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!'