Part 12

I will not speak of reward when permitted to do our country’s work—it is what we live for. FLORENCE NIGHTINGALE.

What is money without a country! CLARA BARTON.

CLARA BARTON—FLORENCE NIGHTINGALE

Clara Barton was born in 1821 and lived to be ninety-one years of age.

Florence Nightingale was born in 1820 and lived to be ninety years of age.

Clara Barton lived her long life without marrying; Florence Nightingale likewise lived her long life without marrying.

Clara Barton is known as the “Angel of the Battlefield”; Florence Nightingale, as the “Lady of the Lamp.”

Although they were strangers to each other, they are known as, indeed, sisters.

Clara Barton had the distinction of being born on Christmas and passing away on Easter; Florence Nightingale had the distinction of having for a name the name of a stately city and a sweet-voiced bird.

Clara Barton as a nurse had her first experience nursing a brother by the name of David; Florence Nightingale as a nurse had her first experience caring for a pet shepherd dog by the name of “Cap.”

Clara Barton on an army wagon seated with a mule driver left Washington to go to the battlefields of the Civil War; Florence Nightingale on board of a vessel with 38 other nurses, sailed from England to go to the hospitals at Scutari, Turkey, in the Crimean War.

Clara Barton continually “followed the cannon” from the camps of the soldiers on to the “firing line”; Florence Nightingale lived at Scutari, but on one occasion inspected the camps of the soldiers at Balaclava within hearing of the cannon.

Clara Barton had for a pet, presented to her, a white Arabian horse and known as “Baba”; Florence Nightingale had for a pet, presented to her, a Russian hound, and known as “Miss Nightingale’s Crimean Dog.”

Clara Barton wore the Iron Cross of Prussia, representing Germany, and presented to her by Emperor William I; Florence Nightingale wore a brooch bearing a St. George’s Cross, in red enamel on a white field representing England, and presented to her by Queen Victoria.

Clara Barton received from the Sultan of Turkey a “Diploma,” and “Decorations”; Florence Nightingale received from the Sultan of Turkey a costly diamond necklace.

The United States Government refused to appropriate one thousand dollars for a memorial tablet to Clara Barton in the Red Cross Building; England conferred on Florence Nightingale the dignity of a “Lady of Grace of the Order of St. John of Jerusalem,” and later the still higher “Order of Merit,” founded by King Edward VII himself, in 1902.

The people of the United States contributed to a fund for Clara Barton—well, perhaps, this is a secret and should not be told here; the people of England contributed to a fund for Florence Nightingale, through the Jenny Lind concerts and in other ways, a fund amounting to $250,000, the fund since used to establish the “Nightingale Home at St. Thomas’ Hospital”—a Training School for Nurses.

By her request, Clara Barton was buried near her home at Oxford, Massachusetts; by her request, Florence Nightingale was buried near her home at Lea Hurst, Derbyshire, England.

Clara Barton built for herself, at her own expense, a very unpretentious memorial in her family burying ground at Oxford; Her Majesty the Queen unveiled the memorial to Florence Nightingale in the crypt of St. Paul’s Cathedral, London, where are the tombs of Nelson, Wellington, Wolsey and Lord Roberts.

The plain granite monument to Clara Barton in the country cemetery bears the inscription:

CLARA BARTON ANGEL OF THE BATTLEFIELD Civil War 1861–1865. Franco-Prussian War 1870–1871. Spanish-American War 1898. Organizer and President of the American National Red Cross 1881–1904. December 25, 1821–April 12, 1912. BARTON

The memorial to Florence Nightingale is a beautiful sculpture in white marble, representing Florence Nightingale bending over a wounded soldier, to whose lips she is holding a cup. A rich alabaster frame surrounds the marble, inscribed above with a legend, “Blessed are the merciful” and below: Florence Nightingale, O. M.; born May 12, 1820—died August 13th, 1910.

Of two famous women be it written:

Their bodies are buried in peace; but their names live for evermore.

LXII

American Red Cross Founder, a life of sacrifice.

_New York Tribune._

We realize the economies which Clara Barton lived and practiced, that she might give life and aid to those who were in dire need. _The Fra._

Economy is not parsimony. BURKE.

