The daily Gate City and constitution-Democrat. (Keokuk, Iowa) 1916-1922, 1918-09-10

, mess all lean. to some mess all
gristle, to others the bony remnant.
She asked that the meat should De
boned and sent out properly. But
their British discipline trium2hed.
1t could not ge done, she was told.
without new army regulation. And
so sick and dying men still got their
bones and gTistie-and remained
sick till they died to save the army
regulations.
A Curious Tribute
Little by little she got her stores
together until she became the feeder
and clother Of the army at Scutari.
She provided $4,000 men with shirts
and great numbers with other cloth
ing; she provided all the things that
were missing from the hospitals. Il
have met only two men in the Cri-
mea, and one Of them was Miss
Nightingale" said a traveller
She worked twenty hours a day.
She received the wounded, she dress
ed their wounds until the surgeons
could take them in hand. She wash
ed and clothed and comforted them.
She sat with them, encouraging them
before an operation. She gave them
lklS duu aOpC. ShC khodc seAiShA 49,
that mercy had come on angel wings
into their bitter lives.
Her nurses were here. there and
everywhere - wherever the doctors
would allow her to send them. The
rough, drunken, mnskilled orderlleS
vanished from the nursing, and skill
ed and tender hands took their
places. Florence Nightingale herself
was the Lady of the Lamp.
When the long days work was
done she would go to her little study
room to begin her correspondence;
then, after time, when the sur
geons had retired and the wards and
corridors were dark, she would take
her little lamp and steal quietly
through the silent rooms among the
sick and dying men. She would
kneel by bed after bed to speak a
word OF comfort; she would give
medicine here, food or drink there.
Made Poets of Mere Men.
No wonder the men worshiped her
though at first they were little
afraid and shy Never be ashamed
of your wounds, my friend" she
would say in her gentle, musical
voice. Her gentleness made poets OF
some of these rough men.
There was giant Highlander who
wrote home of her, and her work:
What a comfort it was to see her
even passi She would speak to one
and nod to another, but she could not
do it to all, you know-we were lying
there by hundreds-but we could kiss
heads on the pillow again, content"
1t was a beautiful idea, and this
soldiers letter travelled round the
world. Longfellow used it in his
poem on THE Lady Of the Lamp"
She stayed the winter at Scutari
and made a revolution. Whereas the
deaths had averaged forty-two in
every one hundred, they were now
down to about two in every one hun
dred So In the spring Of 1855 she
went to the Crimea itself to attend to
the hospitals there. The Crimea sur
geons objected and reminded her
that she was superintendent OF the
nursing staff in Turkey and the Cri-
mea was in Russia. But she went.
neverthe less.
In the Crimea she saw men In
trenches, and she saw them there
five nights out Of seven, thirty-six
hours at stretch, with nothing to
eat but raw pork, sprinkled with rum
and sugar and powdered crackers.
They could not cook their food be-
cause when the time came they were
too tired to collect fuel for the fires.
She set to work reforming, as she
had done at Scutari; but she had
done very little when she herself
was struck down with fever.
! She was carried to hut lmmedi-
~ ~ he In
England the news Of her illness Gre
ated a sensation as profound as IL a
great battle had been lost. She was
very near death, yet she managed to
pull through. but she recovered, with
her beautiful hair cut off. looking
like the ghost of her former self.
When she was well enough she
was taken back to Scutari, feeble,
unable to feed herself or to speak
above whisper, but she would not
go home. She worked on until the
last British soldier had left the hos
pital and the war was over.
At home by this time she had be-
come national heroine. Hundreds
of poems were written about her;
pamphlets describing her life were
sold in the streets. Her face was
stamped on pottery, on tradesmen's
paper bags, on showmen's booths, on
note paper in thousand homes. Life
boats. emigrant ships, children,
streets, waltzes, race horses were
named after her. She hated 1t all,
but one thing pleased her-the found
ing of a Nightingale fund, which she
was to spend as she liked.
Her fund grew to over 100000.
and with this money behind her she
established training school for
nurses and began many great re
forms She set herself to reform en-
tirely the health arrangements Of
the army, not only in time of war,
but in peace; for she was able to
show that horrible as were civil hos
pital records, the death rate among
soldiers IN peace time was twice as
high as among civilians.
She turned her attention to the
workhouse system OF hospital nurs-
ing and cleansed it of its horrors,
and finally she assailed the entire
hospital system OF the country. She