The nearest house was fully a mile distant, that
section of country being but sparsely settled."
Their painful journey thitherward ended, just imagine what it must
have been to these suffering men to arrive at such a haven of rest!--a
"refuge" indeed. Think of the cool, breezy chambers, clean and white
and fragrant, _like home_, of the tender ministry of that gentle
woman, whose loving service was theirs to command, of the country
food, of the cool, sparkling water from the spring under the oaks,
held to fevered lips by ever-ready hands, while the favored patients
drank at the same time draughts of sympathy from eyes whose kindly
glances fell upon the humblest as upon their very own. The excellence
and faithfulness of the nursing is fully proved by the fact that while
three or four hundred patients were sent to this blessed "Refuge," no
mortality occurred among the soldiers, the only death being that of a
little son of Captain Laurence Nichols, who had fallen in battle at
Gaines's Mill, and whose widow found in this lovely, hospitable home a
temporary resting-place for the body of her gallant husband, and
shelter for herself and child, a lovely boy of three years, who was
thence transferred to the arms of the Good Shepherd.
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