Economy is no disgrace. BERZ.

It would be well if we had more misers. GOLDSMITH.

Economy is the poor man’s mint. TUPPER.

Economy is half the battle of life. SPURGEON.

Economy is the parent of integrity, of liberty, and of ease.

DR. S. JOHNSON.

A habit of economy is prolific of a numerous offspring of virtues.

C. BUTLER.

Sound economy is a sound understanding, brought into action.

HANNAH MORE.

It is not what we earn, but what we save, that makes us rich.

SIR WALTER SCOTT.

Beware of little expenses; a small leak will sink a ship.

BENJAMIN FRANKLIN.

The prospect of penury in age is so gloomy and terrifying that every man who looks before him must resolve to avoid it.

DR. S. JOHNSON.

I was brought up New England, and I have the New England thrift. CLARA BARTON.

My expenses have been so heavy and my receipts so “nothing” that I cannot take on more “help.” CLARA BARTON.

There must be no more big hotel bills; the money must be saved for the sufferers. CLARA BARTON.

Clara Barton has often been known by those near her to rob herself of all her personal income—to carry on the work of an abiding and all-absorbing charity. DR. J. GARDNER.

At first I used to be shocked over her penuriousness but when I discovered the motive, that it was to save for others in need, no words could describe my conscience-stricken feeling and my admiration of that self-sacrificing woman.

GENERAL W. H. SEARS, “Secretary.”

THE GENERAL HAS MONEY—I AM HIS RECONCENTRADO

When traveling on the cars, Clara Barton would take her lunches with her. At night she would sit up in the day coach, and not take a sleeper—because of the expense. She made a trip from Washington to Boston. Her secretary was with her. He wanted a sleeper. How could he enjoy the luxury and Miss Barton not know it? Miss Barton had taken her shawl—in a bundle tied together with straps—and laid her head on it for a pillow. “Now is my opportunity,” thought the secretary, but she didn’t close her eyes. Four or five hours any night was enough sleep for Miss Barton, and the secretary knew it. The secretary was becoming ill at ease. He said, “Now, if you will excuse me, Miss Barton, I will go to the smoking car and have a smoke.” He was not there long;—he quietly slipped into the Pullman and went to sleep.

Early the next morning he passed unseen into the smoker of the day coach, then to where Miss Barton, bright and cheerful, was sitting. As nothing was said about “a good night’s rest,” he assumed that she thought he too had practiced self-denial. Nevertheless, he was ashamed over his “make-believe,” and also that a lady of seventy years the possessor of wealth had beaten him, her able-bodied young secretary, on a small salary, at the “game of economy.”

On arriving at Boston “Sister Harriette,” owner of one of the ancestral homes of Massachusetts, was at the station to meet her. The secretary unsuspecting—still “blooded” and a “real sport”—as they entered the station restaurant said “Now, ladies, you are going to have breakfast with me this morning.”

“Sister Harriette,” having served with the Red Cross in the Spanish-American War and knowing the secretary, fully understood when Miss Barton slyly remarked “oh, yes, the General has money, you know; _he_ travels in a Pullman and I am his reconcentrado.”

LXIII

The greatest generals were proud to know her; eminent statesmen felt honored by her friendship.

Bridgeport (Conn.) _Post_.

Abraham Lincoln—the simplest, serenest, sublimest character of the age. U. S. SENATOR JOHN M. THURSTON.

The beauty of Lincoln’s immortal character has thrown in the shade the splendor of his intellect. BISHOP J. P. NEWMAN.

Presidents Arthur, Cleveland, Harrison and McKinley, with their cabinets, have been actively interested in, and committed to its (Red Cross) work. WALTER P. PHILLIPS, Chairman, Red Cross Committee (in 1903).

Character is higher than intellect. EMERSON.

Character is the dearest earthly possession. T. SHARP.

If our character is lovely we are loved. PRESTON.

Character lives in a man; reputation lives outside of him.

J. G. HOLLAND.

Character, like everything else, is affected by all the forces that work upon it, and produce it. BISHOP W. F. MCDOWELL.

Character is made up of small duties faithfully performed.

