doctor says it is doing well and will do so, for there is almost no fever. The great mud poultice that was on it for several hours at first was his salvation, so the surgeon thinks. I will not stop to explain this to you now, but when Roy gets home he will tell you, for he remembers most of it and we will tell him the rest. But just now I want simply to tell you the reassuring things and the plans I have made for Boy. He is perfectly conscious and says that he does not suffer very much. We don't allow him to talk, of course, for fear of his lung, but I've arranged to have him sent to Nashville, where he can be nursed as well as if he were at home. I recalled that the Wests live there now, and I sent a telegram asking if they would not take Roy to their house and care for him until we could send him home. They wired that they would be most happy to do so. You will recall that pretty little Emma West who used to come to the house. She was at school with Roy before he went to college. They are nice people, and I am sure that Roy will be cared for as if he were their own. They are Union people. They will write to you daily, too, so that everything will be made as easy for you as possible. This takes a great load off my heart, and as Roy seems so bright to-day I am almost gay after yesterday's terrible experience—of which I shall tell you when we all get home, but not now. One of the most absurd things I ever heard of was that the very first question Roy tried to ask, when he became conscious, was who got the challenge last. It was a side challenge of battle between his regiment and a Louisiana regiment. It was posted on a tree-written on a slab of wood. I had tied my horse to that tree when I was looking for Roy, and had utterly forgotten him. Roy's question recalled the poor horse to me and I went to see what had become of him. There the old fellow stood, pawing the ground and twisting about the tree, hungry and thirsty and tired. He had knocked the challenge down and split it with his stamping feet. I gathered it up and took it to Roy, and a real lively smile crossed his face, and immediately he fell asleep. What strange freaks of fancy and of desire and ambition we are! I am told that Roy was promoted again on the field just before he was shot, so he is as big a captain now as I am, but that fact has not yet appeared to come back to him. Who got the challenge at the last was his first thought! I suspect he was thinking of that when he fell, and his returning consciousness took up the thread of thought right where he had dropped it or where it was broken by the lapse. It has not seemed to surprise him to see me. He acts as if I had been about him all along, and yet it has been nearly two years since we were together! Of course I act the same way so as not to excite him. He has had two long, good, natural naps to-day and I talked to him between. He knows he is to go to Nashville, and I had a sneaking idea that when I mentioned Emma West he looked uncommonly well pleased with the scheme. Do you know whether they got 'spoony,' after I left home? Anyhow that Nashville scheme seems to suit him all the way through. I feel absolutely light-hearted and gay to-day, mother mine. It is the reaction from the strain of yesterday and last night, I suppose; but if I could, I'd dance or sing or something. Since I can't do that I'll content myself with writing you rather a frivolous letter. You just ought to see these trees! They are simply riddled with shot and shell. This shows, too, one very good reason why so few of the rounds of ammunition take effect in the men. They shoot entirely too high. Quite above the heads of the tallest men. The trees are simply cartridge cases, and the limbs are torn away. The mud! You ought to see it. You'd think you never saw mud before. It took sixteen mules and the entire regiment hitched to one of the cannon to pull it along the road the Johnnies retreated over. A man we captured was one who had given out at the job. Poor fellows! they had a hard time of it all around, and we fresh troops who landed from the gunboats were the last straw in their cup of tribulation. I reckon they don't think they got their tribulation through a straw though, and the figure is a trifle mixed; but as a soldier I can't stop to edit copy! Oh, mother, I wish I could make you feel as relieved as I do to-day. Skittish is the word—I feel really skittish; because I am so sure Boy is in no danger. I believe he will be able to go home before many weeks, and meantime, for all comforts, he will be as if he were at home. When he comes you can get the whole story of his fall, the fight, and his promotion. Dear old fellow! He's a great big captain now, and I stick right there. I'm acting Inspector-General now on the staff, but I'm really only a captain yet. I hope things will settle down before I get any higher—though I'd feel uncommonly well to have the same kind of a promotion as he got yesterday. I'm going to let him tell you himself. It was quite dramatic, as the fellows tell me. I just stopped to take a peep at him and he is sleeping like a baby. There is almost no fever. I feel like hugging this pottery clay mud—for we have it to thank for a good deal—but it makes us swear to march through it. I do hope father is home now. He is my main anxiety. I hope he won't see the papers if anything was said of Roy. He was thought to be 'missing,' at first when the reports went, and then to be killed; but don't worry a single bit. I am telling you the very truth when I tell you that last night I believed that Roy could not live and to-night I feel absolutely safe about him—I feel like singing—and all this accounts for this very giddy and jerky letter. I suppose I am what you'd call hysterical. Of course he will need intelligent care, but since that is all arranged for I shall march away to Corinth (that is our next aim) with a light heart and as hopeful as I want to make you feel. Ah, mother mine, I realize more and more what all this must be to you! I thought of it as I looked for Roy last night. Silent, patient, inactive anxiety! The part of war the women bear is by far the harder part. It takes bravery, of course, to face bullets and death; but it must require almost inspired heroism to sit inactively by and wait for it to strike those we love far better than life. More and more, small mother, do I realize this, do I understand that the hardest part of war must be borne by those who are not warriors; but we love you, little mother, and we will be as careful of the sons you care for and love as we can be and do our duty. We will not be foolhardy nor reckless, for your sake—be sure.

