Chapter XIII: FLORENCE NIGHTINGALE. Written and adapted from various (8)

Grace Darling was born on the 24th of November, 1815, at a small town upon the northeastern coast of England. She was the seventh child of her parents. Her grandfather, Robert Darling, had been keeper of the coal-light on the outmost of the Farne Islands, and her father, William, succeeded him in that post. In 1826, however, when Grace was eleven years old, William Darling took his family to Longstone, another island of the same group.

These Farne Islands are about twenty-five in number at low tide, and, as a visitor has pointed out, are desolate to an uncommon degree, although they are at no great distance from the Northumberland coast. The sea rushes with great force through the channels between the islands. Longstone, upon which Grace dwelt was, says another visitor, of dark whinstone, cracked in every direction and worn with the action of winds, waves and tempests, since the world began. Over the greater part of it was not a blade of grass nor a grain of earth; it was hard and iron-like stone, crusted round all the coast as far as high water-mark with limpet and still smaller shells. We ascended wrinkled hills of black stone, and descended into worn and dismal dells of the same, into some of which, where the tide got entrance, it came pouring and roaring in raging whiteness, and churning the loose fragments of whinstone into round pebbles, and piling them up in deep crevices, with seaweed. Over our heads screamed hundreds of hovering birds, the gull mingling its hideous laughter most wildly.

Fancy a lone lighthouse standing upon this pile of stone, dropped seemingly, in the midst of the water, five miles from the mainland. The sea tosses, and swells, and beats the rocks unceasingly. In fine weather it is blue and more kindly; in storms the waters are black and furious and fearful. It was known as a most desolate and dangerous lighthouse, and its service could be only a man and family of courage, endurance, large human feeling and strong sense of duty.

In such an abode grew the little girl, almost alone so far as school friends go. Her father taught her to read and write together with the seven of her brothers and sisters, and their schoolroom was the lantern of the lighthouse. Her instructors were in other ways the sky and the breaking surf; her comrades the sea birds and the simple shell fish and floating grasses of the salt water and all the strange and curious growths the sea brings wherever it is free.

Like her brothers and sisters, Grace was schooled after the simpler fashion. But when such days were passed she kept to her home rather than go out into the world or marry. The lighthouse sheltered a united and happy family. Grace loved the seclusion of that life and assisted her mother with the work of the household. Others of the daughters had gone to homes of their own upon the mainland.

If our surroundings help to form our characters, here in this lighthouse Grace must have grown into a strong self-control and a spirit of helpfulness toward hapless people and those wrecks upon the Farne Islands, of which many a legend has been told.

About thirty years before she was born a fine merchantman from America had struck the ledges near the lighthouse, and it is said that to the recital of this ship-wreck, of how the brave sailors fought for life and how one by one they fell or were swept into the fierce waters, the little girl would listen weeping, and then go pitifully to her bed. This tale, and the story of other sea mishaps, had a special attraction for the child, and the strength of her interest and compassion for the shipwrecked were noticed by her family as they sat round the family table of an evening, knitting, talking of the sea and watching the bright beacon above.

So it was that Grace Darling grew to womanhood. She was twenty-two years old when the disaster came that made evident what sort of a girl had come to woman's years upon the solitary island.

In the fall of the year, 1838, one fifth of September, a steamer, called the _Forfarshire_, a vessel of small size, but laden with a considerable cargo, sailed for Dundee, Scotland, from the port of Hull, England. There were forty-one passengers and twenty-two of the crew--sixty-three in all. The ship was but two years old, but her boilers were in bad order, although they had had some overhauling before she cleared her port.

She sailed in the early evening and for a part of her way seemed to be steaming safely. But as the vessel neared Flamborough Head the captain and crew became disturbed by many anxieties. Word passed from mouth to mouth among the passengers that the leak of the boiler was growing rapidly and the firemen could with difficulty keep up the fires. So much did this delay the passage of the steamer that toward the evening of the following day she had only made the channel between the coast and the Farne Islands. The wind was blowing from the north. It is reported that the engines became utterly useless. There being great danger of drifting ashore, the sails were hoisted fore and aft, and the vessel got about in order to get her before the wind and keep her off the land. It rained heavily during the entire time, and the fog was so dense that it became impossible to tell the situation of the vessel. At length breakers were discovered close to leeward, and the Farne Light, which about the same period became visible, left no doubt as to the peril of all on board.

Passengers crowded the deck and as rain beat upon them and the fog shut out all but the sad scene on board, friends and strangers pressed hands for support and sought hopeful words from one another's lips. The sails hoisted for a defence became useless for the purpose, the wind was rising to tempest strength, and all control over the vessel seemed gone. The sea was master and was tossing the helpless steamer in its waves, and, as the summer wind drives thistledown in its course, was driving her toward the light. The billows beat upon the frail timbers and every lurch and swell took the vessel nearer the island where the wild waters were breaking in foam.

