Forgetting her bonnet, and tying the ends of her shawl behind her, Christie caught up a bottle of brandy and a canteen of water, and ran on deck.  There a sight to daunt most any woman, met her eyes; for all about her, so thick that she could hardly step without treading on them, lay the sad wrecks of men:  some moaning for help; some silent, with set, white faces turned up to the gray sky; all shelterless from the cold wind that blew, and the fog rising from the river.  Surgeons and nurses were doing their best; but the boat was loaded, and greater suffering reigned below.

“Heaven help us all!” sighed Christie, and then she fell to work.

Bottle and canteen were both nearly empty by the time she came to the end of the long line, where lay a silent figure with a hidden face.  “Poor fellow, is he dead?” she said, kneeling down to lift a corner of the blanket lent by a neighbor.

A familiar face looked up at her, and a well remembered voice said courteously, but feebly: 

“Thanks, not yet.  Excuse my left hand.  I’m very glad to see you.”

“Mr. Fletcher, can it be you!” she cried, looking at him with pitiful amazement.  Well she might ask, for any thing more unlike his former self can hardly be imagined.  Unshaven, haggard, and begrimed with powder, mud to the knees, coat half on, and, worst of all, the right arm gone, there lay the “piece of elegance” she had known, and answered with a smile she never saw before: 

“All that’s left of me, and very much at your service.  I must apologize for the dirt, but I’ve laid in a mud-puddle for two days; and, though it was much easier than a board, it doesn’t improve one’s appearance.”

“What can I do for you?  Where can I put you?  I can’t bear to see you here!” said Christie, much afflicted by the spectacle before her.

“Why not? we are all alike when it comes to this pass.  I shall do very well if I might trouble you for a draught of water.”

She poured her last drop into his parched mouth and hurried off for more.  She was detained by the way, and, when she returned, fancied he was asleep, but soon discovered that he had fainted quietly away, utterly spent with two days of hunger, suffering, and exposure.  He was himself again directly, and lay contentedly looking up at her as she fed him with hot soup, longing to talk, but refusing to listen to a word till he was refreshed.

“That’s very nice,” he said gratefully, as he finished, adding with a pathetic sort of gayety, as he groped about with his one hand:  “I don’t expect napkins, but I should like a handkerchief.  They took my coat off when they did my arm, and the gentleman who kindly lent me this doesn’t seem to have possessed such an article.”

Christie wiped his lips with the clean towel at her side, and smiled as she did it, at the idea of Mr. Fletcher’s praising burnt soup, and her feeding him like a baby out of a tin cup.