The Life of Florence Nightingale Volume II Part 3

The first step is to ask what the War and India departments will do. If on consideration they consent to the appointment of the commissions recommended with or without modification of our plan, the thing is fairly started. I am inclined to believe that they will be found willing. But we must give them time to read the report. If they object to do anything, other methods may be tried.

We have friends in the Indian Council, and Lord de Grey is a Sanitarist. I quite agree in what you say as to its being a duty to help the ministry of the day in working out their plans.

Practically I have acted on this rule. Few matters pa.s.s in the India Office that do not come before me. But such help cannot be offered by an outsider--it must be asked by those who are responsible. If Sir C. Wood desires a.s.sistance in giving effect to the sanitary projects, I will not refuse it. There is ample time to consider all this.

So Lord Stanley was waiting to be asked. Then it became Miss Nightingale's business to contrive that he should be asked. She saw Lord de Grey, begged him to go forthwith to the India Office, and to suggest to Sir Charles Wood that he should talk matters over with Lord Stanley.

The thing was done:--

(_Lord Stanley to Miss Nightingale._) _July_ 24. I have had several conversations with Sir C. Wood, and from the language he now holds, I consider it settled that the report of the commissioners will be acted upon--the W.O. Commission being enlarged for the purpose of dealing with Indian questions. I have also arranged with him for the settlement of all personal claims arising out of our enquiry.[27] I hope, therefore, that we may look on our work as done for the present. It is probable that difficulties will arise out of the conflicting claims of the Indian and home authorities: but these we must be prepared for, and deal with as they come up. So far, all has gone well.

[27] Mr. Herbert had promised, but apparently only by word of mouth, that the services rendered by Dr. Farr and Dr. Sutherland to the Commission should be paid. Miss Nightingale was able to confirm the promise.

The Duke of Newcastle wrote to her to like effect (Aug. 31): "The Report on the Indian Army is attracting much attention, and I have no doubt it will do a great deal of good, tho' there is supposed to be still a very strong obstructive power in the India Office." For a time, it seemed as if official measures would be taken with reasonable celerity. Two members, to represent India, were added to the Barrack and Hospital Improvement Commission. The Secretary for India sent a dispatch (Aug.

15) suggesting the formation of Sanitary Commissions as recommended in the Report. Miss Nightingale was asked to draft a code of suggestions which might be sent out to India. But soon there was a hitch. The military element in the India Office quarrelled with the Report, and it was intimated that there might be similar criticism from the military element in the Government of India. The accuracy of Dr. Farr's statistics was to be impugned; and it was to be objected that Miss Nightingale's "Observations" did not in all cases reflect the present state of the Indian stations. As if reports, which had taken and must have taken months and months to collect, could possibly have been brought up to the last moment! And as if the mere fact that such reports had been called for was not likely to lead to some improvement! These things need not detain us. They were, as Miss Nightingale put it, "the Crimea over again," "these and those" protesting that things were not so bad as they had been painted, and that in any case it was not A who was to blame, but B. But meanwhile everything was hung up. Lord Stanley, the Chairman of the Commission, whose Report was impugned, was in the country. Miss Nightingale "urged and baited him" (so she described it) to come up to London and return to the charge. He came in November, and had an interview with her before seeing Sir Charles Wood.

II

And now an event occurred which was followed by results of consequence to her cause. Lord Elgin, the Viceroy, while travelling in the Himalayas, was stricken down by a heart complaint from which he was not expected to recover. The question of a successor became urgent. The minds of many turned to Sir John Lawrence, but, with one exception, no Indian civilian since Warren Hastings had permanently held the office of Viceroy. Miss Nightingale had unbounded admiration for him. The soldier's heart in her loved his heroic deeds. "What would Homer have been," she once said, "if he had had such heroes as the Lawrences to sing?"[28] Personal intercourse had filled her with closer admiration for what Lord Stanley called "a certain heroic simplicity" in the man, for his unaffected piety, his rugged honesty, his deep sympathy with human suffering. In later years a photograph of Watts's portrait of Lawrence always hung in Miss Nightingale's room. At the moment with which we are now concerned, she regarded him as the indispensable man for India, not more on account of the threatening border war on the north-west frontier (the consideration which doubtless most moved Lord Palmerston), than on account of his sympathy with the cause of sanitary reform. An opportunity came for putting in her word. Sir Charles Wood consulted his predecessor at the India Office, and Lord Stanley in turn talked matters over with Miss Nightingale. She urged him with fervent eagerness to do everything in his power to promote the appointment of Sir John Lawrence. Lord Elgin died on November 20. Lawrence was appointed on November 30, and was to start for India immediately:--

