And now in England, in that Society of Friends, which among Christian communities might seem outwardly farthest away from a communion valuing as its very language the ancient symbols and ritual of the Catholic Church, yet was perhaps by its obedience to the inward voice more in sympathy with the sisterhoods of that Church than were many other religious groups, there had been lifted up by Elizabeth Fry a new standard of duty in this matter, which in her hands became a new standard of nursing, to be passed on in old age by her saintly hands into the young and powerful grasp of the brilliant girl who is the heroine of our story. The name of Elizabeth Fry is associated with the reform of our prisons, but it is less commonly known that she was also a pioneer of decent nursing. She understood with entire simplicity the words, “I was sick and in prison, and ye visited me.” Perhaps it was not mere coincidence that the words occur in the “lesson” appointed for the 15th of February—the day noted in Elizabeth Fry’s journal as the date of that visit to Newgate, when the poor felons she was yearning to help fell on their knees and prayed to a divine unseen Presence. In a recent number of the _Times_ which celebrates her centenary a quotation from her diary is given which tells in her own words:— “I heard weeping, and I thought they appeared much tendered; a very solemn quiet was observed; it was a striking scene, the poor people on their knees around us, in their deplorable condition.” And the _Times_ goes on to say, “nothing appears but those qualities of helpfulness, sympathy, and love which could tame the most savage natures, silence the voice of profanity and blasphemy, and subdue all around her by a sense of her common sisterhood even with the vilest of them in the love of God and the service of man.... But the deepest note of her nature was an intense enthusiasm of humanity. It was this which inspired and sustained all her efforts from first to last—even in her earlier and more frivolous days—for the welfare and uplifting of her fellow-creatures; and it is only right to add that it was itself sustained by her deep and abiding conviction that it is only by the love of God that the service of man can be sanctified and made to prosper.” A letter followed next day from Mr. Julian Hill, who actually remembers her, and tells how the Institution of Nursing Sisters which she organized grew out of her deep pity for the victims of Sairey Gamp and her kind. All this was preparing the way for the wider and more successful nursing crusade in which her memory and influence were to inspire the brave young soul of Florence Nightingale. Speaking of all the difficulties that a blindly conventional world is always ready to throw in the way of any such new path, her old friend writes: “Such difficulties Mrs. Fry and Miss Nightingale brushed contemptuously aside.”