Florence Nightingale, the Angel of the Crimea: A Story for Young People

Before a year had passed, the fund amounted to over forty thousand pounds; and there is no knowing how much higher it might have gone had not Miss Nightingale herself come home and stopped it.

That was enough, she said; if they wanted to give more money, they might give it to the sufferers from the floods in France.

But she did not come home at once; no indeed! The war might be over, but her work was not, and she would never leave it while anything remained undone. The war was over, but the hospitals, especially those of the Crimea itself, were still filled with sick and wounded soldiers, and until the formal peace was signed an "army of occupation" must still remain in the Crimea. Miss Nightingale knew well that idleness is the worst possible thing for soldiers (as for everyone); and while she cared for the sick and wounded, she took as much pains to provide employment and amusement for the rest. As soon as she had fully regained her strength, she returned to the Crimea as she had promised to do, set up two new camp hospitals, and established a staff of nurses, taking the charge of the whole nursing department upon herself. These new hospitals were on the heights above Balaklava, not far from where she had passed the days of her own desperate illness. She established herself in a hut close by the hospitals and the Sanatorium, and here she spent a second winter of hard work and exposure. It was bitter cold up there on the mountainside. The hut was not weather-proof, and they sometimes found their beds covered with snow in the morning; but they did not mind trifles like this.

"The sisters are all quite well and cheerful," writes Miss Nightingale; "thank God for it! They have made their hut look quite tidy, and put up with the cold and inconveniences with the utmost self-abnegation. Everything, even the ink, freezes in our hut every night."

In all weathers she rode or drove over the rough and perilous roads, often at great risk of life and limb. Her carriage being upset one day, and she and her attendant nurse injured, a friend had a carriage made on purpose for her, to be at once secure and comfortable.

It was "composed of wood battens framed on the outside and basketwork. In the interior it is lined with a sort of waterproof canvas. It has a fixed head on the hind part and a canopy running the full length, with curtains at the side to inclose the interior. The front driving seat removes, and thus the whole forms a sort of small tilted wagon with a welted frame, suspended on the back part on which to recline, and well padded round the sides. It is fitted with patent breaks to the hind wheels so as to let it go gently down the steep hills of the Turkish roads."12

This curious carriage is still preserved at Lea Hurst. Miss Nightingale left it behind her when she returned to England, and it was about to be sold, with other abandoned articles, when our good friend M. Soyer heard of it; he instantly bought it, sent it to England, and afterwards had the pleasure of restoring it to its owner. She must have been amused, I think, but no doubt she was pleased, too, at the kindly thought.

But this comfortable carriage only increased her labors, in one way, for with it she went about more than ever. No weather was too severe, no snowstorm too furious, to keep her indoors; the men needed her and she must go to them. "She was known to stand for hours at the top of a bleak rocky mountain near the hospitals, giving her instructions while the snow was falling heavily. Then in the bleak dark night she would return down the perilous mountain road with no escort save the driver."13

It was not only for the invalids that Miss Nightingale toiled through this second winter; much of her time was given to the convalescents and those who were on active duty. She established libraries, and little "reading huts," where the men could come and find the English magazines and papers, and a stock of cheerful, entertaining books, carefully chosen by the dear lady who knew so well what they liked. She got up lectures, too, and classes for those who wished to study this or that branch of learning; and she helped to establish a café at Inkerman, where the men could get hot coffee and chocolate and the like in the bitter winter weather. There really seems no end to the good and kind and lovely things she did. I must not forget one thing, which may seem small to some of you, but which was truly great in the amount of good that came from it. Ever since she first came out to Scutari, she had used all her influence to persuade the soldiers to write home regularly to their families. The sick lads in the hospital learned that if they would write a letter – just two or three lines, to tell mother or sister that they were alive and doing well – and would send it to the Lady-in-Chief, she would put a stamp on it and speed it on its way. So now, in all the little libraries and reading huts, there were pens, ink and paper, envelopes and stamps; and when Miss Nightingale looked in at one of these cheerful little gathering places, we may be sure that she asked Jim or Joe whether he had written to his mother this week, and bade him be sure not to forget it. Does this seem to you a small thing? Wait till you go away from home, and see what the letters that come from home mean to you; then multiply that by ten, and you will know partly, but not entirely, what your letters mean to those at home. It has always seemed to me that this was a very bright star in Miss Nightingale's crown of glory.