"One of the pathetic things that is not unmingled with humor was told me to-day by the young fellow in the next bed to Roy. He is a pretty boy, only about eighteen. He belongs to an Ohio regiment. During the first day's fight he got separated from his command and did not know whether he was inside or outside of our lines. He was picking his way around, peering from behind trees cautiously, trying to get his bearings, when all of sudden he came upon a Johnnie. Both were taken by surprise. The other fellow jumped and seemed about to shoot, and the Ohio boy yelled out, 'Don't shoot! don't shoot! I'm already wounded!'

"The Johnnie was a mere slip of a boy himself, and hadn't the faintest desire to shoot. They had both seen all they wanted to of war. Both were homesick and heartsick with it all. They sat down on a log and fell to comparing notes. Neither one knew whether he was captured or whether he had a prisoner. Both were lost. They agreed to call it even and go their separate ways when they got their bearings. Neither wanted to be a prisoner. 'I've got a dear old father back in Alabama, and if I ever see his face again I'll have enough sense to stay at home;' explained Johnnie, with a suspicious quaver in his voice. Ohio had the very dearest and best of fathers too, and he confessed that if he could but see his face now heaven would be his. They shook hands over the situation and both fell to crying softly, as they decided that war was not what it was cracked up to be. The two homesick fellows sat there on that log and compared notes about those blessed fathers at home, and both were blubbering—because they had, instead of because they had not, fathers who loved them and whom they loved! Well, the upshot was that they agreed to part friends; and go back to their regiments as soon as ever they could find out which one was captured. They'd just call it even and let each other off. The Ohio boy is laid up now with a Minie in his arm that he caught the next day, and he is wondering if the Alabama lad with the father sent him that ball as a keepsake and a reminder! So you see there are some humorous sides to these horrors after all, mother. My journalistic instinct has kept me amused with this thing a good deal to-day. I'd have given a good deal to have overheard the talk. I swear I wouldn't have captured Alabama. He should have had his chance to go back to the dear old home and the father. Ohio was troubled over it, but I told him that he did exactly right. But wasn't it delightfully funny? Oh, mother mine, I wish I could say something to make you keep up good heart. I hope father is home. If I could be sure that he is, I'd feel almost gay, today. Wool little Margaret's curly pate for me and tell her that I say her chirographical efforts are very creditable for a young lady of her limited experience. Get her some little paper and encourage her to write to me often. It will do her good, and it will be a delight to me. Her last letter was as quaint and demure as her little self. Love to aunt Judy—the faithful old soul, and to the gentle Hosanna—in the highest—peace and good will; not to 'mention me resphects.'

"Keep up a brave heart, mother. It can't last much longer; and truly, truly I believe that Roy is quite safe. Kiss yourself for your eldest and loving son,

"Beverly."