wounds dressed. Mrs. Bickerdyke and myself assisted in the operation. Poor boys! how my heart ached that I could do so little.

"After doing what we could in Hospital No. 1, to render the condition of the poor fellows tolerable, we proceeded to No. 2, and did what we could there, distributing our sanitary comforts in the most econonomical manner, so as to make them go as far as possible. We found that what we brought in the ambulance was giving untold comfort to our poor exhausted wounded men, whose rough hospital couches were made by pine boughs with the stems cut out, spread upon the ground over which their blankets were thrown. This forms the bed, and the poor fellows' blouses, saturated with their own blood, is their only pillow, their knapsacks being left behind when they went into battle. More sanitary goods are on the way, and will be brought to relieve the men as soon as possible."

Amidst all this care for others, there was little thought for her own comfort. She says in another place:

"Our bed was composed of dry leaves, spread with a rubber and soldier's blanket-our own blankets, with pillows and all, having been given out to sufferers long before night."

In this diary we find another illustration of her extreme modesty. Though intended but for the eyes of her own family, she says much of Mrs. Bickerdyke's work, and but little of her own. Two, three, or four hundred men, weary and exhausted, would be sent to them, and they must exert every nerve to feed them, while they snatched a little rest. Pickles, sauer-kraut, coffee and hard bread they gave to these for the sick and wounded they reserved their precious luxuries. With a fire made out of doors, beneath a burning sun, and in kettles such as they could find, and of no great capacity, they made coffee, mush, and cooked dried fruit and vegetables, toiling unweariedly through the long hot days and far into the nights. Many of the men knew Mrs. Bickerdyke, for many of them she had nursed through

wounds and sickness during the two years she had been with this army, and she was saluted as "Mother" on all sides. Not less grateful were they to Mrs. Porter. Again she says:

"The failing and faint-hearted are constantly coming in. They report themselves sick, and a few days of rest and nourishing food will restore most of them, but some have made their last march, and will soon be laid in a soldier's grave! Mrs. Bickerdyke has sent gruel and other food, which I have been distributing according to the wants of the prostrate multitude, all on the floor. Some are very sick men. It is a pleasure to do something for them. They are all dear to some circle, and are a noble company."

Again she gives a sort of summary of her work in a letter, dated Kingston, Georgia, June 1st: "We have received, fed, and comforted at this hospital, during the past week, between four and five thousand wounded men, and still they come. All the food and clothing have passed under our supervision, and, indeed, almost every garment has been given out by our hands. Almost every article of special diet has been cooked by Mrs. Bickerdyke personally, and all has been superintended by her. I speak of this particularly, as it is a wonderful fulfillment of the promise, 'As thy day is, so shall thy strength be.'"

Again, writing from Alatoona, Georgia, June 14th: "I have just visited a tent filled with 'amputated cases.' They are noble young men, the pride and hope of loving families at the North, but most of them are so low that they will never again return to them. Each had a special request for 'something that he could relish.' I made my way quickly down from the heights, where the hospital tents are pitched, and sought for the food they craved. I found it among the goods of the Sanitary Commission-and now the dried currants, cherries, and other fruit are stewing; we have unsoddered cans containing condensed milk and preserved fruit and the poor fellows will not be disappointed in their expectations."

In the foregoing sketch we have given but a very brief statement of the labors and sacrifices of Mrs. Porter which were not intermitted until the close of the war. We have said that her sons were in the army. Her eldest son re-enlisted at the close of his first term, and the youngest, after a hundred days' service, returned to college to fit himself for future usefulness in his regenerated country. Mr. Porter's services, as well as those of his wife were of great value, and her son, James B. Porter, though serving as a private only, in Battery A, First Illinois Light Artillery, has had frequent and honorable mention.

At the close of Sherman's campaign Mrs. Porter finished her army service by caring for the travel-worn and wearied braves as they came into camp at Washington where, with Mrs. Stephen Barker and others, she devoted herself to the distribution of sanitary stores, attending the sick and in various ways comforting and relieving all who needed her aid after the toils of the Grand March.

MRS. MARY A. BICKERDYKE.

MONG the hundreds who with untiring devotion have consecrated their services to the ministrations of mercy in the Armies of the Union, there is but one "Mother" Bickerdyke. Others may in various ways have made as great sacrifices, or displayed equal heroism, but her measures and methods have been peculiarly her own, and "none but herself can be her parallel."

She is a widow, somewhat above forty years of age, of humble origin, and of but moderate education, with a robust frame and great powers of endurance, and possessing a rough stirring eloquence, a stern, determined will and extraordinary executive ability. No woman connected with the philanthropic work of the army has encountered more obstacles in the accomplishment of her purposes, and none ever carried them through more triumphantly. She has two little sons, noble boys, to whom she is devotedly attached, but her patriotic zeal was even stronger than her love for her children, and she gave herself up to the cause of her country most unhesitatingly.

At the commencement of the war, she was, it is said, housekeeper in the family of a gentleman in Cleveland, but she commenced her labors among the sick and wounded men of the army very early, and never relinquished her work until the close of the conflict. It has been one of her peculiarities that she devoted her attention almost exclusively to the care of the