The soldier's wife and child, mother and sister, were always in her thoughts. Not only did she persuade the men to write home, but she used all her great influence to induce them to send home their pay to their families. At Scutari she had a money-order office of her own, and four afternoons in each month she devoted to receiving money from the soldiers who brought it to her, and forwarding it to England. It is estimated that about a thousand pounds was sent each month, in small sums of twenty or thirty shillings. "This money," says Miss Nightingale, "was literally so much rescued from the canteen and drunkenness."

After the fall of Sebastopol the British Government followed her example, and set up money-order offices in several places, with excellent results.

Sometimes it was Miss Nightingale herself who wrote home to the soldier's family; sad, sweet letters, telling how the husband or father had done his duty gallantly, and had died as a brave man should; giving his last messages, and inclosing the mementos he had left for them. To many a humble home these letters brought comfort and support in the hour of trial, and were treasured – are no doubt treasured to this day – like the relics of a blessed saint.

The Treaty of Peace was signed at Paris on March 30, 1856, and now all hearts in the Crimea turned toward home. One by one the hospitals were closed, as their inmates recovered strength; one by one the troopships were filled with soldiers – ragged, gaunt, hollow-eyed, yet gay and light-hearted as schoolboys – and started on the homeward voyage; yet still the Lady-in-Chief lingered. Not while one sick man remained would Florence Nightingale leave her post. Indeed, at the last moment she found a task that none but herself might have taken up. The troopships were gone; but here, on the camping ground before Sebastopol, were fifty or sixty poor women, left behind when their husbands' regiments had sailed, helpless and – I was going to say friendless, but nothing could be more untrue; for they gathered in their distress round the hut of the Lady-in-Chief, imploring her aid; and she soon had them on board a British ship, speeding home after the rest.

And now the end had come, and there was only one more thing to do, one more order to give; the result of that last order is seen to-day by all who visit that far-away land of the Crimea. On the mountain heights above Balaklava, on a peak not far from the Sanatorium where she labored and suffered, towers a great cross of white marble, shining like snow against the deep blue sky. This is the "Nightingale Cross," her own tribute to the brave men and the devoted nurses who died in the war. At the foot of the cross are these words:

"Lord have mercy upon us."

To every Englishman – nay, to everyone of any race who loves noble thoughts and noble deeds – this monument will always be a sacred and a venerable one.

In the spring of this year, Lord Ellesmere, speaking before Parliament, said:

"My Lords, the agony of that time has become a matter of history. The vegetation of two successive springs has obscured the vestiges of Balaklava and of Inkerman. Strong voices now answer to the roll call, and sturdy forms now cluster round the colors. The ranks are full, the hospitals are empty. The angel of mercy still lingers to the last on the scene of her labors; but her mission is all but accomplished. Those long arcades of Scutari, in which dying men sat up to catch the sound of her footstep or the flutter of her dress, and fell back on the pillow content to have seen her shadow as it passed, are now comparatively deserted. She may be thinking how to escape, as best she may, on her return, the demonstration of a nation's appreciation of the deeds and motives of Florence Nightingale."

This was precisely what the Lady-in-Chief was thinking. She meant to return to England as quietly as she left it; and she succeeded. The British Government begged her to accept a man-of-war as her own for the time being; she was much obliged, but would rather not. She went over to Scutari, saw the final closing of the hospitals there, and took a silent farewell of that place of many memories; then stepped quietly on board a French vessel, and sailed for France. A few days later – so the story goes – a lady quietly dressed in black, and closely veiled, entered the back door of Lea Hurst. The old butler saw the intruder, and hastened forward to stop her way – and it was "Miss Florence!"

CHAPTER XV.

