The Anaconda standard. [volume] (Anaconda, Mont.) 1889-1970, 1899-12-26
THE DAY At ST. AIMS
How Christmas Was Passed in
the City Hospital.
MANY TOASTED TURKEYS
Disappeared Before the Reviving Appe-
titles of More Than Score of Patients
Christmas Eve Celebrated With
Photograph Entertainment.

CHRISTMAS uaN Ill lIe CllS-ll ollt idNlHE
eyes cares to see-is like gazing at dis
torted landscape as reflected in a Claude
Lorrain mirror-the human proportions
are so exaggerated: the distortion is so
intense On one hand you are shown the
happiness, or at least the semblance of the
happiness of the cherished and the rich;
on the other hand, touching bounds, you
behold the loneliness and the misery of
Fortunes outcasts, the poor, the wretch
ed, the fallen; yet another look, and there
are the pale wan faces of the sick peer
ing out from the places of pain; the wom-
an of sin is pinnng a sprig of green and
few bits of tawdry brightness to the
walls of her dreary home to simulate
Christmas cheer and the prisoner in his
cell gazes out with sullen. joyless eyes
on the world whose freedom he is denied.
But there is one bright reflection in this
strange mirror view, and it redeems much
else that is dark and unbeautiful and sad:
1t is the picture of the going out of warm.
human sympathy from the fortunate and
the free to those who else would lose their
little tastes of joy. 1t is the spirit Of the
Christmas day.
Passing to things at hand. there is a
brief visit to St. AIMS to be made
Christmas day in a large hospital is a
StelIH "a as HUGH lllleieSt pdlilbS " lliC
visitor from the streets to enter is like
stepping of a sudden from a world of
noise and mirth into another and so pit
fully different world of pain and love and
quiet The sufferers are everywhere, in
wards, in ROOM. in halls; and ceaselessly
the silent, sweet-faced Sisters come and
go, come and go, on thousand errands
of tenderness and mercy that they never
are through with the doing of. And he
who has stepped in for a brief moment
from the outer world remembers almost
sadly, that for him it is enough to give
on the Christmas day, while these Sisters
are giving always-not the gifts that can
be bought, but the priceless gift of their
lives. Their happiness is in their con.e-
Grafton; their strength to endure and
never falter in the lifelong giving is in
their measureless love.
Yet with all the suffering and the weari-
ness of being shut in, there was much of
brightness and some mirth in St. AIMS
on Christmas day. 1t did not pass I'M
noticed that Of the two score patients in
the hospital not one was desperately sick,
while very many We're setting foot on the
broad highway to health 1t may sound
odd, but it is assuredly true. that a whole
flock of crisp, brown Christmas turkeys
fell before the returning appetites of the
shut-ins, to say nothing of a vast guam
tity of cranberry sauce and trimmings of
a stouter growth. Not a few of the con-
valescents from sick and surgical wards
were able to creep downstairs to the pa
tents dining room. where scarcely a seat
at either of the three heavily laden and
flower decked tables was permitted for
long to stand empty. Only those who
never in all their lives have occupied
a cot in hospital ward can fail to un-
derstand what a momentous episode IT Is
to the tired patient to crawl down stairs
fn thn fret limo tn toll hi 1- y,
his neighbors; nor what a zest it gives to
the faded appetite. 1t was no wonder that
a whole flock of turkeys succumbed at st.
AIMS on Christmas.
One of those who yesterday made their
first trip down stairs was little Herman
Erwin the smallest patient at ST. AIMS.
He is a bright boy of 9 years, with
childish face so white and thin and wan
that the look of it goes to your heart. He
tried to jump on a moving ore train near
the works about three months ago and
that is why he is a patient in the surgi-
cal ward at st. Anne s, and also why he
hops ABOUT on one foot with the aid of
pair of miniature crutches. When he
missed his hold and fell from the ore
train the wheels caught and mangled his
right foot, so that several of the toes had
to be amputated and the flesh was terri
bly, scraped. Herman has still some
weeks and possibly months to remain a
shut-in, for though his foot IS healing, the
wounds were many and deep.
Someone gave the lad a pair of pink
worsted bed slippers for a Christmas pres
ent, He could use only the left one, for
his right foot is a bundle of bandages, but
he put that one on and became deliciouslp
happy. He was hobblng down the hall
from the surgical ward when a Sister and
the newspaper man stopped him.
How old are you?" asked the Sister
the bandaged foot by resting one knee
against his crutch.
And how old do you suppose you will
be when your foot is well so you can go
home?"
The boy hesitated. while a longing smile
| crept over his face: "Oh, bout 10 years, !
| guess"
Fifteen men were found in the eurgica!
ward. ''They are all doing WE'LL said
| Sister Generosa, cheeriy.
! Sitting on cot near a window was a
tail, sharp featured man, a Swede His
| left arm from the elbow down was hiu,
| den in bundle of bandages and splints
| He had been struck by steam hamme,
| at the works. On an opposite cot lay 9
| German, a man of immense build. One OF
! his feet, swathed deep in bandages, pro-
| truded from the bed Badly crushed at
! the lower works" the Sister said in pass.
| ing.
| And so on every side were bruised and
| battered men, some new patients, somt
old, and all the victims of pain.
Passing to the general wards the SiStel