(_Lord Stanley to Miss Nightingale._) _Dec._ 1. I saw Sir C. Wood yesterday. The sanitary question was gone into, tho' not so fully as I could have wished. Sir J. Lawrence's appointment is a great step gained. He knows what is wanted, and has no prejudices in favour of the existing military administration. I shall see him to-night and shall probably be able to have some talk with him on the subject. But why should not he see you? The plans are in the main yours; no one can explain them better: you have been in frequent correspondence with him. I believe there will now be but little difficulty in India.... Let me repeat--you must manage to see Sir John Lawrence. He does not go till the 10th. Your position in respect of this whole subject is so peculiar that advice from you will come with greater weight than from anyone else.

[28] Letter to Harriet Martineau (Feb. 2, 1865).

Miss Nightingale was among the first to offer congratulations to the new Viceroy; the terms in which she addressed him expressed what she sincerely and intensely believed:--

(_Miss Nightingale to Sir John Lawrence._) Among the mult.i.tude of affairs and congratulations which will be pouring in upon you, there is no more fervent joy, there are no stronger good wishes, than those of one of the humblest of your servants. For there is no greater position for usefulness under heaven than that of the government of the vast Empire you saved for us. And you are the only man to fill it. So thought a statesman with whom I worked not daily, but hourly, for five years, Sidney Herbert--when the last appointment was made. In the midst of your pressure pray think of us, and of our sanitary things on which such millions of lives and health depend.[29]

[29] From the _Life of Lord Lawrence_, by R. Bosworth Smith, 1885, vol. ii. p. 278.

Prompted by Lord Stanley, Miss Nightingale asked the new Viceroy to call. He was the first of a succession of high Indian officials who made a point of coming to Miss Nightingale before leaving for their posts.

The interview took place on December 4. Miss Nightingale never forgot either the interview itself or Lord Stanley's kindly anxiety that it should take place. Thirty years later (Feb. 17, 1893), in sending Aitchison's Memoir of Lord Lawrence to Sir Harry Verney, she wrote: "How many touches--short but sweet--I could add to the book! The real tale of Sir J. Lawrence's appointment as Viceroy will never be told. During the only ten days left to Lawrence before he started, he came to see me. How kind it was of Lord Stanley. He came like a footman to my door, and, without giving his name, sent up to ask whether Sir John Lawrence was coming. The interview was one never to be forgotten."

Sir John Lawrence discussed the sanitary question with Miss Nightingale in all its bearings, and they exchanged views further by correspondence before he left London:--

(_Miss Nightingale to Dr. Farr._) _Dec._ 10. I have had the great joy of being in constant communication with Sir John Lawrence, and of receiving his commands to do what I had almost lost the hope of being allowed to do--viz. of sending out full statements and schemes of what we want the Presidency Commissions to do. I should be glad to submit to you copies of papers of mine which he desired me to write and which he took out with him, as to the const.i.tution of the Presidency Commissions, if you care to see them. They are, of course, confidential. I have also seen Lord Stanley more than once during these busy days. And with Sir John Lawrence's command, we feel ourselves empowered to begin the Home Commission,[30] and to further our plans upon it. Sir John Lawrence, so far from considering our Report exaggerated, considers it under the mark.

[30] That is the Barrack and Hospital Improvement Commission (Army Sanitary Committee), reinforced by India Office representatives, which was to issue Sanitary Suggestions for the Government of India.

Thus was preparation made for putting the Report into execution in India. During Lawrence's Viceroyalty, Sir Bartle Frere was governor of Bombay. "Men used to say," he told Miss Nightingale, "that they always knew when the Viceroy had received a letter from Florence Nightingale: it was like the ringing of a bell to call for sanitary progress."

III

Within a month of his arrival in India, Sir John Lawrence had set the Sanitary Commissions on foot, and nothing was wanting except hints and instructions from home:--

(_Sir John Lawrence to Miss Nightingale._) CALCUTTA, _Feb._ 5 [1864]. I write a line to say that we have commenced work by establis.h.i.+ng our Sanitary Committees for Calcutta, Madras, and Bombay. They are composed of five members. A Civilian is at their head, and a Medical Officer as Secretary. I hope that you will expedite the transmission to India of the codes and rules and plans which have been approved of for home and the colonies. We shall then have an idea in a practical shape of the main features of the sanitary system, and can readily adapt it to the peculiar circ.u.mstances of the country. Without such a guide we shall often be perhaps working in direct opposition to your views. Where we differ, it will become our duty to set forth the grounds for so doing, in sending our plans and reports home. Pray excuse this hurried scrawl, and believe me, Sincerely yours, JOHN LAWRENCE.