At length appeared in an opening of the fog a great rock, frightfully rugged, deadly to a ship weakened and in the power of the sea. Passengers and crew alike knew the spot, and they knew that unless some miracle prevailed the ship must go to pieces. There was a moment's delay, the sea seemed putting off its final victory, and then it brought the vessel with her bow foremost upon the rocks.

A panic followed. All who had been below rushed to the deck and sought in the companionship of wretchedness an escape from threatening destruction. Some of the crew, determined to save themselves, lowered the larboard quarter boat, and left the ship. The boiling sea now swept over the decks.

Very soon after the first shock a powerful wave struck the vessel on the quarter, and raising her off the rocks allowed her immediately after to fall violently upon it, the sharp edge striking her amidships. She was by this fairly broken in two pieces, and the after part, containing the cabin with many passengers was instantly carried off through a tremendous current, called the Piper Gut. The captain and his wife were among those who perished.

The forepart still remained crushed upon the rocks. Upon its deck were eight unfortunate creatures--five sailors and three of the passengers. In the cabin below lay a woman huddling two children in her arms, a girl of eleven and a boy of eight. The waves washed through the cabin tearing off the clothing of the children and half freezing them with cold. The hideous noise of the tempest drowned their melancholy cries and at last they lay quiet and dead.

At the Longstone Lighthouse the morning of the seventh of September broke mistily. The dwellers there were but three--the keeper and his wife and daughter. They were used to raging seas and driving winds, but this night had been one of anxiety. Grace, it is said, had been unable to sleep, and as she dozed toward morning had started up with a wail for help echoing in her ears. She roused her father and taking his field-glass sought the wreck which she felt must be near. The remains of the shattered vessel lying about a mile off met her eye, and dim figures clinging to the broken timbers. As the waters lashed the wreck it seemed as if each wave must sweep the forms into the sea.

The hearts of all three of the lighthouse family sank. What could three do and the billows running mountains? William Darling shrank from attempting any rescue. He had been on other humane enterprises. But this seemed futile. At Grace's earnest plea the boat was launched, her father yielding to her entreaties, which his heart said were right. Grace sprang in--she knew how to handle an oar--and her father followed. She had never assisted in the boat before this wreck of the _Forfarshire_, but other members of the family had been present.

Her mother, Mrs. Darling, had assisted in making the boat ready, but as her husband and daughter pushed off, and the waves washed the rock on which she stood, she cried with tears in her eyes:

"Oh, Grace, if your father is lost, I'll blame you for this morning's work."

Says one who told the story:

"In estimating the dangers which heroic adventurers encounter, one circumstance ought not to be forgotten. Had it been at ebb tide the boat could not have passed between the islands; and Darling and his daughter knew that the tide would be flowing on their return, when their united strength would have been utterly insufficient to pull the boat back to the lighthouse island. Had they not got aid of the survivors in rowing back again, they themselves would have been compelled to remain on the rock beside the wreck until the tide ebbed again."

The frail boat passed over the stormy waters and neared the rock.

It could only have been by the exertion of muscular power as well as determined courage that the father and daughter carried the boat to the rock. And when there a danger, greater even than that which they had encountered in approaching it, arose from the difficulty of steadying the boat and preventing its being destroyed on those sharp ridges by the ever-restless chafing and heaving of the billows.

The father and daughter could see the eager faces turned toward them, and the sight redoubled their efforts in reaching the rock, and in the task of disembarking and drawing the boat up the rock and out of reach of the waves. It was a perilous landing-place. But when the craft was secured the father and Grace approached the half-dead group.

All were safe except the two children. Their mother was seemingly dead, also, and lay clasping the bodies in her arms. But care and attention revived her. A fireman who had lain for three hours on the rock where he had been tossed, had clung to a strong nail spiked in the rock, and though lashed and beaten by the waves, and tortured by bleeding hands, he had not let go.

The rescuers placed the survivors one by one in the boat. But the return journey was even more perilous than that which took them to the wreck, although the sailors aided at the oars. Longstone, however, was at last reached and the sufferers housed in the lighthouse.

They were in safety, but the violence of the sea forbade any attempt to reach the mainland. There were good accommodations at the light. The tower was ingeniously built, and besides a well-furnished sitting-room, in which was a capital collection of books, had three or four comfortable bedrooms. In addition there was an abundance of wholesome, homely fare.

The poor woman who had lost her children was suffering intensely, and to her Grace gave up her bed, sleeping upon a table. A boat's crew from Northumberland, which after some hours came in search of the _Forfarshire_, also had to claim the hospitality of the lighthouse, and for three days were held by the raging seas. Finally, the passage to the mainland was undertaken in safety, and the news reached the keeper's family that the boat first launched had been picked up and its nine passengers rescued. Of the sixty-three who had sailed from Hull five days before, nineteen were alive.

Within a few days search was made for the missing bodies, but almost in vain. The cargo of the steamer, which was of unusual value was wholly lost. The wreck, consisting of the engine, paddle-wheels, anchor, foremast and rigging, remained upon the rock and was visited by thousands.

