In the war that England and France were carrying on against Russia in the Crimea about fifty years ago, the English soldiers suffered terrible hardships, so terrible that more than half the army were in the hospital, and many men were dying of starvation and neglect. The people in England knew nothing of this, because they thought that everything the army needed had been sent to it. At last, they found out from the letters of Dr. Russell, the correspondent of the London _Times_, how great were the sufferings of the soldiers, and they were so shocked at this state of things that they subscribed large sums of money, many thousands of dollars, and sent out to the army Florence Nightingale and thirty-four other nurses to do what they could for the neglected soldiers. After they came, the wounded and sick soldiers were so well cared for that thousands of them lived to come home who would have died if these noble women had not gone out to nurse them. Do you want to know why Florence Nightingale was the one person out of all the people of England to be asked to go? From her earliest childhood she was always doing what she could to help those who were in trouble. The poor and suffering appealed to her more than to most people. When quite young, she went to visit the poor and sick on her father's estates, carrying to them some little dainties or flowers that they would be sure to like, and helping them to get well. All the animals around her home liked her, because they knew that she would not hurt them; even the shy squirrels would come quite close to her and pick up the nuts she dropped for them. An old gray pony, named Peggy, would trot up to her when she went into the field to see it, and put its nose into her pocket for the apple or other little treat that she always had for it. A sheep dog had been hurt by a stone thrown at it by a boy, and the owner thought that its leg was broken and that he would have to kill it. But it turned out to be only a bad bruise and the dog was soon well with Florence's nursing. When her rich parents took her to London, she preferred visiting the sick people in the hospitals to enjoying herself at parties or in sight-seeing. When the family travelled in Europe, she visited the hospitals to see how the sick were being looked after. She went to one of the best hospitals in Germany to study how to nurse the sick in the best way. When she came back to England, she did a great deal to improve the hospitals, and for many years she worked so hard that her health began to fail.