THE LADY WITH THE LAMP.
Whene'er a noble deed is wrought,[5]
Whene'er is spoken a noble thought,
Our hearts, in glad surprise,
To higher levels rise.
The tidal wave of deeper souls
Into our inmost being rolls,
And lifts us unawares
Out of all meaner cares.
Honor to those whose words or deeds
Thus help us in our daily needs,
And by their overflow
Raise us from what is low!
Thus thought I, as by night I read
Of the great army of the dead,
The trenches cold and damp,
The starved and frozen camp,--
The wounded from the battle-plain,
In dreary hospitals of pain,
The cheerless corridors,
The cold and stony floors.
Lo! in that house of misery
A lady with a lamp I see
Pass through the glimmering gloom,
And flit from room to room.
And slow, as in a dream of bliss,
The speechless sufferer turns to kiss
Her shadow, as it falls
Upon the darkening walls.
As if a door in heaven should be
Opened and then closed suddenly,
The vision came and went,
The light shone and was spent.
On England's annals, through the long
Hereafter of her speech and song,
That light its rays shall cast
From portals of the past.
A Lady with a Lamp shall stand
In the great history of the land,
A noble type of good,
Heroic womanhood.
Nor even shall be wanting here
The palm, the lily, and the spear,
The symbols that of yore
Saint Filomena bore.
Miss Nightingale's headquarters were in the "Sisters' Tower," as it came
to be called, one of the four corner towers of the great building. Here
was a large, airy room, with doors opening off it on each side. In the
middle was a large table, covered with stores of every kind, constantly
in demand, constantly replaced; and on the floor, and flowing into all
the corners, were--more stores! Bales of shirts, piles of socks,
slippers, dressing gowns, sheets, flannels--everything you can think of
that is useful and comfortable in time of sickness. About these piles
the white-capped nurses came and went, like bees about a hive; all was
quietly busy, cheerful, methodical. In a small room opening off the
large one the Lady-in-Chief held her councils with nurses, doctors,
generals or orderlies; giving to all the same courteous attention, the
same clear, calm, helpful advice or directions. Here, too, for hours at
a time, she sat at her desk, writing; letters to Sidney Herbert and his
wife; letters to Lord Raglan, the commander-in-chief, who, though at
first averse to her coming, became one of her firmest friends and
admirers; letters to sorrowing wives and mothers and sisters in
England. She received letters by the thousand; she could not answer them
all with her own hand, but I am sure she answered as many as was
possible. One letter was forwarded to her by the Herberts which gave a
great pleasure not to her only, but to everyone in all that place of
suffering. It was dated Windsor Castle, December 6, 1854.
"Would you tell Mrs. Herbert," wrote good Queen Victoria, "that I beg
she would let me see frequently the accounts she receives from Miss
Nightingale or Mrs. Bracebridge, as _I hear no details of the wounded_,
though I see so many from officers, etc., about the battlefield, and
naturally the former must interest me more than anyone.
"Let Mrs. Herbert also know that I wish Miss Nightingale and the ladies
would tell these poor, noble wounded and sick men, that _no one_ takes a
warmer interest or feels _more_ for their sufferings or admires their
courage and heroism _more_ than their Queen. Day and night she thinks of
her beloved troops. So does the Prince.
"Beg Mrs. Herbert to communicate these my words to those ladies, as I
know that _our_ sympathy is much valued by these noble
fellows.--Victoria."
I think the tears may have come into those clear eyes of Miss
Nightingale, when she read these words. She gave the letter to one of
the chaplains, and he went from ward to ward, reading it aloud to the
men, and ending each reading with "God save the Queen!" The words were
murmured or whispered after him by the lips of sick and dying, and
through all the mournful place went a great wave of tender love and
loyalty toward the good Queen in England, and toward their own queen,
their angel, who had shared her pleasure with them.
You will hardly believe that in England, while the Queen was writing
thus, some people were still sadly troubled about Miss Nightingale's
religious views, and were writing to the papers, warning other people
against her; but so it was. One clergyman actually warned his flock not
to subscribe money for the soldiers in the East "if it was to pass
through Popish hands." He thought the Lady-in-Chief was a Catholic;
others still maintained that she was a Unitarian; others were sure she
had gone out with the real purpose of converting the soldiers to
High-Church views.
In reading about this kind of thing, it is comforting to find one good
Irish clergyman who, being asked to what sect Miss Nightingale belonged,
replied: "She belongs to a sect which unfortunately is a very rare
one--the sect of the Good Samaritans."
