Leaving an excellent young woman as preceptress in my stead, I gathered from eighteen hundred to two thousand garments for freedmen, and hospital supplies for soldiers, and with papers from Austin Blair, governor of our State, from F. C. Beaman, member of Congress, and from others, I left my sweet home and the loved ones who still clustered around it. On my way to the depot I was met by Rev. P. Powell, who inquired how much money I had. "Fifteen dollars," was my answer. "Why, Mother Haviland," he exclaimed, "you can never go with only that. Stop a day or two, and I'll get up eighty or a hundred dollars for you." "But I have arranged for all my supplies to go on today. There are three or four boxes waiting for me at Hillsdale, and I wrote them I would be there to-night. I have not asked for money, but for supplies. I have a free pass to Chicago and return, and if I can get a pass free to Cairo and return, I think I can get along, and perhaps lives may be in peril in the twenty-four hours I might be waiting here for money." "Will you telegraph me if you do not succeed in getting the passes in Chicago?" "I will," I said, and went forward. As I was taking leave of my son Joseph, and was about to enter the car, he held me by the hand, and said: "One promise I want you to make me, and make it so strong that your conscience will come in for a share; and that is, that you will stop, once in a while, to think whether you are tired or not. You are going among the suffering and dying, and I know you so well that you will go and go and do and do, until you will drop before you will think of yourself. If you will make me this promise I will feel a great deal better about you." "Joseph," I said, "I will promise to do this," and we parted. On visiting the sanitary rooms in Chicago I met Mrs. Hague, Mrs. Livermore, and others, who thought it very doubtful whether I could secure a fare free to Cairo, as President Arthur had shut down the gate on free, or even half-fare, passes. He had told them that associations might pay their agents enough to pay their fare. But I was under the auspices of no association. I was only a self-constituted agent, and I must try. Leaning on the arm of my guide, I went to President Arthur, and introduced myself by handing him my papers. On reading them he asked, rather sharply, "What do you want?" "I am hoping to obtain a free pass to Cairo and return," I replied, "and free transportation for the supplies referred to in those papers." "Are you alone, madam?" "I am alone." "Well, I think this is a heavy responsibility for a lady of your age. Are you aware of the responsibility you assume in this?" holding the paper up. "I think I am aware of the responsibility. I do not know but the experience of age, however, may somewhat make up for the strength of youth." "Well, I guess it will." Settling himself back in his easy arm chair, he said again, "How long a time do you want it for?"