Gone with the Wind / Унесённые ветром. Уровень 3

The Yankees are recruiting men for frontier service to fight the Indians, recruiting them from among Confederate prisoners. Any prisoner who will take the oath of allegiance and enlist for Indian service for two years will be released and sent West. Mr. Wilkes refusedВ».

«Oh, how could he?» cried Scarlett. «Why didn’t he take the oath and then desert and come home?»

«How can you even suggest that?” said Melanie. “Betray his own Confederacy and then betray the Yankees! I’ll be proud of him if he dies in prison.

Later Scarlett asked Rhett:

«And you, for example, won’t you enlist with the Yankees and then desert?»

В«Of courseВ», said Rhett.

«Then why didn’t Ashley do it?»

«He’s a gentleman», said Rhett.

Chapter XII

The Yankees under General Sherman were in Georgia again, above Dalton, one hundred miles northwest of Atlanta. An army of refugees fell back before them. Rich and poor, black and white, women and children, the old, the dying, the crippled, the wounded, the women in pregnancy, crowded the road to Atlanta on trains, afoot, on horseback, in carriages and wagons.

The wounded flooded Atlanta and the town was appalled. The hospitals overflowed and wounded lay on the floors of empty stores and in the warehouses. Every hotel, boarding house and private residence was crowded with sufferers. There was endless cooking and lifting and turning and fanning, endless hours of washing and rerolling bandages and picking lint.

On the day when the first wounded from Kennesaw Mountain were coming in, Scarlett silently cursed the wounded and the whole Southern Confederacy. She was sick of all this nursing. This very day she will tell Mrs. Merriwether that Ellen had written her to come home for a visit.

But that worthy matron said:

«Don’t let me hear any more such foolishness, Scarlett Hamilton. I’ll write your mother today and tell her how much we need you, and I’m sure she’ll understand and let you stay.

«Oh, God», thought Scarlett drearily, «that’s just the trouble. I shall die if I smell these stinks

She went hastily up the two short blocks to Peachtree Street. She was standing on the corner, ashamed to go home to Aunt Pitty’s but determined not to go back to the hospital, when Rhett Butler drove by.