From Aldershot to Pretoria | Page 3

be given to them to aid in the
final overthrow of the tyrant who threatened the liberties of the world?
But returning to the Crimean War and the Mutiny, there were not
wanting even then men and women in foremost places to voice the
awakening which these created, and to give it right and wise direction.
=The Queen's Care of her Men.=
The care of the Queen for her soldiers and sailors in those early days,
which she has continued with wonderful tact and tenderness throughout
her long and glorious reign, was of untold advantage. Her sympathy
showed the nation where its heart should go and where its hand should
help.
The send-off from the courtyard of Buckingham Palace; the review of

the battle-worn heroes in the Palace itself, when she decorated them
with their well-earned honours; her constant visits to the hospitals,
were incidents which the nation could not forget. In them, as in so
many other ways, she awakened her people from their apathy, and by
her example led them to a higher and more Christian patriotism.
=The Netley and Herbert Hospitals.=
There was also the noble man whose monument adorns the Quadrangle
of the War Office, who was War Minister at the time. But perhaps
foremost of all, save the Queen herself, was the 'Lady of the Lamp,'
who, surrendering the comfort of a refined and beautiful home, went
out to the hospitals at Scutari to minister to the wounded and the
fever-stricken, and found in doing so a higher comfort, a comfort which
is of the soul itself. These two--Florence Nightingale and Sydney
Herbert--the one in guiding the Administration, the other inspiring the
nation, did imperishable good.
The Herbert and the Netley Hospitals were the first embodiment of the
nation's sympathy expressed in terms of official administration--palaces
of healing, which have been rest-houses for multitudes of sick and
wounded men pending their return to duty, their discharge on pension,
or their passing to an early grave.
The Royal Patriotic Fund was the expression of the nation's desire to
succour the widows and orphans of the breadwinners who had fallen in
the war.
=The Awakened National Conscience.=
But these efforts, noble though they were, by no means met the full
necessity. For solicitude on behalf of our soldiers and our sailors being
once aroused, their daily life on board ship and in barracks soon
compelled attention. Its homelessness and monotony, its utter lack of
quiet and rest, its necessary isolation from all the comforts and
amenities of social life, the consequent eagerness with which the
men--wearied well-nigh to death, yet full of lusty vigorous life--went
anywhere for change, society, and excitement--all these things broke

like a revelation on the awakened conscience of the nation. The terrible
fact, to which reference has already been made, that hitherto almost the
only sections of the civil community which had catered for them was
the publican, the harlot, and the crimp, that they had indeed been left to
the tender mercies of the wicked, still further deepened the impression.
At the same time it came to be gradually realized that the splendid
manhood of the army and the navy was a vast mission force, which, if
it could only be enlisted on the side of purity, temperance, and religion,
might be of untold value to the empire and the home population.
It was plainly seen that if left, as it had hitherto been, to the
homelessness of the barracks and the main-deck, and to the canteen and
the public-house, it would certainly take the side of sin; and whilst
defending the empire by its valour, would imperil it by its ill-living.
All these convictions were confirmed by the record of the noble lives of
heroes, who were Christians as well as heroes, with which the history
of the Crimean War and the Mutiny is enriched. If a few could thus be
saved, it was asked, why not many? if some, why not all? For men of
all ranks, of varied temperaments and gifts, were among the saved,
some whose natural goodness made them easily susceptible of good,
others 'lost' in very deed, sunk in the depths of a crude and brutal
selfishness.
=Woman's Work in this Field.=
As might be expected, the first to take to heart these special aspects of
the case, and to embody the great awakening in the deeds of a practical
beneficence, were women. Miss Robinson and Miss Weston, Mrs. and
Miss Daniel, Miss Wesley, and Miss Sandes will ever live among those
who set themselves to fight the public-house and the brothel by
opening at least one door, which, entering as to his own home, the
soldier and the sailor would meet with purity instead of sin, and where
the hand stretched out to welcome him would be