But these grumblers were only a few, we must think. The great body of
English people was filled with an enthusiasm of gratitude toward the
"angel band" and its leader. From the Queen in her palace down to the
humblest working women in her cottage, all were at work making lint and
bandages, shirts and socks and havelocks for the soldiers. Nor were they
content with making things. Every housekeeper ransacked her linen closet
and camphor chest, piled sheets and blankets and pillowcases together,
tied them up in bundles, addressed them to Miss Nightingale, and sent
them off.
When Sister Mary Aloysius first began to sort the bales of goods on the
wharf at Scutari, she thought that "the English nobility must have
emptied their wardrobes and linen stores, to send out bandages for the
wounded. There was the most beautiful underclothing, and the finest
cambric sheets, with merely a scissors run here and there through them,
to insure their being used for no other purpose, some from the Queen's
palace, with the royal monogram beautifully worked."
Yes, and the rats had a wonderful time with all these fine and delicate
things, before the Sisters could get their hands on them!
These private gifts were not the only nor the largest ones. The _Times_,
which you will remember had been the first to reveal the terrible
conditions in the Crimea, now set to work and organized a fund for the
relief of the wounded. A subscription list was opened, and from every
part of the United Kingdom money flowed in like water. The _Times_
undertook to distribute the money, and appointed a good and wise man,
Mr. McDonald, to go out to the East and see how it could best be
applied.
And now a strange thing came to pass; the sort of thing that, in one way
or another, was constantly happening in connection with the Crimean War.
Mr. McDonald went to the highest authorities in the War Office and told
of his purpose. They bowed and smiled and said the _Times_ and its
subscribers were very kind, but the fact was that such ample provision
had been made by the Government that it was hardly likely the money
would be needed. Mr. McDonald opened his eyes wide; but he was a wise
man, as I have said; so he bowed and smiled in return, and going to
Sidney Herbert, told his story to him.
"Go!" said Mr. Herbert; "Go out to the Crimea!" and he went.
When he reached the seat of war, it was the same thing over again. The
high officials were very polite, very glad to see him, very pleased that
the people of England were so sympathetic and patriotic; but the fact
was that nothing was wanted; they were amply supplied; in short,
everything was "all right."
Many men, after this second rebuff, would have given the matter up and
gone home; but Mr. McDonald was not of that kind. While he was
considering what step to take next, one man came forward to help him;
one man who was brave enough to defy Red Tape, for the sake of his
soldiers. This was the surgeon of the 39th regiment. I wish I knew his
name, so that you and I could remember it. He came to Mr. McDonald and
told him that his regiment, which had been stationed at Gibraltar, had
been ordered to the Crimea and had now reached the Bosporus. They were
going on to the Crimea, to pass the winter in bitter cold, amid ice and
snow; and they had no clothes save the light linen suits which had been
given them to wear under the hot sun of Gibraltar.
Here was a chance for the _Times_ fund! Without more ado Mr. McDonald
went into the bazaars of Constantinople and bought flannels and woolens,
until every man in that regiment had a good warm winter suit in which to
face the Crimean winter.
Did anyone else follow the example of the surgeon of the 39th? Not one!
Probably many persons thought he had done a shocking thing, by thus
exposing the lack of provision in the army for its soldiers' comfort.
This was casting reflection upon Red Tape! Better for the soldier to
freeze and die, than for a slur to be cast upon those in authority, upon
the rules of the service!
So, though McDonald stood with hands held out, as it were, offering
help, no one came forward to take it.
He went to Scutari, and here at first it was the same thing. He offered
his aid to the chief medical authority over the hospitals; the reply was
calm and precise: "Nothing was wanted!" He went still higher, to
"another and more august quarter"; the answer was still more emphatic:
there was no possible occasion for help; soldiers and sailors had
everything they required; if he wished to dispose of the _Times_ fund,
it might be a good thing to build an English church at Pera!
"Yet, at that very time," says the historian of the Crimea, "wants so
dire as to include want of hospital furniture and of shirts for the
patients, and of the commonest means for maintaining cleanliness, were
afflicting our stricken soldiery in the hospitals."[6]
Mr. McDonald did not build an English church; instead, he went to the
Barrack Hospital and asked for the Lady-in-Chief.
I should like to have seen Florence Nightingale's face when she heard
his story. No help needed? The soldiers supplied with everything they
needed? Everything "all right"?
"Come with me!" she said.
She took him through the wards of the Barrack Hospital, and showed him
what had been done, and what an immense deal was yet to do; how, though
many were comfortably clad, yet fresh hundreds were arriving constantly,
half naked, without a shred of clean or decent clothing on their backs;
how far the demand was beyond the supply; how fast her own stores were
dwindling, and how many of the private offerings were unsuitable for the
needs they were sent to fill; how many men were still, after all her
labors, lying on the floor because there were not beds enough to go
round.
