As this was a special ward, the nurses had
been forbidden to admit visitors without a permit, and no stranger was
ever allowed to feed the patients except when some particularly
nourishing and suitable food was brought, when I used to take a great
delight in the mutual pleasure of patient and visitor, hardly knowing
which was more happy, the giver or receiver. Our sick boy continually
craved and talked about some "apple _turnovers_," such as his mother
used to make, but of course was denied. One day, during my absence, an
old lady gained access to the ward, and when she heard the boy's
desire for "turn-overs" promised him some. The next day she found an
opportunity to keep her promise. At midnight, Dr. Gore and I having
been hastily summoned, met at the bedside of the poor fellow, who was
in a state of collapse, and died before morning. Dr. Gore was so
overcome that he actually wept. The boy had been a patient of his from
his infancy, and in a piteous letter, which I afterwards read, his
mother had implored the doctor to watch over him in case of sickness.
When, under the dead boy's pillow, was found a portion of the
apple-pie, revealing the cause of his death, the doctor's anger knew
no bounds, and he gave vent to the imprecation above mentioned.

As the summer waned, our commissary stores began to fail. Rations,
always plain, became scant. Our foragers met with little success. But
for the patriotic devotion of the families whose farms and plantations
lay for miles around Ringgold (soon, alas! to fall into the ruthless
hands of the enemy), even our sickest men would have been deprived of
suitable food. As it was, the supply was by no means sufficient. One
day I asked permission to try _my_ fortune at foraging, and, having
received it, left Ringgold at daylight next morning, returning by
moonlight. Stopping at every house and home, I told everywhere my tale
of woe. There was scarcely one where hearths were not lonely, hearts
aching for dear ones long since gone forth to battle. They had heard
mischievous and false tales of the surgeons and attendants of
hospitals, and really believed that the sick were starved and
neglected, while the hospital staff feasted upon dainty food.
Occasionally, perhaps, they had listened to the complaint of some
"hospital rat," who, at the first rumor of an approaching battle, had
experienced "a powerful misery" in the place where a brave heart
should have been, and, flying to the rear, doub