Report of Grace Darling's heroic deed was soon spread throughout England. It was a simple, humane action and such actions are doing among us all the time. But the courage in facing the elemental rage of the sea, and the helpful sympathy with the unfortunate which it made evident, appealed to the popular heart, and Grace became a people's heroine. Public subscriptions were at once set on foot to express by a splendid gift the universal sense of her deserts. Many smaller tokens also came to her. Among them was a silver medal which read:

Presented by the Glasgow Humane Society to Miss Grace Horsley
Darling, in admiration of her dauntless and heroic conduct in
saving (along with her father) the lives of nine persons from
the wreck of the _Forfarshire_ steamer, 7th September, 1838.

So great was popular report and admiration for the heroine that the manager of a theatre broached to her the plan of representing the rescue, in part at least, upon his stage, and offered her a considerable sum for sitting in the boat for the audience to view. Her portrait was taken and sold everywhere. She was generally flattered and caressed.

It was now that we find the true balance and strength in Grace's character. The testimonials she received with quiet pleasure. But she preferred to remain upon the solitary island under the light, and aid her mother in her simple household work.

She was glad to have saved lives at the risk of her own, she said, and would most willingly do it again if opportunity should occur. But she could not feel that she had done anything great, and certainly she did not wish for the praise that had been bestowed upon her. As for going to the theatre to receive the plaudits of a curious crowd, that was the last thing she desired.

Of Grace at this time the pleasing English writer, William Howitt, gives this account. He paid a visit to Longstone and met the heroine:

"When I went she was not visible, and I was afraid I should not see her, as her father said she very much disliked meeting strangers that she thought came to stare at her; but when the old man and I had had a little conversation he went up to her room, and soon came down with a smile, saying that she would be with us soon. So when we had been up to the top lighthouse, and had seen its machinery, and taken a good look-out at the distant shore, and Darling had pointed out the spot of the wreck, and the way they took the people off, we went down and found Grace sitting at her sewing, very neatly but very simply dressed in a plain sort of striped print gown, with her watch-seal just seen at her side and her hair neatly braided--just, in fact, as such girls are dressed, only not quite so smart as they often are. She rose, very modestly, and with a pleasant smile said: 'How do you do, sir?'

"Her figure is by no means striking--quite the contrary; but her face it full of sense, modesty and genuine goodness; and that is just the character she bears. Her prudence delights one. We are charmed that she should so well have supported the brilliancy of her humane deeds. It is confirmative of the notion that such actions must spring from genuine heart and mind."

She had the sweetest smile, continued Mr. Howitt, that he had ever seen in a person of her station and appearance. "You see that she is a thoroughly good creature, and that under her modest exterior lies a spirit capable of the most exalted devotion, a devotion so entire that daring is not so much a quality of her nature, as that the most perfect sympathy with suffering or endangered humanity swallows up and annihilates everything like fear or self-consideration, puts out, in fact, every sentiment but itself."

As we read above Grace was slight of frame, and not markedly robust. Barely three years after the wreck at which her pity and heroism had won her world-wide fame, she showed evidences of decline. Toward the close of 1841 she was taken from Longstone and placed under the care of a doctor in Bamborough. Not gaining in strength she begged to be moved to Wooler, a small market town on the border of Northumberland, where the scenery is of the Cheviot Hills--of sunny heights and wooded glens. But even here the clear bracing air had little help for her illness, and after meeting her father and considering her failing strength, with his advice she returned to Bamborough. Her eldest sister nursed her with devotion, but it was evident her life was fading.

Throughout her illness she never murmured and never complained, we are are told, and shortly before her death she expressed a wish to see as many of her relations as the peculiar nature of their employment would admit, and with surprising fortitude and self-command she delivered to each one of them some token of remembrance. This done she calmly awaited the approach of death; and finally, on October 20, 1842, resigned her spirit without a murmur.

Two stones have been raised to her memory, one in the Bamborough churchyard, her figure lying at length; and another in the chapel of St. Cuthbert, on one of the Farne Islands, and bearing this memorial:

TO THE MEMORY OF
Grace Horsley Darling
A NATIVE OF BAMBOROUGH AND AN INHABITANT
OF THESE ISLANDS
WHO DIED OCTOBER 20TH, 1842,
AGED 26 YEARS.

But the best memorial of a heroine is the inspiration her example offers to her own generation and those that succeed her, the love her deeds engender in other hearts, the enlarging and uplifting of our kind through her endeavour. And so it is that the heroine of Farne Islands has become a lovely memory to us, and to those who shall come after us.

XII

SISTER DORA

Dorothy Wyndlow Pattison was born on January 15th, 1832. She was the youngest daughter, and the youngest child but one, of the Rev. Mark Pattison, who was for many years Rector of Hauxwell, near Richmond, in Yorkshire. She inherited from her father, who was of a Devonshire family, that finely proportioned and graceful figure which she always maintained; and from her mother, who was the daughter of a banker in Richmond, those lovely features which drew forth the admiration of everyone who had the pleasure of knowing her.

