A volume of verse, "Passion Flowers," was praised by Longfellow and Whittier and won a wide popularity. A later collection, "Words for the Hour," was, on the whole, better, but not so much read. Still, the woman felt that she had not yet really found herself in her work. She longed to give something that was vital--something that would fill a need and make a difference to people in the real world of action. The days of the Civil War made every earnest spirit long to be of some service to the nation and to humanity. Dr. Howe and his friend were among the leaders of the Abolitionists at the time when they were a despised "party of cranks and martyrs." It was small wonder that, when the struggle came, Mrs. Howe's soul was fired with the desire to help. There seemed nothing that she could do but scrape lint for the hospitals--which any other woman could do equally well. If only her poetic gift were not such a slender reed--if she could but command an instrument of trumpet strength to voice the spirit of the hour! In this mood she had gone to Washington to see a review of the troops. On returning, while her carriage was delayed by the marching regiments, her companions tried to relieve the tensity and tedium of the wait by singing war songs, among others: "John Brown's body lies a-moldering in the grave; His soul is marching on!" The passing soldiers caught at this with a "Good for you!" and joined in the chorus. "Mrs. Howe," said her minister, James Freeman Clarke, who was one of the company, "why do you not write some really worthy words for that stirring tune?" "I have often wished to do so," she replied. Let us tell the story of the writing of the "nation's song" as her daughters have told it in the biography of their mother: Waking in the gray of the next morning, as she lay waiting for the dawn the word came to her. "Mine eyes have seen the glory of the coming of the Lord--" She lay perfectly still. Line by line, stanza by stanza, the words came sweeping on with the rhythm of marching feet, pauseless, resistless. She saw the long lines swinging into place before her eyes, heard the voice of the nation speaking through her lips. She waited till the voice was silent, till the last line was ended; then sprang from bed, and, groping for pen and paper, scrawled in the gray twilight the "Battle Hymn of the Republic."