Queen Victoria had taken from the first a deep interest in Miss Nightingale’s work, and was wishful to receive and thank her in person, while the young Princesses were with natural girlish enthusiasm eager to see the heroine of the war. Accordingly, it was arranged that Miss Nightingale should proceed to Balmoral, where the Queen and Prince Consort were spending the autumn. She arrived in the middle of September, a month after her return from the Crimea, and was privately received by the Queen. The favourable impression made by Miss Nightingale on the royal circle is recorded in the Life of the Prince Consort. One can imagine, too, the emotions of the Crown Princess and Princess Alice, whose desire to help the suffering soldiers had been fired by the visitor’s noble work. Both these young Princesses were destined to experience the anxiety of the soldier’s wife whose husband is at the front, and both followed in the footsteps of Florence Nightingale in organising hospital work in the Prussian War of 1866 and in the Franco-German War of 1870, while tiny Princess Helena was to become in after years an accomplished nurse, and an active leader in the nursing movement of this country; and, alas! to yield her soldier son on the fatal field of South Africa. Miss Nightingale spent several weeks in the Highlands as a guest at Birkhall, near Balmoral. She was present at a dance at the Castle, and sat with the Royal Family at one end of the hall, and is described as looking very graceful and pleasing. She wore a pretty lace cap to conceal her short hair, her abundant tresses having been cut off during her attack of Crimean fever. On Sundays Miss Nightingale worshipped at the old church of Crathie, and her sweet, pale face was affectionately regarded by the village congregation, for there were many brave sons of Scotland whose pains she had soothed and whose dying lips had blessed her. After leaving the Highlands, Miss Nightingale joined her family for the customary stay at Embley Park, her Hampshire home, where she was received by the people with many expressions of congratulation. At Embley she was in the near vicinity of Wilton House, the home of her friends, the Hon. Mr. and Mrs. Sidney Herbert, with whom there was much to discuss regarding the founding of the training home for nurses to which the Nightingale Fund was to be devoted. The fund was the people’s gift to Florence Nightingale, and continued to be enthusiastically supported by private contributions, from the pennies of the poor to the cheques of the rich, and by means of public entertainments throughout the winter which succeeded the return of the heroine from the Crimea.