Her words to Sir Bartle Frere at the outset had been: “It does seem that there is no element in the scheme of government (of India) by which the public health can be taken care of. And the thing is now to create such an element.” As early as 1863, in her “Observations on the Sanitary State of the Army in India,” she had written:— “Native ‘caste’ prejudices appear to have been made the excuse for European laziness, as far as regards our sanitary and hospital neglects of the natives. Recent railroad experience is a striking proof that ‘caste,’ in their minds, is no bar to intercommunication in arrangements tending to their benefit.” Sir C. Trevelyan justly says that “a good sanitary state of the military force cannot be secured without making similar arrangements for the populations settled in and around the military cantonments; that sanitary reform must be generally introduced into India for the civil as well as the military portion of the community.” And now that the opportunity arrived, all was done with wise and swift diplomacy. The way was smoothed by a call from Frere on his old friend Sir Richard Temple, at that time Finance Minister at Calcutta, asking him to help. Those who know India best, and know Miss Nightingale best, are those who are most aware of the mighty tree of ever-widening health improvement that grew from this little seed, and of the care with which Miss Nightingale helped to guard and foster it. “She was a great Indian,” her friend General Evatt repeated to me more than once, “and what a head she had! She was the only human being I have ever met, for instance, man or woman, who had thoroughly mastered the intricate details of the Bengal land-purchase system. She loved India, and she knew it through and through. It was no wonder that every distinguished Indian who came to England went to see Miss Nightingale.” She bore her ninety years very lightly, and made a vision serene and noble, as will be seen from our picture, though that does not give the lovely youthful colouring in contrast with the silvery hair, and we read of the great expressiveness of her hands, which, a little more, perhaps, than is usual with Englishwomen, she used in conversation. It was a very secluded life that she lived at No. 10 South Street; but she was by no means without devotees, and the bouquet that the German Emperor sent her was but one of many offerings from many high-hearted warriors at her shrine. And when she visited her old haunts at Lea Hurst and Embley she delighted in sending invitations to the girls growing up in those village families that she had long counted among her friends, so that to her tea-table were lovingly welcomed guests very lowly, as well as those better known to the world.