There will be no attempt to describe in detail the work of the different hospitals in every part of the South, or to set forth the loving and charitable acts of all Southern women, wherever there was a Confederate soldier to comfort and to care for. The particular instances which are to be mentioned must be taken merely as exquisite specimens of a splendid whole. * * * * * During the winter of 1861–62, the number of sick and wounded soldiers who were sent to their homes in different parts of the South became considerable, and there was urgent need of means of caring for them and giving them proper nourishment during their journey. The Wayside Hospital at Columbia, S. C., was established on March 10, 1862, and continued until February 15, 1865. Over one hundred soldiers were often accommodated with cots and three hundred with meals in a day. The Home was entirely supported by voluntary contributions from all parts of the State. Soldiers detained by sickness, and want of connection in the trains, had religious service from ministers of the different religious denominations. The number of soldiers entertained in this Home, during its existence of nearly three years, was about seventy-five thousand. After the 17th of February, 1865, when the Home could no longer be used, large numbers of soldiers received food and accommodations, when they were passing through Columbia. Funds belonging to the Wayside Home were sent to the upper districts as long as they were available, during the spring of 1865, benefiting in that way many soldiers returning home. * * * * * In an address delivered before the South Carolina Medical Association, at Charleston, in 1873, Dr. John T. Darby—himself distinguished for gallantry as well as surgical skill—alluding to the ameliorations of modern warfare, described the relief given to the soldiers on the way to and from their homes, and said: “Here be it said, with justice and pride, that the credit of originating this system is due to the women of South Carolina. In a small room, in the capital of this State, the Wayside Home was founded. From this little nucleus spread that grand system of wayside hospitals which was established during our own and the late European wars.” The Wayside Hospital at Columbia, S.C., was then the first institution of the kind, not only in this country, but in the whole world! Were the noble women embarrassed or annoyed in the fulfilment of their welcome task? A lady who was at the Wayside Hospital at Columbia, almost daily, during the whole period of its existence, gives the answer. She says: