A Book of Golden Deeds | Page 5

time of the Indian Mutiny, when every English man
and woman was flying from the rage of the Sepoys at Benares, and Dr.
Hay alone remained because he would not desert the patients in the
hospital, whose life depended on his care--many of them of those very
native corps who were advancing to massacre him. This was the
Roman sentry's firmness, more voluntary and more glorious. Nor may
we pass by her to whom our title page points as our living type of
Golden Deeds--to her who first showed how woman's ministrations of
mercy may be carried on, not only within the city, but on the borders of
the camp itself--'the lady with the lamp', whose health and strength
were freely devoted to the holy work of softening the after sufferings
that render war so hideous; whose very step and shadow carried
gladness and healing to the sick soldier, and who has opened a path of
like shining light to many another woman who only needed to be
shown the way. Fitly, indeed, may the figure of Florence Nightingale
be shadowed forth at the opening of our roll of Golden Deeds.
Thanks be to God, there is enough of His own spirit of love abroad in
the earth to make Golden Deeds of no such rare occurrence, but that
they are of 'all time'. Even heathen days were not without them, and
how much more should they not abound after the words have been
spoken, 'Greater love hath no man than this, that he lay down his life
for his friend', and after the one Great Deed has been wrought that has
consecrated all other deeds of self-sacrifice. Of martyrdoms we have
scarcely spoken. They were truly deeds of the purest gold; but they are
too numerous to be dwelt on here: and even as soldiers deem it each

man's simple duty to face death unhesitatingly, so the 'glorious army of
martyrs' had, for the most part, joined the Church with the expectation
that they should have to confess the faith, and confront the extremity of
death and torture for it.
What have been here brought together are chiefly cases of self-devotion
that stand out remarkably, either from their hopelessness, their courage,
or their patience, varying with the character of their age; but with that
one essential distinction in all, that the dross of self was cast away.
Among these we cannot forbear mentioning the poor American soldier,
who, grievously wounded, had just been laid in the middle bed, by far
the most comfortable of the three tiers of berths in the ship's cabin in
which the wounded were to be conveyed to New York. Still thrilling
with the suffering of being carried from the field, and lifted to his place,
he saw a comrade in even worse plight brought in, and thinking of the
pain it must cost his fellow soldier to be raised to the bed above him, he
surprised his kind lady nurses (daily scatterers of Golden Deeds) by
saying, 'Put me up there, I reckon I'll bear hoisting better than he will'.
And, even as we write, we hear of an American Railway collision that
befell a train on the way to Elmira with prisoners. The engineer, whose
name was William Ingram, might have leapt off and saved himself
before the shock; but he remained in order to reverse the engine, though
with certain death staring him in the face. He was buried in the wreck
of the meeting train, and when found, his back was against the boiler he
was jammed in, unable to move, and actually being burnt to death; but
even in that extremity of anguish he called out to those who came
round to help him to keep away, as he expected the boiler would burst.
They disregarded the generous cry, and used every effort to extricate
him, but could not succeed until after his sufferings had ended in death.
While men and women still exist who will thus suffer and thus die,
losing themselves in the thought of others, surely the many forms of
woe and misery with which this earth is spread do but give occasions of
working out some of the highest and best qualities of which mankind
are capable. And oh, young readers, if your hearts burn within you as
you read of these various forms of the truest and deepest glory, and you
long for time and place to act in the like devoted way, bethink
yourselves that the alloy of such actions is to be constantly worked
away in daily life; and that if ever it be your lot to do a Golden Deed, it

will probably be in unconsciousness that you are doing anything
extraordinary, and that the whole impulse will consist in the having
absolutely forgotten