It was not Miss Nightingale's fault that this plea for expedition was necessary. In December 1863 Lord de Grey had again asked her to draft a letter to the India Office, as from the War Office, on the measures recommended by the Royal Commission, and she had done it. But days, weeks, months pa.s.sed, and nothing happened. In January 1864 her "Suggestions in regard to Sanitary Works required for the Improvement of Indian Stations,"[31] written at the urgent request of the Governor-General, were ready, Dr. Sutherland, Dr. Farr, and Mr. Rawlinson collaborating with her. Again months pa.s.sed and nothing happened. The Barrack and Hospital Improvement Committee had been officially informed in December of the appointment of the Indian members, and requested to report on any matters which might be referred to it by the Secretary for India or the Secretary for War; but as yet no Indian reference had been made. Miss Nightingale chafed sorely at the needless delay. The Governor-General wrote to her again and again pressing for the Suggestions. She had done her part long ago; the War Office had been in possession of her Draft for months. She tried plain pressure, and pressure barbed with sarcasm. "Poor man!" she wrote in forwarding to the War Office one of the Governor-General's letters (March 10); "he really expects despatch. He thinks we can write a letter in three months! He must be more fit for a Lunatic Asylum than for a Governor-Generals.h.i.+p." Or, when the Government had been having a close division in the House,[32] she tried to play the India Office against the War Office. "You will all be 'out' this session," she wrote to the War Office (March 7, 1864); "after which I shall be able to get what I like from Lord Stanley [I.O.], but _you_ will not be able to get what you like from Gen. Peel [W.O.]. It is therefore very desirable that this letter should be written now at once while you are still 'in.'" It turned out that the reason of the delay was this: the War Office _had_ sent a preliminary letter to the India Office, and the India Office resented it. Sir Charles Wood, it was explained to Miss Nightingale, had "snubbed" Lord de Grey. The War Office was sulking in its tents accordingly. The India Office, on its part, was standing on its dignity, and was not going to place itself in the humiliating position of taking action proposed to it by the War Office. And this was the reason why Miss Nightingale's Suggestions, for which the Governor-General was asking, were still pigeon-holed. As for minor recommendations in the Royal Commission's Report, it was quite true that many of them could be carried out by administrative order, and some of them were; but the difficulty in the case of others was that it had hitherto pa.s.sed the wit of man to discover with whom the power, or the responsibility, of making the order lay. Well may Miss Nightingale have written, as she did in more than one letter of this time (Jan. 1864): "No impression in all my life was ever 'borne in upon me' more strongly than this, that the Ministers have never considered the respective jurisdictions of the W.O.

and the I.O., and that I.O., W.O., Horse Guards at home, Commander-in-Chief in India, Governor-General in India are as little defined as to the respective powers and duties as if India were the Sandwich Islands."

[31] Bibliography A, No. 24.

[32] On March 1, on a debate on the Yeomanry, the majority had been 1.

On the major matter, the dispatch of sanitary suggestions to guide the Indian authorities, Miss Nightingale now resolved that the delay should come to an end. She had drafted an ultimatum to the War Office, threatening an attack in the House of Commons, when Lord Stanley, a prominent member of the Opposition, appeared on the scene. He had forewarned Miss Nightingale, as we have heard, that departmental jealousies would cause some delay; but seven months had now pa.s.sed since the Report of his Commission had been issued, and he seems to have thought that this was time enough to allow for the two offices to let off steam between themselves. He wrote to Miss Nightingale suggesting that he should come to see her, and offering, if she approved, to put pressure either upon Lord de Grey or upon Sir Charles Wood. Miss Nightingale loyally gave her friends at the War Office a last chance, but they did not care to take it. Lord Stanley saw Sir Charles Wood accordingly, promised him parliamentary support in any action which he might take, and matters were at last arranged. Miss Nightingale's draft "Suggestions" were submitted to the Barrack and Hospital Improvement Commission, and with slight alterations were adopted by that body. It was a War Office Commission, but the dignity of the India Office was consulted by the statement on the t.i.tle-page of the Blue-book, that the Suggestions had been prepared by the said Commission "in accordance with Letters from the Secretary of State for India in Council." The fact was that they were prepared by Miss Nightingale in accordance with the wishes of Sir John Lawrence.

