dead
carried out! Instead was he resting on a bed of violets and listening to
the heart throbs of thankfulness and supplication murmured by an angel!
And if ever a prayer reached the heavenly throne it was that one! When
it was finished, and her loving blue eyes were looking into his, he
whispered:

"Liddy, God bless you! Now I shall live."

Such is the power of love!

I feel that here and now I must beg the kind reader's pardon for
introducing so much that is painful and sad in the lives of these two,
fitted by birth and education for peace and simple home happiness. War
and all its horrors is not akin to them and was never meant to be.
Rather should their footsteps lead them where the bobolink sings as he
circles over a green meadow, and the blue water lilies stoop to kiss the
brook that ripples through it; or where the fields of grain bend and
billow in the summer breeze; or the old mill-wheel splashes, while the
white flowers in the pond above smile in the sunlight. If the patient
reader will but follow their lives a little further, only peace and
happiness and all the gentle voices of nature shall be their companions.

For a month, while cheered by the presence of her devoted father, Liddy
nursed that feeble spark of life back to health and strength as only a
tender and heroic woman could. All the dread aftermath of war that daily
assailed her every sense, did not make her falter, but through all those
scenes of misery and death she bravely stood by her post and her
love-imposed duty. How hard a task it was, no one unaccustomed to such
surroundings can even faintly realize, and it need not be dwelt upon.
When she had fulfilled the most God-like mission ever confided to
woman's hands--that of caring for the sick and dying--and when returning
strength made it possible to remove her charge, those three devoted ones
returned to the hills of old New England.

How fair the peaceful valley of Southton seemed once more, and how clear
and distinct the Blue Hills were outlined in the pure September air! The
trees were just gaining the annual glory of autumn color; but to Liddy
they brought no tinge of melancholy, for her heart was full of sweetest
joy. She had saved the one life dearest on earth to her, and now the
voices of nature were but sounds of heavenly music. And how dear to her
was her home once more, and all about it! The brook that rippled near
sounded like the low tinkle of sweet bells, and the maple by the g