Her father was a good and sincere man. He was thoroughly upright and strict.

Dora and her sister, like a thousand other country parsons' daughters, were of the utmost use in their father's Yorkshire parish. A French gentleman who had lived a while in England and in the country, said to me one day:

"Your young ladies astound me. They are angels of mercy. They wear no distinguishing habit; one does not see their wings, yet they fly everywhere, and everywhere bring grace and love and peace--in my country such a thing would be impossible."

These Pattison girls were for ever saving their pocket money to give it away, and they made it a rule to mend and remake their old frocks, so as not to have to buy new ones out of their allowance for clothes, so as to have more to give. Even their dinners they would reserve for poor people, and content themselves with bread and cheese. "Giving to others instead of spending on themselves seems to have been the rule and delight of their lives."

A pretty story is told of Dorothy at this time. A schoolboy in the village, who was especially attached to her, fell ill of rheumatic fever. The boy's one longing was to see "Miss Dora" again, but she was abroad on the Continent. As he grew worse and worse, he constantly prayed that he might live long enough to see her. On the day on which she was expected, he sat up on his pillows intently listening, and at last, long before anyone else could hear a sound of wheels, he exclaimed: "There she is!" and sank back. She went to him at once, and nursed him till he died.

Her beauty was very great: large brilliant, brown eyes, full red lips, a firm chin and a finely cut profile; her hair dark, and slightly curling, waved all over her head; and the remarkable beauty and delicacy of her colouring and complexion, added to the liveliness of her expression, made her a fascinating creature to behold. Her father always called her "Little Sunshine."

But the most remarkable feature about her was to be found in her inner being. A will, which no earthly power could subdue, enabled her to accomplish an almost superhuman work; yet at times it was to her a faculty that brought her into difficulties. She was twenty-nine before she was able to find real scope for her energies, and then she took a bold step--answered an advertisement from a clergyman for a lady to take the village school. Her mother had died in 1861, and she considered herself free from duties that bound her to her home. Her father did not relish the step she took, but acquiesced. She went to Woolston, and remained there three years, during which time she won the hearts, not of the children only, but of their parents as well. She had to live alone in a cottage, and do everything for her self; but the people never for a moment doubted she was a real lady, and always treated her with great respect.

Not thinking a little village school sufficient field for her energies, she resolved to join a nursing sisterhood at Redcar, in Yorkshire. The life was not quite suited to her strong will, but it did her good. She there learned how to make beds and to cook. At first she literally sat down and cried when the beds which she had just put in order were all pulled to pieces by some superior authority, who did not approve of the method in which they were made. But it was a useful lesson for her after life in a hospital. She was there till the early part of 1865, and then was sent to Walsall to help at a small cottage hospital, which had already been established for more than a year.

Walsall, though not in the "Black Country," is in a busy manufacturing district, chiefly of iron. At the time when Sister Dora went there it contained a population of 35,000 inhabitants. It is now connected with Birmingham by almost continuous houses and pits and furnaces.

As fresh coal and iron pits were being opened in the district around Walsall, accidents became more frequent, and it was found impracticable to send those injured to Birmingham, which was seven miles distant; Accordingly, in 1863, the Town Council invited the Redcar Society to start a hospital there. When the Sister who had begun the work fell ill, Sister Dora was sent in her place, and almost directly caught small-pox from the outpatients. She was very ill, and even in her delirium showed the bent of her mind by ripping her sheets into strips to serve as bandages.

When the cottage hospital--which was the second of its kind in England--was opened, the system of voluntary nursing was unknown; the only voluntary nurses heard of then being those who had gone out to the Crimea with Miss Florence Nightingale. Therefore a good deal of misunderstanding was the result; but in the course of time people began to judge the institution by its results. But Sister Dora, by her frank, open manner, disarmed suspicion, while the sublime eloquence of noble deeds silenced tongues, and won for the hospital the confidence of the public, and for herself the admiration and affection of the people.

In 1866 she had a serious illness, brought on by exposure to wet and cold. She would come home from dressing wounds in the cottages, wet through and hot with hurrying along the streets, to find a crowd of outpatients awaiting her return at the hospital, and she would attend to them in total disregard of herself, and allow her wet clothes to dry on her.

This neglect occurred once too often; a chill settled on her, and for three weeks she was dangerously ill. Then it was that the people of Walsall began to realise what she was, and the door of the hospital was besieged by poor people come to inquire how their "Sister Dora" was.

