“But—why have they taken him there?” she found power at last to ask. “To amputate his leg, poor fellow!” “‘To amputate his leg!’” exclaimed Elfie, again echoing the soldier’s words. “Yes, Miss, it was the only way of saving his life, it seems. This morning when the assistant surgeon looked at his wound, he sent immediately for the surgeon in charge, and they both examined it together and decided that the leg must be taken off at once, if the man’s life was to be saved. Elfie, unable to stand, sank pale and trembling down upon Albert Goldsborough’s empty bed, and sitting there, with clasped hands and strained eyes, waited for the soldier’s farther words. “The poor fellow objected very much; said that his leg had ceased to give any pain at all; that it was quite easy; and, except for weakness, he never felt better in his life; he had had the best night’s rest he had ever enjoyed; his leg hadn’t troubled him once; and he had waked up this morning quite refreshed though rather feeble.” “Then why did they persist in the operation?” cried Elfie. “To save his life, Miss, as they explained to him. His freedom from pain was, under the circumstances, the worst possible symptom. Mortification had commenced in the wound and was rapidly extending upward, and it became necessary to amputate the limb without delay.” “And then he consented?” wept Elfie. “Yes, Miss.” “How long was that ago?” “They removed him about ten minutes before you entered the ward, Miss.” “So they are even now at their dreadful work! They have him even now stretched upon the ghastly operating board, and are torturing his nerves and flesh with knife and saw!” shuddered Elfie. “Oh, Albert! oh, my love, my love, if I could bear it for you!” And the loyal Union girl, who had discarded and defied her rebel lover in the days of his pride and his power, and who had believed her own words when she told him that the one burning aspiration of her heart was to see him hanged for his treason, now burst into a convulsion of sobs, and wept over his sufferings the sorest tears she had ever shed in her life. “Don’t distress yourself so much, Miss. He will not feel it. He will know nothing after he is stretched upon the operating board until it is all over. They are going to give him chloroform,” said the young soldier, trying to comfort the weeping woman. Elfie struggled to regain her self-command. She recollected with compunction that the hospital ward was not the place to indulge in the exhibition of strong emotions. “Listen, Miss,” said the soldier boy—“I know he will not feel it. See, Miss—I had my leg taken off two weeks ago, and I never felt it; and just look how well I’m getting over it.” There was an instantaneous sympathy in all the words and looks and actions of the impulsive girl.