_Anon._

The true character of a man displays itself in great events.

NAPOLEON.

Brains and character rule the world. The most distinguished Frenchman of the last century said: “Men succeed less by their talents than by their character.” WENDELL PHILLIPS.

Great trials test great characteristics. CLARA BARTON.

Great trials seem to be a necessary preparation for great duties.

EDWARD THOMPSON.

Times of general calamity and confusion have ever been productive of greatest minds. COLTON-LACON.

It is only by the active development of events that character and ability can be tested. A. LINCOLN.

ABRAHAM LINCOLN’S SON

Robert T. Lincoln was Secretary of War.

When Clara Barton handed her card to the porter, he asked, “What do you want to see him about?”

“Just because he is Abraham Lincoln’s son. I knew his father and merely want to pay my respects to him.”

Clara Barton was admitted. The War Secretary rose as she entered the office, and Miss Barton opened the conversation by saying: “I knew President Lincoln well. He was good and kind to me in whatever I tried to do for the soldiers. He seemed to appreciate the little things I had succeeded in doing; and when there came a great undertaking (referring to making a record of the missing soldiers), so great as to appal with its seeming impossibility, he encouraged me. Survivors of the missing entreated me to undertake the work and, when other officials said it could not be done, your father, with his big heart, said ‘I will help you.’ He smoothed the way and made it possible, assisting me until the work was done. When I came back to Washington, he was not here to receive my grateful thanks. He had gone beyond all that. It was a sad little burden to carry around with me unshared, but I have carried it. At home and beyond the sea, wherever I have been, it has gone with me, and I have come today to ask you, as his representative, to accept my burden of thanks for him.”

The tears were filling Miss Barton’s eyes before she had finished. She was abashed at her failure to control her emotions but, glancing up at the Secretary, she saw that he too was weeping. Looking at each other a moment in silence, the Secretary reached out his hand to Miss Barton and said “I do accept your tribute of thanks—for my father.”

LXIV

Clara Barton—intelligent and reclaiming, her leading attributes.

Atlanta (Ga.) _Constitution_.

Pity it is to slay the meanest thing. HOOD.

Man is an aristocrat among animals. HEINE.

The merciful man doeth good to his own soul. PROVERBS.

How deeply seated in the human heart is the injunction not to kill animals. TOLSTOI.

Animals in their generation are wiser than the sons of men.

JOSEPH ADDISON.

Could we understand the language of animals, how instructive a dialogue of dogs would be. EUDOXES.

Animals, in our degenerate age, are every day perishing under the hands of barbarity, without notice, without mercy. A. DEAN.

Surely the sensibility of brutes entitles them to a milder treatment than they usually meet with from hard and unthinking wretches. A. DEAN.

THE BUTCHER DIDN’T GET IT

“Miss Barton, the butcher has been here today. He wants to buy the little Jersey calf; offered me $5.00 for it,” said the manager of the Red Cross home, “and I told him he could have it.” “But he can’t,—why didn’t you ask me about it?” “Well, I knew we couldn’t keep it; we need the milk—” “But the calf needs the milk too, and I tell you that the calf is not going to be killed.” “But I have sold it.” “That doesn’t make any difference; I haven’t—and it’s my calf.”

“You just ask your neighbors, and they’ll tell you that nobody thinks of raising a calf—in town here.” “But I’m not asking my neighbors.”

“Now, Miss Barton, don’t you know we have no pasturage and we have to buy all our feed, and feed is high now, too.”

“Never mind, we’ll get the feed.”

“But, Miss Barton, the calf is a nuisance around the house, and it will cost more——”

“Now, you’ve said enough; the calf is _not_ a nuisance and _I_ am paying the expenses. If you don’t want to take care of the calf, I’ll take care of it myself. Now go along and don’t talk to me any more about that calf. The butcher will _not_ get it.”

And the butcher didn’t get it.

LXV

Clara Barton, an example of charity to a younger generation.

Boston (Mass.) _Pilot_.

Woman! there is a place for thee; go forth and fill it, that in thee mankind may be doubly blessed. CLARA BARTON.

Let all things be done in charity. I. CORINTHIANS.

Go and sin no more. ST. JOHN.

