presided over with a little good common sense and womanly care, would change the whole aspect of things and lengthen the days of some, and brighten the last days of others of the poor sufferers within the thin walls of this hospital. I wish it might be, but what can _I_ do? First it is not _my_ province; I should be out of place there; next, Miss Dix is supreme, and her appointed nurse is matron; next, the surgeons will not brook any interference, and will, in my opinion, resent and resist the smallest effort to break over their own arrangements. What _others_ may be able to do I am unable to conjecture, but I feel that _my_ guns are effectually silenced. My sympathy is not destroyed, by any means, but my _confidence_ in my ability to accomplish anything of an alleviating character in _this_ department is completely annihilated. I _went_ with all I had, to work where I thought I saw greatest need. A man can _have_ no greater need than to be saved from death, and after six weeks of unremitting toil I was driven from my own tents by the selfish _cupidity_ or _stupidity_ of a pompous staff surgeon with a little accidental temporary authority, and I by the means thrown upon a couch of sickness, from which I barely escaped with my life. After four weeks of suffering most intense, I rose in my weakness and repaired again to my post, and scarcely were my labors recommenced when, through the _same_ influence or _no_ influence brought to bear upon the General Commanding, I was made the subject of a general order, and commanded to leave the island, giving me three hours in which to pack, remove, and ship four tons of supplies with no assistance that _they_ knew of but one old female negro cook. I complied, but was remanded to _Beaufort_ to labor in the hospitals there. With this portion of the “order” I failed to comply, and went home to Hilton Head and wrote the Commanding General a full explanation of my position, intention, proposed labors, etc., etc., which brought a rather sharp response, calling my humanity to account for not being willing to comply with his specified request, viz. to labor in Beaufort hospitals; insisting upon the plan as gravely as if it had been a possibility to be accomplished. But for the extreme ludicrousness of the thing I should have felt hurt at the bare thought of such a charge against _me_ and from such a quarter. The hospitals were supplied by the Sanitary Commission, Miss Dix holding supremacy over all female attendants by authority from Washington, Mrs. Lander _claiming_, and endeavoring to enforce the same, and scandalizing through the Press--each hospital labeled, _No Admittance_, and its surgeons bristling like porcupines at the bare sight of a proposed visitor. How in reason’s name was I “to labor there”? Should I prepare my food and thrust it against the outer walls, in the hope it might strengthen the patients inside? Should I tie up my bundle of clothing and creep up