The hospital had moved men of every shade of politics, and every form of religious belief, to the work, and there have been passages in its history not pleasant to remember, but not one of these in the remotest degree involved Sister Dora. On the contrary, her presence and counsel always brought light and peace, and lifted every question into a higher sphere. "Ask Sister Dora," it used to be said. "Had we not better send for Sister Dora" some member would exclaim out of the fog of contention. Thereupon she would appear; and many well remember how calmly self-possessed, and clear-sighted she would stand--never sit down. Indeed, there were those who worked with her fifteen years who never saw her seated; she would stand, usually with her hand on the back of the chair which had been placed for her, every eye directed to her; nor was it ever many moments before she had grasped the whole question, and given her opinion just as clearly and simply and straight to the purpose as any opinion given to the sufferers in the wards. Nor was she ever wrong; nor did she ever fail of her purpose with the committee. No committeemen ever questioned or differed from Sister Dora, yet in her was the charm of unconsciousness of power or superiority and the impression left was of there being no feeling of pleasure in her, other than the triumph of the right.

In 1867 the cottage hospital had to be abandoned, as erysipelas broke out and would not be expelled. The wards were evidently impregnated with malignant germs to such an extent that the committee resolved to build a new hospital in a better situation.

Sister Dora's work became more engrossing when this larger field was opened for it; the men's beds were constantly full, and even the women's ward was hardly ever entirely empty.

Just at this period an epidemic of small-pox broke out in Walsall, and all the energies of Sister Dora were called into play. She visited the cottages where the patients lay, and nursed them or saw to their being supplied with what they needed; whilst at the same time carrying on her usual work at the hospital.

One night she was sent for by a poor man who was dying of what she called "black-pox," a violent form of small-pox. She went at once, and found him in the last extremity. All his relations had fled, and a neighbour alone was with him. When Sister Dora found that only one small piece of candle was left in the house, she gave the woman some money, begging her to go and buy some means of light whilst she stayed with the man. She sat on by his bed, but the woman, who had probably spent the money at the public house, never returned; and after some little while the dying man raised himself up in bed with a last effort, saying, "Sister, kiss me before I die." She took him, all covered as he was with the loathsome disease, into her arms and kissed him, the candle going out almost as she did so, leaving them in total darkness. He implored her not to leave him while he lived, although he might have known she would never do that. So she sat through the night, till the early dawn breaking in revealed that the man was dead.

When the bell at the head of her bed rang at night she rose at once, saying to herself, "The Master is come, and calleth for thee!" Indeed, she loved to think that she was ministering to her Lord in the person of His poor and sick.

Here is a letter from a former patient in the hospital, from which only a short extract can be made:

"I had not been there above a week when Sister Dora found me a little bell, as there was not one to my bed, and she said, 'Enoch, you must ring this bell when you want sister.' This little bell did not have much rest, for whenever I heard her step or the tinkle of her keys in the hall I used to ring my bell, and she would call out, 'I'm coming, Enoch,' which she did, and would say, 'What do you want?' I often used to say, 'I don't know, Sister,' not really knowing what I did want. She'd say, 'Do you want your pillows shaken up, or do you want moving a little?' which she'd do, whatever it was, and say, 'Do you feel quite cosey now?' 'Yes, Sister.' Then she would start to go into the other ward, but very often before she could get through the door I'd call her back and say my pillow wasn't quite right, or that my leg wanted moving a little. She would come and do it, whatever it was, and say, 'Will that do?' 'Yes, Sister.' Then she'd go about her work, but at the very next sound of her step my bell would ring, and so often as my bell rang Sister would come; and some of the other patients would often remark that I should wear that little bell out or Sister, and she'd say, 'Never mind, for I like to hear it, and it's never too often.' And it rang so often that I've heard Sister say that she often dreamt she heard my little bell and started up in a hurry to find it was a dream."

Sister Dora said once to a friend, who was engaging a servant for the hospital:

"Tell her this is not an ordinary house, or even a hospital. I want her to understand that all who serve here, in whatever capacity, ought to have one rule, _love for God_, and then, I need not say, love for their work."

She spoke often and with intense earnestness, on the duty, the necessity, of prayer. It was literally true that she never touched a wound without raising her heart to God and entreating him to bless the means employed. As years glided away, she became able almost to fulfil the Apostle's command: "Pray without ceasing." And her prayers were animated by the most intense faith--an absolutely unshaken conviction of their efficacy. It may truly be said that those who pray become increasingly more sure of the value of prayer. They find that, whatever men may say about the reign of law and the order of nature, earnest prayer does bring an answer, often in a marvellous manner. The praying man or woman is never shaken in his or her trust in the efficacy of prayer. She firmly held to the supernatural power, put into the hands of men by means of the weapon of prayer; and the practical faithlessness in this respect of the world at large was an ever-increasing source of surprise and distress to her.

Since her death, in commemoration of her labours at Walsall, a very beautiful statue has been there erected to her, and on the pedestal are bas-reliefs representing incidents in her life there. One of these illustrates a terrible explosion that took place in the Birchett's Iron Works, on Friday, October 15, 1875, whereby eleven men were so severely burnt that only two survived. All the others died after their admission into the hospital. It came about thus: The men were at work when water escaped from the "twyer" and fell upon the molten iron in the furnace and was at once resolved into steam that blew out the front of the furnace, and also the molten iron, which fell upon the men. Some suffered frightful agonies, but the shock to the nervous systems of others had stupefied them. The sight and the smell were terrible. Ladies who volunteered their help could not endure it, and were forced to withdraw, some not getting beyond the door of the ward. But Sister Dora was with the patients incessantly till they died, giving them water, bandaging their wounds, or cutting away the sodden clothes that adhered to the burnt flesh. Some lingered on for ten days, but in all this time she never deserted the fetid atmosphere of the ward, never went to bed.