The Lord alone can direct me. CLARA BARTON.

Go straight to God’s work, in simplicity and singleness of heart.

FLORENCE NIGHTINGALE.

I never in my life performed a day’s work at the field that was not grounded in that little sentence “Inasmuch as ye have done it unto one of the least of these, ye have done it unto me.”

CLARA BARTON.

With malice towards none; with charity for all. A. LINCOLN.

Alas, for the rarity of Christian charity under the sun. HOOD.

O charity, thou friend to him who knows no other friend besides.

CANON BOWLES.

Charity and personal force are the only investment worth anything. WALT WHITMAN.

Did universal charity prevail, earth would be a heaven and hell a fable. COLTON.

Clara Barton—the candles of her charity lighted the gloom of death. _Grand Rapids Herald._

Clara Barton—her beautiful deeds of charity.

_Roswell Record._

How white are the fair robes of charity, as she walketh amid the lowly habitations of the poor. HOSEA BALLOU.

THE KIND OF GIRLS THAT NEEDED HELP

In Miss Barton’s relief work in the overflow of the Ohio River at one of the stops, at Shawneetown, among the people who came on board the boat for relief were two girls. They had evidently told Clara Barton their needs in a private conversation and were leaving, when somebody living in the town came to Miss Barton and quietly told her that she had better not have anything to do with these girls; they were not the kind she should be helping.

Without ostentation, or without making any display about it, she called the girls back, had a long private talk with them and furnished them with all of the supplies they needed, in quiet defiance of the advice which had been volunteered about the character of the girls. Of course her advice would be of a kind that they would never forget through their whole lifetime and would be their guide in the future. And as they left she calmly remarked that they were the kind of girls that probably needed her help more than any others in the place.

LXVI

Clara Barton—loved and honored as perhaps no other woman of her day. Tacoma (Wash.) _Ledger_.

Switzerland is an _armed_ neutrality in which one has faith.

CLARA BARTON.

The Red Cross was chosen out of compliment to the Swiss Republic; the Swiss colors being a white cross on a red ground. The badge chosen were those colors reversed. CLARA BARTON.

Romance is the poetry of literature. MADAME NECKER.

Romance is always young. WHITTIER.

Romance—the parent of golden dreams. BYRON.

The Red Cross seems to have become the milder romance of war.

CLARA BARTON.

Love took up the glass of time. TENNYSON.

Love will find out the way. ALFRED NOYES.

Love took up the harp of life. LOCKSLEY HALL.

Love conquers all things. VIRGIL.

All mankind loves a lover. EMERSON.

True love is better than glory. THACKERAY.

Love is the beginning of everything. F. W. BOREHAM.

None but the brave and beautiful can love. BAILEY.

Love rules the camp, the court, the grove.

_Lay of the Last Minstrel._

A love that makes breath poor, and speech unable.

SHAKESPEARE.

Hail wedded love, Perpetual fountain of domestic sweets. MILTON.

Love’s history, as Life’s, is ended not by marriage.

BAYARD TAYLOR.

Love is greater than war, truer than steel, stronger than fear or danger of death. CLARA BARTON.

A ROMANCE OF TWO CONTINENTS

The battle had been fought, and on the bloody field lay the wounded. Among these was a Swiss boy who had left his native country, coming to America to fight in the cause of the Union. In her ministerings on the field, Clara Barton had heard of this lad, by name Jules Golay, but had not seen him. He was undergoing a surgical operation. As the knife was doing its work, in great pain he cried out, “Mon Dieu!” Clara Barton heard the cry and went to him. He could not speak in English, but in French Clara Barton while dressing his wound gave him words of sympathy. Daily, as tender as a mother, she cared for him until he recovered.

Only the brave know how to be grateful. The soldier’s gratitude knew no bounds. He did not forget, and awaited his opportunity. Years later Miss Barton was taken ill, and went to Switzerland. Jules begged her to come to his home. There, in her shattered physical condition, she was cared for in greater than a royal palace—a cottage where love reigns. Clara Barton returned to America. The elder Golay died; his family then scattered. The eldest son, Mons A. Golay, came to New York. There his wife, of a

The hand that rocks the cradle Is the hand that rocks the world. WILLIAM ROSS WALLACE.

