tion held a meeting every Tuesday
evening in the chapel, which was always crowded. Some of the citizens of
Annapolis, with their families, did not disdain a constant attendance.
An animated discussion of some popular topic was held by the debating
club; and the intelligence often shown did credit to the attainments of
the men who filled the ranks of our army. Ballads were sung by the
Kelsey Minstrels,--so named from their leader, a clerk at head-quarters.
"The Knapsack," a paper edited by the ladies, was read. Into it was
gathered whatever of local interest or amusement there was going on at
the time. Contributions in prose or verse, stories, and conundrums
filled the little sheet.

The short Southern winter wore quickly away, with little of unusual
excitement in the constantly changing scenes of war. Our prisoners pined
in dreary captivity, and the clash of arms was stilled for a season.

So many strange ideas are entertained about a woman's life in hospital
service that I am tempted to transcribe a page from my own experience,
in order that a glimpse may be had of its reality. Imagine me, then, in
a small attic room, carpeted with a government blanket, and furnished
with bed, bureau, table, two chairs, and, best of all, a little stove,
for the morning is cold, and the lustrous stars still keep their quiet
watch in the blue heavens. A glow of warmth and comfort spreads from
gas-light and fire,--an encouraging roar in the chimney having crowned
with success the third attempt at putting paper, wood, and coal together
in exact proportions. After all, the difficulty has been chiefly in the
want of a sufficient amount of air, for there could be no draught
through the dead embers, and these could be disturbed only noiselessly,
for the lady in the next room has the small-pox, and it will not do to
awake her from her morning slumbers.

A glance at the wonderful beauty in which day is breaking is sufficient
compensation for such early rising, as with hurried step I go to the
wards, about seven rods off. The kind-hearted steward stands at the
door: "Talbot died at two o'clock; he was just the same till the last."
I am not surprised, for when I left him I knew that his feeble frame
could not much longer endure the violence of delirium. He was by no
means among the most hopeless of the last prisoners who came, but an
unaccountable change had passed suddenly over him within the last few
days. And now tidings of his death must car