She had so much to do with burns that she became specially skilful in treating them. Children terribly burnt or scalded were constantly brought to the hospital; often men came scalded from a boiler, or by molten metal. She dressed their wounds herself, but, if possible, always sent the patients to be tended at home, where she would visit them and regularly dress their wounds, rather than have the wards tainted by the effluvium from the burns. Her treatment of burnt children merits quotation.

"If a large surface of the body was burnt, or if the child seemed beside itself with terror, she did not touch the wounds themselves, but only carefully excluded the air from them by means of cotton wool and blankets wrapped around the body. She put hot bottles and flannel to the feet, and, if necessary, ice to the head. Then she gave her attention to soothing and consoling the shocked nerves--a state which she considered to be often a more immediate source of danger to the life of the child than the actual injuries. She fed it with milk and brandy, unless it violently refused food, when she would let it alone until it came round, saying that force, or anything which involved even a slight further shock to the system, was worse than useless. Sometimes, of course, the fatal sleep of exhaustion, from which there was no awakening, would follow; but more often than not food was successfully administered, and after a few hours, Sister Dora, having gained the child's confidence, could dress the wounds without fear of exciting the frantic terror which would have been the result of touching them at first."

Children Sister Dora dearly loved; her heart went out to them with infinite tenderness, and she was even known to sleep with a burnt baby on each arm. What that means only those know who have had experience of the sickening smell arising from burns.

Once a little girl of nine was brought into the hospital so badly burnt that it was obvious she had not many hours to live. Sister Dora sat by her bed talking to her of Jesus Christ and His love for little children, and of the blessed home into which he would receive them. The child died peacefully, and her last words were: "Sister, when you come to heaven, I'll meet you at the gates with a bunch of flowers."

One of the most heroic of her many heroic acts was taking charge of the small-pox hospital when a second epidemic broke out.

Mr. S. Welsh says: "In the spring of 1875 there was a second visitation of the disease, and fears were entertained that the results would be as bad as during the former visitation. One morning Sister Dora came to me and said, 'Do you know, I have an idea that if some one could be got to go to the epidemic hospital in whom the people have confidence, they would send their friends to be nursed, the patients would be isolated, and the disease stamped out.'" This was because a prejudice was entertained against the new small-pox hospital, and those who had sick concealed the fact rather than send them to it. "I said," continues Mr. Welsh, "'I have long been of the opinion you have just expressed; but where are we to get a lady, in whom the people would have confidence, to undertake the duty?'

"Her prompt reply was, 'I will go.'

"I confess the sudden announcement of her determination rather took me by surprise, for I had no expectation of it, and not the least remote idea that she intended to go. 'But,' I said, 'who will take charge of the hospital if you go there?'

"'Oh,' she replied, 'I can get plenty of ladies to come there, but none will go to the epidemic. And', she added, by way of reconciling me to her view, 'it will only be for a short time.'

"'But what if you were to take the disease and die?' I inquired.

"'Then,' she added, in her cheery way, 'I shall have died in the path of duty, and, you know, I could not die better.'

"I knew it was no use pointing out at length the risk she ran, for where it was a case of saving others, _self_ with her was no consideration. I tried to dissuade her on other grounds.... A few days later I was in company with the doctor of the hospital, who was also medical officer of health, and who, as such, had charge of the epidemic hospital, near to which we were at the time. He said, 'Do you know where Sister Dora is?' 'At the hospital I suppose,' was my reply. 'No,' he rejoined, 'she is over there!' pointing to the epidemic hospital....

"The people as soon as they knew Sister Dora was in charge, had no misgiving about sending their relatives to be nursed, and the result was as she had predicted; the cases were brought in as soon as it was discovered that patients had the disease, and the epidemic was speedily stamped out."

She had, however, a hard time of it there, as she lacked assistants. Two women were sent from the work-house, but they proved of little use. The porter, an old soldier, was attentive and kind in his way, but he always went out "on a spree" on Saturday nights, and did not return till late on Sunday evening. When the work-house women failed her she was sometimes alone with her patients, and these occasionally in the delirium of small-pox.

It was not till the middle of August, 1875, that the last small-pox patient departed from the hospital, and she was able to return to her original work.

