Fingernails for a spoon

From the account of a nurse, Phoebe Yates Pember's experiences as a nurse at Chimborazo Hosptial during the war comes a new look at fingernails. "The speaker was an up country Georgian,one of the kind called 'Goobers" by the soldiers generally; lean, yellow, attentuated, with wispy strands of hair hanging over his high thin cheek bones. He put out a hand to detain me and the nails were like claws. 'Why do you not let the nurse cut your nails?' 'Because i aren't got any spoon, and I use them instead.' One will never see that acted out on the History channel. Instead of a spoon he used hisThe boy later told Ms. Yates he would not cut his hair until the war ended.