: The Life of Florence Nightingale vol. 2 of 2 by Cook Edward Tyas Sir - Nightingale Florence 1820-1910

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. It is addressed entirely to the poor. And now thank you and bless you for all the support you have always given me. Believe me, very gratefully, E. A. PARKES.

The Professors at the Army Medical School had written to Miss Nightingale in alarm at a report in the newspapers that the institution was once more threatened. She begged Dr. Acland, who was a friend of the War Secretary , to do what he could; and meanwhile she took direct action herself. She drew up for Mr. Hardy, as she had done years before for Mr. Cardwell, the case for the defence of the School; she added personal entreaties of her own; and she sent Sir Harry Verney to present the documents to the minister in person. "Mr. Hardy listened attentively while I read your papers," reported Sir Harry. "I emphasised passages underlined by you, indeed showing him your marks and initials. He said that he had not decided the matter, and I replied, 'And Miss Nightingale wants to get hold of you before you do.' I shall congratulate you most earnestly, my dearest Florence, if your representations save the School, for I know that such success cheers you more than anything else." Three weeks later, the minister returned the papers to Sir Harry, announced that the School would not be touched, and said he might tell Miss Nightingale that he would make the appointments she had suggested.

Some unfinished letters from M. Mohl, found in his blotter after his death, were sent to Miss Nightingale by Madame Mohl, who leaned much on her "Flochen's" sympathy in her loss:--

Miss Nightingale's interest in the Eastern Question, moved by the Turkish atrocities in Bulgaria, had been heightened by her close friendship with Miss Paulina Irby. Of the women friends whom Miss Nightingale saw frequently, and with whom she corresponded regularly, Miss Irby was one of the few who could in any intellectual and spiritual sense be called her equal. Miss Irby was a woman of the highest cultivation, an excellent scholar; a woman of most generous kindliness and simplicity of mind who truly thought no evil. There was a sort of innocence in her that seemed to disperse difficulties of itself, and Miss Nightingale's papers contain references to occasions on which Miss Irby's friendly offices resolved many worries. She was a friend of Mr. and Mrs. Nightingale, and Florence had first met her at Embley in 1869. She was one of the many women who revered the name of Florence Nightingale, and she had spent some months at Kaiserswerth. She was enraptured by making the personal acquaintance of her heroine, and was used to say henceforth that any good she was able to do was owing to Miss Nightingale's example and sympathy. The good that Miss Irby did was great; in promoting education among the Sclavonic Christians of Bosnia and Herzegovina, and in relieving the distress among orphans and refugees. During the years 1874-79 Miss Irby was often in England, to collect funds and for other purposes connected with her work in the East. Miss Nightingale helped her much therein, and thus became very familiar with some aspects of the Eastern Question. This interest, combined with her detestation of the forward policy on the Indian frontier, formed a link of sympathy with Mr. Gladstone.

It is unfortunate that no record of this admirable woman exists except a slight article in one of the Reviews. Her letters were, I am told, destroyed at her death in 1912; those from Miss Nightingale among the rest. A very large number of letters from Miss Irby is preserved among Miss Nightingale's papers.

Was Miss Nightingale's life happy or unhappy? Her sister used to say to her, thinking of her many political acquaintances: "You lead such an interesting life." Mr. Jowett told her that her life was a blessed one, and that she ought so to think it. He always sent her a New Year's letter, and on the last day of 1879 he wrote to her thus:--

I cannot let the new year begin without sending my best and kindest wishes for you and for your work: I can only desire that you should go on as you are doing, in your own way. Lessening human suffering and speaking for those who cannot make their voices heard, with less of suffering to yourself, if this, as I fear, be not a necessary condition of the life you have chosen. There was a great deal of romantic feeling about you 23 years ago when you came home from the Crimea . And now you work on in silence, and nobody knows how many lives are saved by your nurses in hospitals ; how many thousand soldiers who would have fallen victims to bad air, bad water, bad drainage and ventilation, are now alive owing to your forethought and diligence; how many natives of India in this generation and in generations to come have been preserved from famine and oppression and the load of debt by the energy of a sick lady who can scarcely rise from her bed. The world does not know all this or think about it. But I know it and often think about it, and I want you to, so that in the later years of your course you may see what a blessed life yours is and has been. Is there anything which you could do, or would wish to do, other than you are doing? though you are overtaxed and have a feeling of oppression at the load which rests upon you. I think that the romance, too, which is with the past, did a great deal of good. Like Dr. Pusey, you are a Myth in your own life-time. Do you know that there are thousands of girls about the ages of 18 to 23 named after you? As you once said to me "the world has not been unkind." Everybody has heard of you and has a sweet association with your name. It is about 17 years since we first became friends. How can I thank you properly for all your kindness and sympathy--never failing--when you had so many other things to occupy your mind? I have not been able to do so much as you expected of me, and probably never shall be, though I do not give up ambition. But I have been too much distracted by many things; and not strong enough for the place. I shall go on as quietly and industriously as I can. If I ever do much more, it will be chiefly owing to you: your friendship has strengthened and helped me, and never been a source of the least pain or regret. Farewell. May the later years of your life be clearer and happier and more useful than the earlier! If you will believe it, this may be so.

In Mr. Jowett's example, his friend found strength and help, even as he did in hers. "He offers himself up to Oxford," she used to say of him with admiration; and she offered up all her powers to the causes she had espoused. There were still to be many years during which she was able to work unceasingly for them. Her life was to be not less useful than before, and perhaps, as increasing years brought greater calm, her life was also clearer. But happiness, as the world accounts it, she neither attained nor desired. She had a friend who was losing his devotion to high ideals, as she thought, in domestic contentment. "O Happiness," she said of him, "like the bread-tree fruit, what a corrupter and paralyser of human nature thou art!"

LORD RIPON AND GENERAL GORDON

I thank God for all He is doing in India through Lord Ripon.--FLORENCE NIGHTINGALE .

General Gordon was the bravest of men where God's cause and that of others was concerned, and his courage rose with loneliness. He was the meekest of men where himself only was concerned. You could not say he was the most unselfish of men: he had no self.--FLORENCE NIGHTINGALE .

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