One of the bas-reliefs on her monument represents Sister Dora consoling the afflicted and the scene depicted refers to a dreadful colliery accident that occurred on March 14, 1872, at Pelsall, a village rather over three miles from Walsall, by which twenty-two men were entombed, and all perished. For several days hopes were entertained that some of the men would be got out alive; and blankets in which to wrap them, and restoratives, were provided, and Sister Dora was sent for to attend the men when brought to "bank." The following extract, from an article by a special correspondent in a newspaper, dated Dec 10, 1872, will give some idea of Sister Dora's connection with the event:

Out of doors the scene is weird and awful, and impresses the
mind with a peculiar gloom; for the intensity of the darkness is
heightened by the shades created by the artificial lights. Every
object, the most minute, stands out in bold relief against the
inky darkness which surrounds the landscape. On the crest of the
mound or pit-bank, the policemen, like sentinels, are walking
their rounds. The wind is howling and whistling through the
trees which form a background to the pit-bank, and the rain is
coming hissing down in sheets. In a hovel close to the pit shaft
sit the bereaved and disconsolate mourners, hoping against hope,
and watching for those who will never return. There, too, are
the swarthy sons of toil who have just returned from their
fruitless search in the mine for the dear missing ones, and are
resting while their saturated clothes are drying.

But another form glides softly from that hovel; and amid the
pelting rain, and over the rough pit-bank, and through miry
clay--now ankle deep--takes her course to the dwellings of the
mourners, for some, spent with watching, have been induced to
return to their homes. As she plods her way amid pieces of
timber, upturned wagons and fragments of broken machinery, which
are scattered about in great confusion, a "wee, wee bairn"
creeps gently to her side, and grasping her hand and looking
wistfully into her face, which is radiant with kindness and
affection, says, "Oh, Sister, do see to my father when they
bring him up the pit." Poor child! Never again would he know a
father's love, or share a father's care. She smiled, and that
smile seemed to lighten the child's load of grief, and her
promise to see to his father appeared to impart consolation to
his heavy, despairing heart.

On she glides, with a kind word or a sympathetic expression to
all. One woman, after listening to her comforting words, burst
into tears--the fountains of sorrow so long pent up seemed to
have found vent. "Let her weep," said a relative of the
unfortunate woman; "it is the first tear she has shed since the
accident has occurred, and it will do her good to cry." But who
is the good Samaritan? She is the sister who for seven years has
had the management of the nursing department in the cottage
hospital at Walsall.

This is written in too much of the "special correspondent" style to be pleasant; nevertheless it describes what actually took place.

Mr. Samuel Welsh says: "I remember one evening I was in the hospital when a poor man who had been dreadfully crushed in a pit was brought in. One of his legs was so fearfully injured that it was thought it would be necessary to amputate it. After examining the patient, the doctor came to me in the committee-room--one door of which opened into the passage leading to the wards and another into the hall in the domestic portion of the building. After telling me about the patient who had just been brought in, he said, 'Do you know Sister Dora is very ill? So ill,' he continued, 'that I question if she will pull through this time.' I naturally inquired what she was suffering from, and in reply the doctor said, 'She will not take care of herself, and is suffering from blood-poison.' He left me, and I was just trying to solve the problem--'What shall be done? or how shall her place be supplied if she be taken from us by death?' when I saw a spectral-like figure gliding gently and almost noiselessly through the room from the domestic entrance to the door leading to the wards. The figure was rather indistinct, for it was nearly dark; and as I gazed at the receding form, I said, 'Sister, is it you?' 'Whist!' she said, and glided through the doorway into the wards. In a short time she returned, and I said to her, 'Sister, the doctor has just been telling me how ill you are--how is it you are here?' 'Ah!' replied, she 'it is true I am very ill; but I heard the surgeons talking about amputating that poor fellow's limb, and I wanted to see whether or not there was a possibility of saving it, and I believe there is; and, knowing that, I shall rest better.' So saying, she glided as noiselessly out of the room as when she entered.

"On her recovery--which was retarded by her neglecting herself to attend to others--she called me one day to the hall-door of the hospital, and asked me if I thought it was going to rain. I told her I did not think it would rain for some hours. She then told me to go and order a cab to be ready at the hospital in half an hour. I tried to persuade her not to venture out so soon; but it was no use--she went; and many a time I wondered where she went to.

"About six months afterward I happened to be at a railway station, and saw a pointsman who had been in our hospital with an injured foot, but who, as his friends wished to have him at home, had left before his foot was cured. I inquired how his foot was. He replied that had it not been for Sister Dora he would have lost his foot, if not his life. I said, 'How did she save your foot when you were not in the hospital, and she was ill at the time you left the hospital?' 'Well,' he replied, 'you know my foot was far from well when I left the hospital; there was no one at our house who could see to it properly, and it took bad ways, and one evening I was in awful pain. Oh, how I did wish for Sister Dora to come and dress it! I felt sure she could give me relief, but I had been told she was very ill, so I had no hope that my earnest desire would be realised; but while I was thinking and wishing, the bedroom door was gently opened, and a figure just like Sister Dora glided so softly into the room that I could not hear her, but oh! she was so pale that I began to think it must be her spirit but when she folded the bedclothes from off my foot, I knew it was she. She dressed my foot, and from that hour it began to improve.'