All these things good Mr. McDonald saw, and laid to heart; but he saw
other things besides.
Perhaps some of you have visited a hospital. You have seen the bright,
fresh, pleasant rooms, the rows of snowy cots, the bright faces of the
nurses, here and there flowers and pictures; seeing two or three hundred
patients, it has seemed to you as if you had seen all the sick people
in the world. Was it not so?
In the Barrack Hospital (and this, remember, was but one of eight, and
these eight the English hospitals alone!) there were two or three
thousand patients; it was a City of Pain. Its streets were long, narrow
rooms or corridors, bare and gloomy; no furniture save the endless rows
of cots and mattresses, "packed like sardines," as one eye-witness says;
its citizens, men in every stage of sickness and suffering; some tossing
in fever and delirium; some moaning in pain that even a soldier's
strength could not bear silently; some ghastly with terrible wounds;
some sinking into their final sleep.
Following the light, slight figure of his guide through these narrow
streets of the City of Pain, McDonald saw and noted that
"Wherever there is disease in its most dangerous form, and the hand of
the Spoiler distressingly nigh, there is this incomparable woman sure to
be seen. Her benignant presence is an influence for good comfort even
among the struggles of expiring nature. She is a 'ministering angel'
without any exaggeration in these hospitals, and as the slender form
glides quietly along each corridor, every poor fellow's face softens
with gratitude at the sight of her. When all the medical officers have
retired for the night, and silence and darkness have settled down upon
those miles of prostrate sick, she may be observed alone, with lamp in
her hand, making her solitary rounds.
"The popular instinct was not mistaken which, when she set out from
England, hailed her as a heroine; I trust she may not earn her title to
a higher though sadder appellation. No one who has observed her fragile
figure and delicate health can avoid misgivings lest these should
fail.... I confidently assert that but for Miss Nightingale the people
of England would scarcely, with all their solicitude, have been spared
the additional pang of knowing, which they must have done sooner or
later, that their soldiers, even in the hospitals, had found scanty
refuge and relief from the unparalleled miseries with which this war has
hitherto been attended."
Look with me for a moment into one of these wards, these "miles of sick"
through which the agent of the _Times_ passed with his guide. It is
night. Outside, the world is wide and wonderful with moon and stars.
Beyond the dark-blue waters of the Bosporus, the lights of Stamboul
flash and twinkle; nearer at hand, the moonlight falls on the white city
of the dead, and shows its dark cypresses standing like silent guardians
beside the marble tombs; nearer yet, it falls full on the bare, gaunt
square of building that crowns the hill. The windows are narrow, but
still the moonbeams struggle in, and cast a dim light along the
corridor. The vaulted roof is lost in blackness; black, too, are the
corners, and we cannot see where the orderly nods in his chair, or where
the night nurse sits beside a dying patient. All is silent, save for a
low moan or murmur from one cot or another. See where the moonbeam
glimmers white on that cot under the window! That is where the Highland
soldier is lying, he who came so near losing his arm the other day. The
surgeons said it must be amputated, but the Lady-in-Chief begged for a
little time. She thought that with care and nursing the arm might be
saved; would they kindly delay the operation at least for a few days?
The surgeons consented, for by this time no one could or would refuse
her anything. The arm _was_ saved; now the bones are knitting nicely,
and by and by he will be well and strong again, with both arms to work
and play and fight with.
But broken bones hurt even when they are knitting nicely, and the
Highland lad cannot sleep; he lies tossing about on his narrow cot,
gritting his teeth now and then as the pain bites, but still a happy and
a thankful man. He stares about him through the gloom, trying to see who
is awake and who asleep. But now he starts, for silently the door opens,
and a tiny ray of light, like a golden finger, falls across his bed. A
figure enters and closes the door softly; the figure of a woman, tall
and slender, dressed in black, with white cap and apron. In her hand she
carries a small shaded lamp. At sight of her the sick lad's eyes grow
bright; he raises his sound arm and straightens the blanket, then waits
in eager patience. Slowly the Lady with the Lamp draws near, stopping
beside each cot, listening to the breathing and noting the color of the
sleepers, whispering a word of cheer and encouragement to those who
wake. Now she stands beside his bed, and her radiant smile is brighter,
he thinks, than lamplight or moonlight. A few words in the low, musical
voice, a pat to the bedclothes, a friendly nod, and she passes on to the
next cot. As she goes, her shadow, hardly more noiseless than her
footstep, falls across the sick man's pillow; he turns and kisses it,
and then falls happily asleep.
So she comes and passes, like a light; and so her very shadow is
blessed, and shall be blessed so long as memory endures.