Shenandoah herald. [volume] (Woodstock, Va.) 1865-1974, 1895-06-28


o woman, in our hour Of ease,
Uncertain, coy and hard TO please
When pain and anguish wiring the brow,
ministering angel thou
Pathetic scriptural story.
think the most pathetic passage in
all the Bible is the description Of the lad
who went out to the harvest field OF
Shunem and got misunderstanding
his hands on his temples and crying out:
"Oh, my head My head" And they
said, Garry him to his mother " And
then the record is, "He sat on her knees
till noon. and then died. 1t is an aw-
ful thing to be i'll away from home in
strange hotel, once in awhile men COM
ing to look at you, holding their hand
over their mouth for fear that they will
catch the contagion. How roughly they
turn Won in bed How loudly they talk !
How you long for the ministries OF
home l knew one such who went away
from one Of the brightest Of homes for
several weeks business absence at the
west. A telegram came at midnight
that he was on his deathbed far away
from home. BY express train the wife
and daughters went westward, but they
went too late. He feared not to die, but
he was in an agony TO live until his
family got there. He tried to bribe the
doctor TO make him live little while
longer. He said, Il am willing to die,
but not alone" But the pulses futter-
ed. the eyes closed and the heart stop
ped. The express trains met in the mid
night-wife and daughters going west
ward. lifeless remains Of husband and
father coming eastward. Oh, it was a
sad. pitiful, overwhelming spectacle
When we are sick, we want TO be sick
at home. When the time comes for us
TO die. we want to die at home. The
room may be very humble, and the faces
that look into ours may be very plain,
but who cares for that? Loving hands to
bathe the temples. Loving voices to
speak good cheer. Loving lips to read
the comforting promises Of Jesus.
In our last dreadful war men cast the
cannon; men fashioned the musketry
men cried TO the hosts, Forward,
march |" men hurled their battalions on
the sharp edges of the enemy, crying,
Charge, charge" but woman scraped
the lint; woman administered the cor
dials; woman watched by the dying
couch woman wrote the last message to
the home circle; woman wept at the soil
tary burial attended by herself and -four
men with spade We greeted the general
home with brass bands and triumphal
arches and wild huzzas, but the story Is
too good to be written anywhere, save
in the chronicles of heaven, Of Mrs.
Brady. who came down among the slcH
in the swamps of the Chickahominy OF
Annie Ross, in the cooper shop hospital
of Margaret Breckenridge, who came tC
men who had been for weeks with
their wounds undressed, some OF then
frozen to the ground, and when she
turned them over those that had an arm
left waved it and filled the air witt
their "Hurrah I" of Mrs. Hodge, whC
came from Chicago with blankets anC
with pillows, until the men shouted
"Three cheers for the Christian com
missionl God bless the women a
home;" then, sitting down to take th'
last message: "Tell my wife not to fire.
about me, but to meet me in heaven
Tell her TO train up the boys whom W.
have loved 80 we'll Tell her we shall
meet again in the good land. Tell he
10 bear my loss like the Christian WIZ
Of a Christian soldier" and of Llrs
Shelton. into whose face the GONZALES
cent soldier looked and said, You
grapes and cologne cured me. " Men di'
their work with shot and shell and car
bipe and howitzer, women did thel
work with socks and slippers and band
ages. and warm drinks, and Scriptur
texts, and gentle strokings OF the no
TEMPLES. and stories of that land wher
they never have any pain. Men hel
down over the wounded and said, -
which side did you fight?" Women nel
down over the wounded and SAID
where are you hurt? What nice thin
/ can make for you to eat? What make
, you cryl" Tonight, while we men ar
sound asleep in our beds, there Will b
a light in yonder loft; there will /
Qroaning in that dark alley; there wi
be cries of distress in that cellar. Me
will sleep. and women will watch
A superlative Right.
Again, woman has superlatiye riRl
10 take care Of the poor. There are hu'
' dreds and thousands Of them in all OF
B cities. There is kind Of work that me
cannot do for the poor. Here comes
group Of little barefoot children to Il
] door Of the Dorcas society. They ne'
| to be clothed and provided for. Whi'
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