When once the "Suggestions" had been pa.s.sed officially, it was within her power, by the simple expedient of laying in a stock of early copies, to prevent a moment's further delay. She used the power; and could not deny herself a few genial taunts at her official friends. "I beg to inform you," she wrote to Captain Galton at the War Office (Aug. 8), "that by the first mail after signature I sent off by H.M.'s book-post, at an enormous expense (I have a good mind to charge it to you!), to Sir John Lawrence direct no end of copies of _Suggestions_ (also to the Presidency Commissions); and that, as he is always more ready to hear than you are to pray (you sinners!), I have not the least doubt that they will have been _put in execution_ long before the India Office has even begun to send them."[33] She was not far wrong; six or seven weeks elapsed before the official copies were sent,[34] and meanwhile Miss Nightingale was able to get in another gibe. She heard from Sir John Lawrence that he had ordered the _Suggestions_ to be reprinted in India.

"It might be as well," she wrote to the War Office, "to hurry your copies for the India Office, who will otherwise receive them first from India."

[33] This was no idle taunt. The Government of India had already put in force some of the recommendations of the Royal Commission before it had officially received copies of the Report: see above, p. 34 and _n._

[34] Miss Nightingale conducted a secret inquiry, which would have done credit to a detective-inspector, into the causes of this delay.

According to "information received," the first cause was that the final printing order was delayed while communications went to and fro between the War Office and the India Office upon the number of copies required. Then the supply ultimately ordered by the latter pa.s.sed leisurely from one sub-department to another. Finally, the stock reposed a while at a warehouse across the water, until there were sufficient official papers to fill certain regulation cases of a regulation size.

IV

In India itself, advance, with Sir John Lawrence at the helm, was rapid.

The President and the Secretary of each Sanitary Commission were required to devote their whole attention to the work. They were charged to "consider and afford advice and a.s.sistance in all matters relative to the health of the Army, and to supervise the gradual introduction of sanitary improvements in Barracks, Hospitals, and Stations, as well as in Towns in proximity to Military Stations." Of every step taken, Miss Nightingale was kept informed. Sir John wrote to her frequently to report progress; he described to her the condition of all the Stations he had inspected on his way up to Simla; he applied to her for information on special points. His private secretary, Dr. Hathaway, who also had seen Miss Nightingale before he left England, wrote yet more fully and frequently. The President of the Bengal Commission was Mr. Strachey.[35] He, too, had made Miss Nightingale's acquaintance, and they corresponded at great length. Dr. J. P. Walker, a surgeon in the Indian Army, was in England in December 1863. He wrote to Miss Nightingale, as a devoted follower of her school. He went out to India, was appointed Secretary of the Bengal Commission, and at every stage consulted her and reported to her. Mr. R. J. Ellis, President of the Madras Commission, and Dr. Leith, President of the Bombay one, also corresponded with her. To any official in India, from the Governor-General downwards, who was ready to listen, Miss Nightingale had much to say. The correspondence with Sir John Lawrence is the most interesting:--

(_Sir John Lawrence to Miss Nightingale._) SIMLEH, _June_ 12 [1864]. It was truly kind of you to write and give me so nice an account of my children.... What an exciting time must Garibaldi's visit to England have been. He is indeed a n.o.ble fellow, and fully worthy of all our sympathies. I only trust that he will be persuaded to keep quiet and bide his time. A good day for his country, if the people only deserve it, must surely come. I am doing what I can to put things in order out here; but it is a very uphill work, and many influences have to be managed and overcome. I often think of the last visit I paid you before leaving England and of your conversation on that occasion. You will recollect how much I dwelt on the difficulties which meet one on every side. These have been exemplified in a way I could scarcely understand or antic.i.p.ate, by the good folks of England really believing that I had sanctioned an attack on the religion of the Hindoos, because I desired to improve the health of the people in Calcutta!

[35] John Strachey (1823-1907); afterwards Chief Commissioner of Oudh, Lieut.-Governor of the N.W. Provinces, financial member of the Governor-General's Council; knighted, 1872; G.C.S.I., 1878; and member of the Secretary of State's Council.

(_Miss Nightingale to Sir John Lawrence._) 32 SOUTH STREET, _Sept._ 26 [1864]. MY DEAR SIR JOHN LAWRENCE--I always feel it a kind of presumption in me to write to you--and a kind of wonder at your permitting it. I always feel that you are the greatest figure in history, and yours the greatest work in history, in modern times.

But that is my very reason. We have but one Sir John Lawrence. Your Bengal Sanitary Commission is doing its work, like men--like martyrs, in fact,--and what a work it is! All we have in Europe is mere child's play to it. Health is the product of civilization, _i.e._ of real civilization. In Europe we have a kind of civilization to proceed upon. In India your work represents, not only diminished Mortality as with us, but increase of energy, increase of power of the populations. I always feel, as if G.o.d had said: mankind is to create mankind. In this sense you are the greatest creator of mankind in modern history....

