But the first week of September brought pitiful paragraphs from various Southern sources--one I recall from the governor of the State, in which he proclaimed his perplexity and great distress at the condition of these poor people, needing everything, and who, at that season of the year, with crops all destroyed, would continue to need; and closed by wondering "if the Red Cross could perhaps do anything for them." It would not do to close our ears or eyes against this suggestion, and I at once sought our congressional neighbor, General M.C. Butler, of South Carolina, then in the Senate, now on the Cuban Commission, asking his views. The response was such as would not have been looked for in that busy, hard-worked Senator, surrounded by a network of political wires, some of them only too likely to be "live;" he dropped all business, telegraphed at once to Governor Tillman at Columbia to learn the conditions and urgently requested us to go, and he would even leave his seat and go with us as soon as we could be ready. Time is never a question with the Red Cross, and the next night, in a dark cheerless September mist, with only two assistants, I closed a door behind me for ten months, went to the station to meet General Butler, prompt and kind, and proceeded on our way. At Columbia we were joyfully surprised at meeting Governor Tillman, prepared to accompany us, with a member of his staff, and thus powerfully reinforced we made our entrance into Beaufort. The work of relief had been wisely placed at first in the hands of committees from both Beaufort and Charleston, comprising the best business men of each city--its lawyers, merchants, bankers, all men of prominence and known practical ability. They had done and were doing all possible for them to do, with hearts full of pity, hands full of work, themselves large losers by the storm, business nearly wrecked, and needing every remaining energy for the repairing of their own damages and those of the citizens about them. The governor, at whose request they had formed, realizing the necessities of the case, sought to release them, calling them together in each city and successively relieving them, placing the Red Cross in full charge of the relief. With the little knowledge we had of the conditions and surroundings, it would have been madness to accept, at least until both more knowledge and more numerical force were gained, and the refusal was as prompt as the proffer had been. We however promised to remain in Beaufort, meet with the committee each day, advise with them, study the situation and report our conclusions when we could safely arrive at them.