It was the testing moment of her life. Had Florence Nightingale failed at this crisis in personal endurance, or in power to inspire her subordinates with a like courage, her mission would have sunk into a benevolent futility. She and her nurses might have run hither and thither smoothing pillows, administering gruel, and doing other kind and womanly service, but grateful as that would be to the poor fellows in their extreme misery, it would not have remedied the root of the evil. The Lady-in-Chief had to look beyond the present moment, though not neglectful of its demands, to the more important future, and institute a system of nursing reform which should make such scenes as she now witnessed impossible. It was her ability to do this which lifted Florence Nightingale into such a supreme position. The attention and praises bestowed on her during the Crimean period roused a little jealousy and resentment in some quarters. Other women engaged in nursing the sick soldiers possibly thought that they had made equal personal sacrifices with Miss Nightingale--some indeed gave their life in the cause. Others again, returning to a life of seclusion after toiling through the arduous nursing of the campaign, might perhaps have felt some injustice that one name alone rang through the land, while others who also had borne the heat and burden of the day remained unhonoured and unsung. No one would wish to exempt from due praise even the humblest of that “Angel Band” who worked with Florence Nightingale and still less would she, but in every great cause there is the initiating genius who stands in solitary grandeur above the rank and file of followers. Such was the Lady-in-Chief: she came to Scutari as something far more even than an efficient nurse. She brought the organising and governing faculty and the brain power of which the officials in charge seemed bereft. Delicate, high-bred, and retiring in nature as Miss Nightingale was, she possessed the subtle quality which gave her command over others, that undefinable something which broke down the opposition of the most conservative obstructionist when he came under her personal influence. She was unfettered by precedent or red tape, and brought to her task a clear idea of the administrative mechanism which was needed to afford due care and provision for the prostrate soldiery.