Would there be any impropriety in your Sanitary Commissions sending copies of their printed Minutes to the Barrack and Hospital Improvement Commission here, through the India Office--merely for information? As far as your Bengal Commission goes: these men don't want urging: they have not now to be taught. Anything which might even appear to interfere with the responsibilities of your Commissions, unless at their own request, is not only undesirable: but, as far as the Bengal Comm^n. is concerned, useless. But, if you saw no objection to sending the Minutes for information to the War Office Commission here, I am sure they would very much like it.

Or, if that would be too formal and official (as regards the India Office here), if they, the Minutes, might be sent to me, with permission to shew them to one or two, such as Lord Stanley (our late Chairman of the Royal Commission), Dr. Sutherland, and Capt.

Galton, of the War Office, &c., it would answer the same purpose.

The India Office here does not shew _now_ the least jealousy of the Barrack and Hosp^l. (War Office) Commission. On the contrary, one can scarcely help smiling at the small things it is glad to throw off its responsibility for upon said Commission.

There are three glaring (tho' lesser) evils in Calcutta about which I know you have been employed--lesser tho' they are--and your attention and Dr. Hathaway's have been aroused by them. These are: (1) The Police Hospitals (or state of Hosp^l. accommodation) for sick poor at Calcutta. The Police establishments seem about as bad as possible. Indeed the poor wretches are brought in mostly to die.

The Parisian system of relief is very good: every Police station at Paris has means of temporary help in cases of emergency until the sufferers can be removed to Hospital. Some such arrangement with a thorough reform of the Hospitals, and such additional accommodation as may be wanted, might meet Calcutta's case.

(2) The condition of Jails and Lunatic Asylums in India. Certainly it is not for me to draw your attention or Dr. Hathaway's to this.

Probably he knows more about them than any man living. The reports and recommendations of one or two of the Jail Inspectors shew that they want experience: as I am sure Dr. Hathaway will agree with me.

Perhaps we might help you by sending out such Reports on the subject as may be useful.

(3) The seamen at the great Ports. You have already done so much.

But Rome can't be built in a day. Bad water, bad food bought in Bazaars, and bad drinks cause a vast amount of disease and death.

Self-supporting Inst.i.tutions, such as our Sailors' Homes (of which, indeed, I believe you have already founded more than one), would give the men wholesome food and drink, and lodgings and day-rooms at little cost. So many men perish for want of this kind of accommodation at Calcutta, where the evil seems greatest.

It seems to me so base to be writing while you are doing. Oh that I could come out to Calcutta and organize at least the Hospital accommodation for the poor wretches in the streets. There is nothing I should like so much. But it is nonsense to wish for what is an impossibility. I am sure you will be glad to hear that one of my life-long wishes, viz. the nursing of Workhouse Infirmaries by proper Nurses, is about to be fulfilled. By the munificence of a Liverpool man (who actually gives 1200 a year for the object, but desires not to be named), we undertake next month the Liverpool Workhouse Infirmary (of 1000 beds)--the first Workhouse that ever has been nursed--with 15 Head Nurses, trained by ourselves, and a Lady (Volunteer) Matron (who underwent a most serious course of training at our Nurses' School at St. Thomas' Hospital), 15 a.s.sistants, and 52 ex-pauper women, whom we are to train as Nurses.[36] I am sure it is not for us to talk of Civilization. For I have seen, in our English Workhouse Infirmaries, neglect, cruelty, and malversation such as can scarcely be surpa.s.sed in semi-barbarous countries. And it was then I felt I must found a school for Nurses for Workhouses, &c. The opportunity has come too late for me to do the Workhouse Nursing myself. But, so it is well done, we care not how. I think with the greatest satisfaction upon your re-union with Lady Lawrence and (some of) your children. G.o.d bless you.--I am yours devotedly, FLORENCE NIGHTINGALE.

_P.S._--The Calcutta Munic.i.p.ality does not seem yet to have wakened up to a sense of its existence. It does not know that it exists: much less, what it exists for. Still, you are conquering India anew by civilization, taking possession of the Empire for the first time by knowledge instead of by the sword.--F. N.

[36] On this subject, see below, p. 128.

The Commander-in-Chief in India, Sir Hugh Rose (Lord Strathnairn) was hardly less helpful in the cause than the Governor-General. The War Office had sent to him, through the Horse Guards, a letter inviting his attention to the regimental recommendations in the Royal Commission's Report. His reply was most sympathetic, and his period of command was marked, amongst other things, by two reforms specially near to Miss Nightingale's desires: he introduced regimental workshops and soldiers'