SENTIMENT IN HISTORY

year, died also. He, ill and penniless, came to Dansville to see Miss Barton, then convalescing.

Mons A. Golay, recovering his health, went to Chicago and became established there in business with his brother Jules. Jules’ old wounds broke out afresh and in consequence he died, leaving a broken hearted wife and several children. “One woe doth tread upon another’s heel so fast they follow.” The widow soon followed him to the Beyond. The orphan children became the care of Mons. A. Golay, who struggled nobly to provide for them. In his distress over the problem of life, he remembered.

She was a form of life and light That seen becomes a part of sight And goes wher’er I turn my eye The moving star of memory.

But the romance does not end here; the romance follows:

A Miss Kupfer while traveling had been stricken with a fever, and was seriously ill at a hotel in Switzerland. There the ever humane Clara Barton took care of her, nursing her back to life. When Miss Kupfer, in her far-away home, heard of Miss Barton’s serious illness she crossed the ocean to be at the bedside of her benefactor, then living at Dansville.

Mons A. Golay revisits Dansville and there, as on former visit, meets the beautiful Miss Kupfer, herself still exemplifying that “the religion of humanity is love.”

“Love is life’s end, an end but never ending.”

The two of foreign birth thus strangely brought together were each of gentle manners, of rare culture,—of like tastes and alike spiritually. As love is the spiritual friendship of two souls, unwittingly through Miss Barton there became inter-clasped two human loves, the crowning event of all human bliss.

It was one of the happiest of occasions in her home at Dansville when Miss Barton gave away the bride,—Miss Kupfer becoming Mrs. Mons A. Golay, and the guardian spirit of the little children needing a mother’s care. The romance of two continents, which reads like a fiction resulted in a happy family, in an ideal American home.

LXVII

Clara Barton’s monument is the gratitude of humanity.

Boston (Mass.) _Record_.

Deeds, not stones, are the true monuments of the great.

MOTLEY.

The grave, dread thing! Men shiver when thou’rt named; nature, appalled, shakes off her wonted firmness. ROBERT BLAIR.

An immortal hope was in her gaze and in her soul—in her life she did everything thoroughly. What more natural than that she should want to know her last resting place would be in order when the Master called? REV. PERCY H. EPLER.

The monument means a world of memories, a world of deeds, a world of tears and a world of glories. JAMES A. GARFIELD.

By desire and nomination of President Garfield, I was made President of the American Red Cross. CLARA BARTON.

Life’s race well run, Life’s work well done, Life’s crown well won Now comes rest. PRESIDENT GARFIELD’S _Epitaph_.

THE LITTLE MONUMENT—FOR ALL ETERNITY

She suddenly stopped talking; she faltered; she choked; then trembling, the veteran of many struggles, propped up in bed and suspecting the end near, on Oct. 3, 1911, there occurred the following conversation:

“Now Mr. Young, I want to ask something of you. Would you do me a favor?”

“Why certainly, Miss Barton, what is it?”

“I know it is uncanny. You may not want to do it. I must not ask it, and yet I _must_.”

“My dear Miss Barton, tell me what it is.”

“You know, I have no one to leave my little property to,—well, I have from time to time been spending some money out in the cemetery.” Then she hesitated for fully two minutes, sobbing but trying to control her emotions, when she continued—“where I’ll remain for all eternity. Maybe you would like to see the little monument I have had constructed; to keep it in memory, and to associate me with the place I am to be always. I would so much like to have you see it, and it might be some satisfaction to you. Will you do me this favor? You can get off the electric car on your way to Worcester; it won’t take you long, and I would feel better to have you do so.”

“My dear,” I said, “it is so kind of you to have mentioned this. I appreciate it more than I can tell you. I won’t get off the car, but if Doctor Hubbell will go with me, I’ll get an auto to drive out there. I also want to see where you were born. How far is that?”

“Only two or three miles. If you will do this you will make me very happy.”

I am taught by the Oak to be rugged and strong In defense of the right, in defiance of wrong. HELEN O. HOYT.

HISTORIC AND SENTIMENTAL