The daily morning journal and courier., 1898-06-16

bring upon us, we may turn with corn- fort and hope to the quiet, good work that has been done by an alien | in our midst, and be thankful that we can depend upon the organization that is now ready to come forward fully equipped for the emergency and ready to send aid and trained assistance to | those who may need it.
 | The life of a professional nurse is one i of constant sef-sacrif1ce but at least | she feels that she is being rewarded for | her services, and that when no longer able to continue her work, she has been able to lay aside a small sum, which
 will be sufficient to support her for the
 rest of her life. But while trained ] nurses in general receive a fair com 1 pensation for their services, the sisters | of the Red Cross get nothing whatever.
 With the danger of a war before us,
 noble professional nurses have come , forward by hundreds, and offered their services for Red Cross work. They fully comprehend the magnitude and | importance of the work that they will
 be called upon to perform, and under 1 take it quite aware that they are giv- | ing gratuitous service.
 | But what shall be said of the unpro- fessional women who, without training or skill, offer themselves as assistants l to the Red Cross? It would seem folly 1 to accept their services, and yet the 1 officers of the society base their opin- 1 ion on the experience gained in the l Franco Prussian war, when the prin- | cesses of Prussia and women of allde- gree oered their services to the Red | Cross, and proved of inestimable as- l sistance.
 1 In the present emergency untrained l women will have to be more carefully
 selected than those who bring diplo- | mas, and possibly but few will stand the preliminary tests. The trained | nursse will have life and death in their | hands, but the untrained assistants will | have no less responsibility for while l upon one will the care of the sick de- volve, on the other the protection of | the healthy will fall and in hostile | country, with unacclimated persons, | the task will be neither easy nor light. l It is difficult to forecast what the du- 1 ties of an assistant may be, but we may | picture one of the scenes that may we'll | take place. A great battle has been | fought; the Red Cross is called for; | bearers begin to carry in the wounded.
 The country is devastated, smoking l ruins show where the homes of the in- 1 habitants once stood; there is no shel- l ter, there are no provisions the
 wounded famish for a sip of water,
 which would poison them if served
 from the polluted streams about them
 The surgeons and nurses are bending
 over the wounded, rendering profess
 sional aid. The unprofessional worker is now alert and calls to her aid her
 housewife's training, and looks after
 the comforts and wants of an emergen-
 cy household. While the trained
 nurses have been providing themselves
 with bandages, lint, etc, the assistant
 has been loading a small cart with
 bread, boiled water, tea, coffee, etc,
 and she hurriedly follows the ambu-
 lance corps. A sheet thrown over the
 branch of a tree makes a shelter, fires
 are lighted, food is prepared, and the
 assistant follows the nurses and doc-
 tors, feeds the wounded and gives a
 woman's gentle aid to the soldier As
 nurses and doctors turn exhausted
 from their fatiguing tasks, the impro-
 vised tent offers the shelter and food
 provided by the assistant.
 It is for this kind of work that the
 unprofessional women are offering
 themselves, and no doubt those of
 America will be found as useful as
 were the daughters of the German mo-
 bility in the Franco-P -Prussian war.
 Among those who have volunteered are
 some of the most prominent women of