"A few days after this interview with the pointsman I was talking to Sister Dora, and said: 'By the bye, Sister, I have found out where you went with the cab that day.' She replied with a merry twinkle in her eye, 'What a long time you have been finding it out!'"

Her old patients ever remembered her with gratitude. A man called Chell, an engine-stoker, was twice in the hospital under her care, first with a dislocated ankle, severely cut; the second time with a leg crushed to pieces in a railway accident. It was amputated. According to his own account he remembered nothing of the operation, except that Sister Dora was there, and that, "When I come to after the chloroform, she was on her knees by my side with her arm supporting my head, and she was repeating:

"'They climbed the steep ascent of heaven,
Through peril, toil and pain:
O God, to us may grace be given
To follow in their train.'

And all through the pain and trouble that I had afterward, I never forgot Sister's voice saying those words." When she was in the small-pox hospital, avoided by most, this man never failed to stump away to it to see her and inquire how she was getting on.

There were, as she herself recognised, faults in the character of Sister Dora; and yet, without these faults, problematical as it may seem, it is doubtful whether she could have achieved all she did.

One who knew her long and intimately writes to me "A majestic character, brimming over with sympathy, but, for lack of self-discipline, this sympathy was impulsive and gushing. Her glorious nature, physical and mental, was marred by undisciplined impulse. Her nature found its congenial outlet in devoted works of mercy and love to her fellow creatures. How far she would have done the same under authority, I fear is a little doubtful."

Miss Twigg, who knew her well, writes me: "She was a lovable woman, so bright and winsome. She used to come into our rather dull and sad home (our mother died when we were quite children) after evening service. She would nurse one of us, big as we were then, and the others would gather round her, while she would tell us stories of her hospital life.... She was a _real_ woman."

There is one point in Sister Dora's life to which sufficient attention has not been paid by her biographers. It is one which the busy workers of the present day think of too little--namely, the writing of bright, helpful letters to any friend who is sick or in trouble. Somehow or other she always found time for that, wrote one who knew her well, and who contributes the following, written to a young girl who was at the time in a spinal hospital, and who was almost a stranger to her:

MY DEAR MISS J.--I was so glad to hear from you, though I fear
it must be a trouble for you to write. I _do_ hope that you will
really have benefited by the treatment and rest. I am so glad
that the doctor is good to his "children." Such little
attentions when you are sick help to alleviate wonderfully. I
wish I could come and take a peep at you. Did Mrs. N. tell you
that she had sent us five pounds for our seaside expedition? Was
it not good of her? Oh! we shall have such a jolly time. To see
all those poor creatures drink in the sea-breezes! We have had a
very busy week of accidents and operations. It has been a
regular storm.[A] My dear, it is in such times as you are now
having that the voice of Jesus Christ can be best heard, "Come
into a desert place awhile." Know you surely that it is God's
visitation. Take home that thought, realise it: God _visiting
you_. Elizabeth was astonished that the Mother of her Lord
should visit her. We can have our Emmanuel. I can look back on
my sicknesses as the best times of my life. Don't fret about the
future. He carrieth our sicknesses and healeth our infirmities.
You know infirmity means weakness after sickness. Think of the
cheering lines of our hymn: "His touch has still its ancient
power." When I arose up from my sick bed they told me I should
never be able to enter a hospital or do work again. I was
fretting over this when a good friend came to me, and told me
only to take a day's burden and not look forward, and it was
such a help. I got up every day feeling sure I should have
strength and grace for the day's trial. May it be said of you,
dear, "They took knowledge of her that she had been with Jesus."
May He reveal Himself in all His beauty is the prayer of

Your sincere friend,
SISTER DORA.

It does not truly represent Sister Dora to dwell on her outer life, and not look as well into that which is within, as it was the very mainspring of all her actions, as it, in fact, made her what she was.

The same writer to the _Guardian_ gives some sentences from other letters: "Take your cross day by day, dearie, and with Jesus Christ bearing the other end it will not be _too_ heavy." "If we could find Jesus, it must be on a mountain, not in the plains or smooth places." "He went up into a mountain and taught them, saying," etc. "It is only on a mountain side that we shall see the cross. It was only after Zacchaeus had _climbed_ the tree he could see Jesus. I have been thinking much of this lately. It is not in the smooth places we shall see Jesus, it is in the rough, in the storm, or by the sick couch." "A Christian is one whose object is Christ." "I am rejoiced that you are enjoying Faber's hymns; they always _warm_ me up. Oh, my dear, is it not sad that we prefer to live in the shade when we might have the glorious sunshine?"

It was during the winter of 1876-77 that Sister Dora felt the first approach of the terrible disease that was to cause her death, and then it was rather by diminution of strength than by actual pain. She consulted a doctor in Birmingham, in whom she placed confidence, and he told her the plain truth, that her days in this world were numbered. She exacted from him a pledge of secrecy, and then went on with her work as hitherto.