This it was, the screaming of the women, that most tried my nerves.
It must have tried, too, the nerves of the red-faced man, for have another picture which will never fade from my mind.The stout gentleman is stuffing the magazine into his overcoat pocket and looking on curiously.A tangled mass of women, with drawn, white faces and open mouths, is shrieking like a chorus of lost souls; and the red-faced man, his face now purplish with wrath, and with arms extended overhead as in the act of hurling thunderbolts, is shouting, "Shut up! Oh, shut up!"I remember the scene impelled me to sudden laughter, and in the next instant I realized I was becoming hysterical myself; for these were women of my own kind, like my mother and sisters, with the fear of death upon them and unwilling to die.And I remember that the sounds they made reminded me of the squealing of pigs under the knife of the butcher, and I was struck with horror at the vividness of the analogy.These women, capable of the most sublime emotions, of the tenderest sympathies, were open-mouthed and screaming.They wanted to live, they were helpless, like rats in a trap, and they screamed.