THE TASKS OF PEACE

Now, the people of England had been on tiptoe for some days with eagerness, waiting to welcome the heroine of the Crimea back to her native shores. They would give her such a reception as no one had ever yet had in that land of hospitality and welcomings. She should have bells and cannon and bonfires, processions and deputations and addresses – she should have everything that anybody could think of.

When they found that their heroine had slipped quietly through their fingers, as it were, and was back in her own peaceful home once more, people were sadly disappointed. They must give up the cannon and the bonfires; but at least they might have a glimpse of her! So hundreds of people crowded the roads and lanes about Lea Hurst, waiting and watching. An old lady living at the park gate told Mrs. Tooley: "I remember the crowds as if it was yesterday. It took me all my time to answer them. Folks came in carriages and on foot, and there was titled people among them, and a lot of soldiers, some of them without arms and legs, who had been nursed by Miss Florence in the hospital, and I remember one man who had been shot through both eyes coming and asking to see Miss Florence. But not ten out of the hundreds who came got a glimpse of her. If they wanted help about their pensions, they were told to put it down in writing, and Miss Florence's maid came with an answer. Of course she was willing to help everybody, but it stood to reason she could not receive them all; why, the park wouldn't have held all the folks that came, and besides, the old Squire wouldn't have his daughter made a staring stock of."14

After the first disappointment – which after all was perfectly natural – all sensible people realized how weary Miss Nightingale must be after her tremendous labors, and how much she must need rest. All who knew her, too, knew that she never could abide public "demonstrations"; so they left her in peace, and began sending her things, to show their gratitude in a different way. The first gift of this kind she had received before she left the Crimea, from good Queen Victoria herself. This was "the Nightingale Jewel," as it is called; "a ruby-red enamel cross on a white field, encircled by a black band with the words: 'Blessed are the merciful.' The letters V. R.; surmounted by a crown in diamonds, are impressed upon the centre of the cross. Green enamel branches of palm, tipped with gold, form the framework of the shield, while around their stems is a riband of blue enamel, with the single word 'Crimea.' On the top are three brilliant stars of diamonds. On the back is an inscription written by the Queen."

Another gift received on the scene of her labors was a magnificent diamond bracelet sent her by the Sultan of Turkey.

I do not know of any more jewels; but two gifts that Miss Nightingale prized highly were a fine case of cutlery sent her by the workmen of Sheffield, each knife blade inscribed with the words "Presented to Florence Nightingale, 1857," and the silver-bound oak case inlaid with a representation of the Good Samaritan; and a beautiful pearl-inlaid writing desk, presented by her friends and neighbors near Lea Hurst.

All these things were very touching; still more touching were the letters that came from all over the country, thanking and blessing her for all she had done. Truly it was a happy home coming.

Miss Nightingale knew that she was very, very weary; she realized that she must have a long rest, but she little thought how long it must be. She, and all her friends, thought that after a few months she would be able to take up again the work she so loved, and become the active leader in introducing the new methods of nursing into England. But the months passed, and grew from few to many, and still her strength did not return. The next year, indeed, when the dreadful Indian Mutiny broke out, she wrote to her friend Lady Canning, wife of the Governor-General of India, offering to come at twenty-four hours' notice "if there was anything to do in her line of business"; but Lady Canning knew that she was not equal to such a task.

Slowly, gradually, the truth came to Florence Nightingale: she was never going to be strong or well again. Always delicate, the tremendous labors of the Crimea had been too much for her. While the work went on, the frail body answered the call of the powerful will, the undaunted mind, the great heart; now that the task was finished, it sank down broken and exhausted. Truly, she had given her life, as much as any soldier who fought and died in the trenches or on the battlefield.

And what did she do when she finally came to realize this? Did she give up, and say, "My work on earth is done?" Not she! There may have been some dark hours, but the world has never heard of them. She never for an instant thought of giving up her work; she simply changed the methods of it. The poor tired body must stay in bed or on the sofa; very well! But the mind was not tired at all; the will was not weakened; the heart had not ceased to throb with love and compassion for the sick, the sorrowful, the suffering; the question was to find the way in which they could work with as little trouble as might be to their poor sick friend the body.

