Produced by Steven Gibbs, Richard J. Shiffer and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team at https://www.pgdp.net A NOBLE WOMAN The Life-Story of EDITH CAVELL By ERNEST PROTHEROE Author of 'In Empire's Cause.' &c., &c. 'I will give thee a crown of life.' London THE EPWORTH PRESS J. ALFRED SHARP _First Edition, January, 1916_ _Second Edition, September, 1916_ _Third Edition, January, 1918_ _Fourth Edition, May, 1918_ CONTENTS CHAP. PAGE I. INTRODUCTION 7 II. THE HEEL OF THE OPPRESSOR 17 III. THE ARREST 29 IV. SPINNING THE TOILS 37 V. THE SECRET TRIAL 44 VI. THE FIGHT FOR A LIFE 52 VII. THE BLOOD OF THE MARTYR 63 VIII. IN MEMORIAM 73 IX. BRITISH OFFICIAL REPROBATION 89 X. GERMANY'S CYNICAL DEFENCE 99 XI. JUSTICE AND SAVAGERY CONTRASTED 108 XII. PULPIT AND PEN UNITE IN DENUNCIATION 114 XIII. THE LASH OF THE WORLD'S PRESS 128 XIV. AMERICA'S VERDICT 159 XV. CONCLUSION 167 I INTRODUCTION Edith Louisa Cavell was born in 1866 at the country rectory of Swardeston, near Norwich, of which parish her father, the Rev. Frederick Cavell, was rector for forty years. In that pleasant sunny house the little girl passed her early days in uneventful happiness, for Swardeston had few interests apart from the obscurities of its own rural retirement. The rector, who was a kindly man at heart, but firm to the point of sternness where his duty was concerned, ruled his home with evangelical strictness. His daughter Edith was a thoughtful child; and her unfailing consideration for others and her concern for their welfare caused her to be beloved by everybody. But the child's innate gentleness was tinged with a sense of duty remarkable in one of her years, which characteristic was the undoubted outcome of her father's precept and example. Edith Cavell's education was as thorough as her parents could contrive; and, apart from mere scholarship, her outlook was widened by being sent to a school at Brussels.