It must not be supposed, however, that Florence was in request among the family circle only at times of sad emergency. She sometimes took her place no less effectually on festive occasions. Waverley Abbey, the house of Uncle Nicholson aforesaid, was the scene of family reunions at Christmas-time; and in letters to Miss Clarke from both Mrs. Nightingale and her daughter Parthe, there is a lively account of private theatricals there in 1841. The _Merchant of Venice_ was chosen, and Macready volunteered some assistance. Parthe's artistic gifts were requisitioned, and she was "scene-painter, milliner, and cap-and-fur maker." The powers of command and organization, which Florence was afterwards to exhibit in another field, seem to have been divined by her cousins, for she was unanimously appointed stage-manager. Miss Joanna Horner, who was one of the party, remembers that the usual little jealousies about parts and costumes used to disappear in presence of Florence. "Flo very blooming," reported Mrs. Nightingale. "The actors were not very obstinate, and were tolerably good-tempered," wrote Parthe, "but it was hard work for Flo. There was a Captain Elliot, fresh from China, who could by no means be brought to obey. He was Antonio, and _would_ burst out laughing in the midst of his most pathetic bits, to the horror of Shylock, who was very earnest and hard-working." The Lady-in-Chief in later years in the Crimea had a rather peremptory way with obstructive military gentlemen. On this occasion, however, she was perhaps satisfied with the assurance given at a well-known pantomime rehearsal, that it would "be all right on the night." But it was not. "Your flame, Uncle Adams,"[18] continues the letter to Miss Clarke, "was very fine in Lancelot! but, oh, desperation, forgot his Duke's part in the most flagrant way, tho' Flo had been putting it into him with a sledge-hammer all the week." In the intervals of rehearsing, the girls and their cousins danced and sang, and took large walks, sixteen together. After the performance, dancing was kept up till five in the morning. "Next day," continues Lady Verney, "we were debating whether 'Sing a Song of Sixpence' went on with a _bag_ or a _pocket_ full of rye; and warming on this interesting subject, we young ones dragged in all the old people, sought recruits high and low, and had a regular election scene. Uncle Adams made a hustings speech, giving both parties hopes of his vote; then the boys slunk out after the counting, and came in with large outcries to be counted a second time, with many other corrupt practices much used at such times; then we bribed a little boy to go and make disturbances in the other faction; but you will be happy to hear the _pockets_ had it by a large majority, and we beat the base _baggites_ out of the field. After the holloaing was over, and the alarming rushings and screamings we had made, M. Kroff (a Bohemian), who