The way was soon found. Whether at Lea Hurst or in London (for she now spent a good deal of time in the great city, to be near the centre of things), her sick room became one of the busiest places in all England.

Schemes for army reform, for hospital reform, for reform in everything connected with the poor and the sick – all these must be brought to Miss Nightingale. All the soldiers in the country must write to her whenever they wanted anything, from a pension down to a wooden leg (to their honor be it said, however, that though she was overwhelmed with begging letters from all parts of the country, not a soldier ever asked her for money). The Nightingale fund, now nearly fifty thousand pounds, was administered under her advice and direction, and the first Training School for Nurses organized and opened. The old incapable, ignorant nurse vanished, and the modern nurse, educated, methodical, clear-eyed and clear-headed, took her place quietly; one of the great changes of modern times was effected, and the hand that directed it was the same one that we have seen holding the lamp, or writing down the dying soldier's last words, in the Barrack Hospital at Scutari.

That slender hand wrote books with all the rest of its work. In the sick room as in the hospital, Miss Nightingale had no time to waste. Her "Hospital Notes" may be read to-day with the keenest interest by all who care to know more of that great story of the Crimean War; her "Notes on Nursing" became the handbook of the Nursing Reform, and ought to be in the hands of every nurse to-day as it was in 1860, when it was written. Nor in the hands of nurses only; I wish every girl and every boy who reads this story would try to find that slender, dingy volume in some library, and "read, mark, learn, and inwardly digest" its contents. They would know a good deal more than they do now. Well might Miss Nightingale write, in 1861: "I have passed the last four years between four walls, only varied to other four walls once a year; and I believe there is no prospect but of my health becoming ever worse and worse till the hour of my release. But I have never ceased, during one waking hour since my return to England five years ago, laboring for the welfare of the army at home, as I did abroad, and no hour have I given to friendship or amusement during that time, but all to work."

Drop a stone in the water and see how the circles spread, growing wider and wider. After a while you cannot see them, but you know that the motion you have started must go on and on till it whispers against the pebbles on the farther shore. So it is with a good deed or an evil one; we see its beginning; we cannot see what distant shore it may reach. So, no one will ever know the full amount of good that this noble woman has done. The Sanitary Commission of our own Civil War, the Red Cross which to-day counts its workers by thousands in every part of the civilized world, both owed their first impulse to the pebble dropped by Florence Nightingale – even her own life, given freely to suffering humanity.

I have never seen, but I like to think of the quiet room in London, where she lies to-day in the white beauty of her age. Nearly ninety years have passed since the little girl-baby woke to life among the blossoms of the City of Flowers; more than half a century has gone by since the Lady with the Lamp passed like light along the corridors of the Barrack Hospital; yet still Florence Nightingale lives and loves, still her thoughts go out in tenderness and compassion toward all who are "in trouble, sorrow, need, sickness, or any other adversity."

Let us think of that quiet room as one of the holy places of the earth; let us think of her, and take our leave of her, with loving and thankful hearts.

THE END

1

"By the Alma River," by Dinah Maria Mulock Craik.

2

"Charge of the Light Brigade," by Alfred, Lord Tennyson.

3

Tooley, "Life of Florence Nightingale," p. 137.

4

Tooley, "Life of Florence Nightingale," p. 126.

5

"Santa Filomena," by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow.

6

Kinglake, "Invasion of the Crimea."

7

"Hiawatha," by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow.

8

Tooley, "Life of Florence Nightingale," p. 154.

9

Rachel was a famous French actress, but I cannot imagine any real resemblance between her and Miss Nightingale.

10

Tooley, "Life of Florence Nightingale," p. 220.

11

Tooley, "Life of Florence Nightingale," p. 223.

12

Tooley, "Life of Florence Nightingale," p. 229.

13

Tooley, "Life of Florence Nightingale," pp. 231-32.

14

Tooley, "Life of Florence Nightingale," p. 240.