10 minutes - 7 questions
The passage is taken from a biography of Florence Nightingale who is mainly remembered for her heroic work as a nurse during the Crimean War.
The name of Florence Nightingale lives in the memory of the world by virtue of the heroic adventure of the Crimea. Had she died - as she nearly did - upon her return to England, her reputation would hardly have been different; her legend would 5 have come down to us almost as we know it today - that gentle
vision of female virtue which first took shape before the adoring eyes of the sick soldiers at Scutari. Yet, as a matter of fact, she lived for more than half a century after the Crimean War; and during the greater part of that long period all the energy and all the 10 devotion of her extraordinary nature were working at their highest pitch. What she accomplished in those years of unknown sat labor could, indeed, hardly have been more glorious than her Crimean triumphs; but it was certainly more important. The true history was far stranger even than the myth. In Miss Nightingale's 15 own eyes the adventure of the Crimea was a mere incident -scarcely more than a useful stepping-stone in her career. It was the fulcrum with which she hoped to move the world; but it was only the fulcrum. For more than a generation she was to sit in secret, working her lever: and her real life began at the very 20 moment when, in popular imagination, it had ended.
She arrived in England in a shattered state of health. The hardships and the ceaseless efforts of the last two years had undermined her nervous system; her heart was affected; she suffered constantly from fainting-fits and terrible attacks of utter 25 physical prostration. The doctors declared that one thing alone
would save her - a complete and prolonged rest. But that was also the one thing with which she would have nothing to do. She had never been in the habit of resting; why should she begin now?
Now, when her opportunity had come at last; now, when the iron 30 was hot, and it was time to strike? No; she had work to do; and, come what might, she would do it. The doctors protested in vain;
in vain her family lamented and entreated, in vain her friends pointed out to her the madness of such a course. Madness? Mad -possessed - perhaps she was. A frenzy had seized upon her. As 35 she lay upon her sofa, gasping, she devoured blue-books, dictated letters, and, in the intervals of her palpitations, cracked jokes. For months at a stretch she never left her bed. But she would not rest.
At this rate, the doctors assured her, even if she did not die, she would become an invalid for life. She could not help that; there 40 was work to be done; and, as for rest, very likely she might rest ...
when she had done it. Wherever she went, to London or in the country, in the hills of Derbyshire, or among the rhododendrons at Embley, she was haunted by a ghost. It was the specter of Scutari - the hideous 45 vision of the organization of a military hospital. She would lay that phantom, or she would perish. The whole system of the Army Medical Department, the education of the Medical Officer, the regulations of hospital procedure ... rest? How could she rest while these things were as they were, while, if the like necessity 50 were to arise again, the like results would follow? And, even in peace and at home, what was the sanitary condition of the Army?
The mortality in the barracks, was, she found, nearly double the mortality in civil life. 'You might as well take 1, 100 men every year out upon Salisbury Plain and shoot them,' she said. After 55 inspecting the hospitals at Chatham, she smiled grimly. 'Yes, this is one more symptom of the system which, in the Crimea, put to death 16,000 men.' Scutari had given her knowledge; and it had given her power too: her enormous reputation was at her back -an incalculable force. Other work, other duties, might lie before 60 her; but the most urgent, the most obvious, of all was to look to the health of the Army.