MISS JESSIE HOME.

ESSIE HOME was a native of Scotland. No ties bound her to this, her adopted land. No relative of hers, resided upon its soil. She was alone-far from kindred and the friends of her early youth. But the country of her adoption had become dear to her. She loved it with the ardor and earnestness which were a part of her nature, and she was willing, nay anxious, to devote herself to its service.

At the commencement of the war Miss Home was engaged in a pleasant and lucrative pursuit, which she abandoned that she might devote herself to the arduous and ill-paid duties of a hospital nurse.

She entered the service early in the war, and became one of the corps of Government nurses attached to the hospitals in the vicinity of Washington. Like others, regularly enlisted, and under orders from Miss Dix, the Government Superintendent of nurses, she was transferred from point to point and from hospital to hospital, as the exigencies of the service required. But she had only to be known to be appreciated, and her companions, her patients, and the surgeons under whom she worked, were equally attached to her, and loud in her praises. She entered into her work with her whole soul-untiring, faithful, of a buoyant temperament, she possessed a peculiar power of winning the love and confidence of all with whom she came in contact.

She was quite dependent upon her own resources, and in giving herself to the cause yielded up a profitable employment and with it her means of livelihood. Yet she denied herself all luxuries,

everything but the merest necessities, that out of the pittance of pay received from the Government, out of the forty cents per day with which her labors were rewarded, she might save something for the wants of the suffering ones under her care.

And be it remembered always, that in this work it was not alone the well-born and the wealthy who made sacrifices, and gave grand gifts. Not from the sacrifice of gauds and frippery did the humble charities of these hired nurses come, but from the yielding up of a thousand needed comforts for themselves, and the forgetfulness of their own wants, in supplying the mightier wants of the suffering. It is impossible to mention them with words of praise beyond their merit.

For about two years Miss Home labored thus untiringly and faithfully, always alert, cheerful, active. During this time she had drawn to herself hosts of attached friends.

At the end of that period she fell a martyr to her exertions in the cause to which she had so nobly devoted herself.

When attacked with illness, she must have felt all the horrors of desolation-for she was without means or home. But Providence did not desert her in this last dread hour of trial. Miss Rebecca Bergen of Brooklyn, N. Y., who had learned her worth by a few months' hospital association, deemed it a privilege to receive the sufferer at her own home, and to watch over the last hours of this noble life as it drew to a close, ministering to her sufferings with all the kindness and affection of a sister, and smoothing her passage to the

grave.

Thus, those, who without thought for themselves, devote their lives and energies to the welfare of others, are often unexpectedly cared for in the hour of their own extremity, and find friends springing up to protect them, and to supply their wants in the day of their need. Far from kindred and her native land, this devoted woman thus found friends and kindly care, and the stranger hands that laid her in an alien grave were warm with the emotion of loving hearts.

M. VANCE AND M. A. BLACKMAR.

ISS MARY VANCE is a Pennsylvanian. Before the War, she was teaching among the Indians of Kansas or Nebraska, but it becoming unsafe there, she was forced to leave. She came to Miss Dix, who sent her to a Baltimore Hospital, in which she rendered efficient service, as she afterward did in Washington and Alexandria. In September, 1863, she went to the General Hospital, Gettysburg, where she was placed in charge of six wards, and no more indefatigable, faithful and judicious nurse was to be found on those grounds. She labored on continuously, going from point to point, as our army progressed towards Richmond, at Fredericksburg, suffering much from want of strengthening and proper food, but never murmuring, doing a vast amount of work, in such a quiet and unpretending manner, as to attract the attention from the lookers-on. Few, but the recipients of her kindness, knew her worth. At City Point, she was stationed in the Second Corps Hospital, where she, as usual, won the respect and esteem of the Surgeons and all connected with her.

Miss Vance labored the whole term of the War, with but three weeks' furlough, in all that time. A record, that no other woman can give, and but few soldiers.

Miss Blackmar, one of Michigan's worthy daughters, was one of the youngest of the band of Hospital nurses. She, for ten months, labored unceasingly at City Point. More than usually skilful in wound dressing, she rendered efficient service to her

Surgeons, as well as in saving many poor boys much suffering from the rough handling of inexperienced soldier-nurses. A lad was brought to her Wards, with a wound in the temple, which, in the course of time, ate into the artery. This she had feared, and was always especially careful in watching and attending to him. But, in her absence, a hemorrhage took place, the nurse endeavored to staunch the blood, but at last, becoming frightened, sent for a Surgeon. When she came back to the Ward, there lay her boy pale and exhausted, life almost gone. But she persevered in her efforts, and at last had the satisfaction of witnessing his recovery.

At City Point, Miss Vance and Miss Blackmar were tent-mates, and intimate friends-both noted for their untiring devotion to their work, their prudent and Christian deportment. As an instance of the wearying effects of the labors of a Hospital nurse, Mrs. Husband, who was the firm friend, and at City Point, the associate of these two young ladies, relates the following; these two ladies, wearied as usual, retired one very cold night, Miss Blackmar taking a hot brick with her, for her feet. They slept the sound sleep of exhaustion for some time, when Miss Vance struggled into consciousness, with a sensation of smothering, and found that the tent was filled with smoke. After repeatedly calling her companion, she was forced to rise and shake her, telling her that she must be on fire. This at last aroused Miss Blackmar, who found that the brick had burned through the cloth in which it was wrapped, the straw-bed and two army blankets. By the application of water, the fire was quenched, and after airing the tent, they were soon sleeping as soundly as ever. But, in the morning, Miss Blackmar, to her consternation, found that her feet and ankles were badly burned, covered with blisters and very painful, though her sleep had been too sound to feel it before.