ic spirit, goaded with the
sense of her country's wrongs, girds upon her own fair and tender form,
the armor of proof, and goes forth, the self-constituted but eagerly
welcomed leader of its mailed hosts, to overthrow the nation's foes. We
need only recall Deborah, the avenger of the Israelites against the
oppressions of the King of Canaan; Boadicea, the daring Queen of the
Britons, and in later times, the heroic but hapless maid of Orleans,
Jeanne d'Arc; and in the Hungarian war of 1848, the brave but
unfortunate Countess Teleki, as examples of these female patriots.

In rare instances, this sense of the nation's sufferings from a tyrant's
oppression, have so wrought upon the sensitive spirit, as to stimulate
it to the determination to achieve the country's freedom by the
assassination of the oppressor. It was thus that Jael brought
deliverance to her country by the murder of Sisera; Judith, by the
assassination of Holofernes; and in modern times, Charlotte Corday
sought the rescue of France from the grasp of the murderous despot,
Marat, by plunging the poniard to his heart.

A far nobler, though less demonstrative manifestation of patriotic
devotion than either of these, is that which has prompted women in all
ages to become ministering angels to the sick, the suffering, and the
wounded among their countrymen who have periled life and health in the
nation's cause.

Occasionally, even in the earliest recorded wars of antiquity, we find
high-born maidens administering solace to the wounded heroes on the
field of battle, and attempting to heal their wounds by the appliances
of their rude and simple surgery; but it was only the favorite leaders,
never the common soldier, or the subordinate officer, who received these
gentle attentions. The influence of Christianity, in its earlier
development, tended to expand the sympathies and open the heart of woman
to all gentle and holy influences, and it is recorded that the wounded
Christian soldiers were, where it was possible, nursed and cared for by
those of the same faith, both men and women.

In the fifth century, the Empress Helena established hospitals for the
sick and wounded soldiers of the empire, on the routes between Rome and
Constantinople, and caused them to be carefully nursed. In the dark ages
that followed, and amid the downfall of the Roman Empire, and the
uprearing of the Gothic kingdoms that succeeded, there was little room
or thought of mercy; but the fair-