One can understand the ecstasy of the volatile Frenchman at finding himself coupled in such distinguished company and forgive his little conceit, for he was an enthusiastic admirer of our heroine, and has left one of the best pen portraits of her extant. “She is rather high in stature,” he writes, “fair in complexion and slim in person; her hair is brown, and is worn quite plain; her physiognomy is most pleasing; her eyes, of a bluish tint, speak volumes, and are always sparkling with intelligence; her mouth is small and well formed, while her lips act in unison, and make known the impression of her heart--one seems the reflex of the other. Her visage, as regards expression, is very remarkable, and one can almost anticipate by her countenance what she is about to say: alternately, with matters of the most grave import, a gentle smile passes radiantly over her countenance, thus proving her evenness of temper; at other times, when wit or a pleasantry prevails, the heroine is lost in the happy, good-natured smile which pervades her face, and you recognise only the charming woman. “Her dress is generally of a greyish or black tint; she wears a simple white cap, and often a rough apron. In a word, her whole appearance is religiously simple and unsophisticated. In conversation no member of the fair sex can be more amiable and gentle than Miss Nightingale. Removed from her arduous and cavalier-like duties, which require the nerve of a Hercules--and she possesses it when required--she is Rachel on the stage in both tragedy and comedy.” CHAPTER XVI _THE ANGEL OF DEATH_ Death of Seven Surgeons at Scutari--The First of the “Angel Band” Stricken--Deaths of Miss Smythe, Sister Winifred, and Sister Mary Elizabeth--Touching Verses by an Orderly. Sleep that no pain shall wake, Night that no morn shall break, Till joy shall overtake Her perfect calm. CHRISTINA ROSSETTI. It is the cause, and not the death, that makes the martyr.--NAPOLEON. Throughout the spring of 1855 disease continued its ravages amongst the soldiers in the Crimea without abatement, and there was an increase of typhus fever in its worst form. The constitutions of the men were so undermined by the privations through which they had passed that they were unable to fight against the disease. The “men with the spades” had no cessation from their melancholy toil at Scutari. Deaths occurred daily in the hospitals, and the stricken took the places of the dead only themselves to die before another day had dawned.