In Memory of Florence Nightingale

Florence Nightingale is one of those who belong to no individual, no group, no homeland, no land: they belong to humanity entire — like light; like beauty, whether it be veiled or spread abroad; like art; and like perfume, whether it be sealed up or diffused. They are the hoped-for loftiness, whether it show itself or stay concealed.

Those like Florence will always remain for us splendid examples of love, service, and cooperation. They are the symbol of the succoring, merciful heart, and the emblem of faithful friendship — not for money, standing, and power, in pursuit of gain, but for giving, for sacrifice, and for devotion to the wretched.

Many have written of Florence Nightingale the heroine; here I shall content myself with recording a little about the first pioneer of the modern art of nursing.

In one of the loveliest regions of England, the county of Derbyshire, on a wooded height, stands a stately English house, looking out upon the beauty of the county around it and upon the gardens that wind about it, bright in summer with heaps of colored blossoms. Down the slope of the hill stretches a flowering meadow, ending in an incline clothed with woods down to the river, which sleeps in and out among the hills like a gleaming silver thread.

In this beautiful house Florence lived as a little girl, through spring and summer, with her parents and her sister — seeming herself a part of the flowers and the music of the birds, with her sweet, radiant face and her glossy brown hair falling on either side of it.

She was born in 1820, and though she lived with her family through autumn and winter in another place, in Hampshire, she always counted that house, with its spacious gardens, its green meadows, and its great trees, the home of her childhood.

She was merciful from her earliest years. Her heart was moved for every bird or animal that was wounded or came to harm, and for every plant that flowered on bare rocky ground.

When her lessons were done, she would go out carrying a little basket with gardening things in it — a watering can and the like — and often she would go far afield, where the wild flowers grew, tending them, mending the broken fences, watering and propping up whatever needed her care.

Her father once said: "Florence was born a nurse." That was after he found her making a nest in a thicket for a nightingale with a broken wing.

And when he saw how she delighted in caring for everything that could not help itself, he set apart a place for her in the glasshouse at home, for a hospital; and whenever she found a bird or a dog or any suffering creature, she would carry it to this hospital and tend it until it was well.

One day, as she rode her little horse alongside the parson of the village church, they came upon an old shepherd, bent, with a palsied hand, having great trouble gathering his scattered sheep. The parson asked him: Where is your dog, Roger?

The shepherd answered sadly: He'll be no good for anything anymore. The boys stoned him and broke his leg, and I am thinking of putting an end to his misery.

Little Florence Nightingale said: Oh! Can I do something for him? Is it not cruel to leave him all alone in his trouble?

Then she looked imploringly at the parson and asked that she be allowed to help the poor animal. The parson turned his horse toward the pen where the dog lay stretched out, whimpering with pain. Florence urged on her little horse, reached the pen before the parson, dismounted, rushed inside, and knelt on the ground with the utmost tenderness, stroking the dog until he turned his great black eyes and looked gratefully into her face.

When the parson had examined the leg, he found no break in the bone, and judged that a hot compress should be laid on the injured leg. Florence listened to him eagerly, and set to work with a will, together with the shepherd's son, lighting the fire and fetching the boiling water.

Then, with the parson's help, she bandaged the leg, and the poor injured creature rested. She would not consent to leave him until he was ready and able to do his part in herding the sheep.

So Florence Nightingale grew and grew up, and there grew with her, strong, her insistent desire to care for the sick and the suffering.

And then she felt that the life of ease she was living would never give her the chance to do the work she believed herself fit for — helping those who cannot help themselves.

At that time, nursing was not the honorable profession it is today. The prevailing notion was that it did not become an honorable, well-born lady. Florence therefore had to arm herself with great courage in order to leave her home and give her life to this service.

And so her family consented to the matter only after long and careful thought. She traveled to Germany, where she studied the art of nursing, then returned to England to teach others.

But her chief work began with the Crimean War in 1854, when the war correspondent of the London Times made known the frightful conditions in the hospitals. The British nation rose up as one, demanding better treatment for its wounded soldiers. The correspondent had painted the scenes of death and suffering among them, and asked: Are there not among us women who will devote themselves? Is there not one daughter of England able to go far away to help the sick and the suffering in the hospitals of Scutari?

Florence Nightingale answered this call, with forty companions who went out to the East, and she herself shouldered the burdens of all the military hospitals. Her wise administration and her efforts to improve sanitary methods spread her name over the whole earth. By skillful nursing and unceasing vigil she saved a number of men of whose wounds the doctors had said there was no hope of recovery. The rate of death among them fell from 42% to 2% within a few months.

The patients called her "the Lady of the Light." They would watch for her as she passed, serene and quiet, at midnight, carrying a small lamp which she shaded carefully so as not to wake the sleepers. But before those who lay awake she would pause, with a gentle smile and a heartening word. Some saw the soldiers kissing her shadow when it fell upon the wall, in acknowledgment of her goodness and in thanks for her devotion to them.

Among her great projects was the organizing of the Red Cross, begun in 1863 at Geneva, Switzerland. Today it is present in every battle and in every country, pointing to her devotion, keeping order far from all confusion.

Florence did not work for fame. She wished to return to England when the war was over, and word reached her that the British government had ordered a warship placed at her disposal for the journey home, and that the British people were preparing a great reception for her. So she sailed on a French steamer, landed in France, and went on from there to England; and the news of her return was not made public until some time afterward. She then set to work to realize the wish of her life — higher training for nurses — and resolved to raise a fund of 250,000, to which all classes of the English subscribed. Every soldier gave a day's pay, until the sum was gathered at once. Thus was founded the first higher school of modern nursing, known as the Florence Nightingale Home, attached to St. Thomas' Hospital in London. She continued to direct it

herself for several years.

At a gathering in England it was once asked that every person write on a slip of paper the name of the one who had rendered the English nation more benefit than any other. When the slips were counted, the name of Florence Nightingale was found on every single one of them!!

King Edward VII honored her by conferring on her the Order of Merit, in recognition of her noble services to the nation. She is the only woman to have gained this honor: the laws of England were changed expressly for the purpose.

When she died she had reached the age of ninety. The Bishop of Westminster asked that she be buried in Westminster Abbey, the famous London church that holds the tombs of the kings, the nobles, and the great. But her will directed that she rest in a quiet county; and the will was carried out.

The dearest wish of the little girl had been to protect the flowers, to nurse the sick, to care for the suffering, and to succor the animals and the birds. And this lofty inclination to help became, after years, the life work of the noble woman whom we have known by this name: Florence Nightingale.