The Life of Florence Nightingale Volume II Part 10

ALLIANCE WITH SIR BARTLE FRERE

(1867-1868)

Truly these poor people will have cause to bless you long after English Viceroys and dynasties are of the past.--SIR BARTLE FRERE (_Letter to Miss Nightingale_, May 6, 1869).

When Sidney Herbert died, his work as an army reformer was in part arrested because he had never put in what Miss Nightingale called "the main-spring." He had failed to reform the War Office. There had thus been no such effective organization set up as would ensure even the permanent possession of ground already gained and much less a continuous advance.

There was now some danger of a like state of things in connection with Public Health in India, and Miss Nightingale turned her thoughts to avert it.

There had been many improvements; but there was as yet no consistent scheme of organization, and in some respects there had already been backsliding. The Sanitary Commissions had been reduced on the ground of expense to two officers (a President and a Secretary) in each case, and a further retrenchment was now in contemplation. Under each Local Government there was to be one sanitary officer, and it was proposed that this officer should be the Inspector-General of Prisons. A "Sanitary Commissioner with the Government of India" would remain, who would not combine that duty with an inspectorship of prisons; but such a scheme would a.s.suredly not supply any "mainspring" for sanitary improvement. Meanwhile Sir John Lawrence's term of office was coming to an end; and Miss Nightingale, regarding him as the indispensable man, looked upon the end of his viceroyalty as an event almost comparable to the death of Sidney Herbert. The same error must not be made a second time. Before Sir John Lawrence retired, the mainspring of the machinery for sanitary progress in India must be inserted. Miss Nightingale had a clear policy in her mind, and she secured most of her points with a celerity and a completeness which ent.i.tle this episode to rank among her most brilliant campaigns. It will make the moves more easily intelligible if the main points are indicated at once. What Miss Nightingale sought to attain was an efficient machine which would turn out sanitary improvement in accordance with the best knowledge of the day and of which the working would be subject to the propelling force of public opinion. She, therefore, set herself to secure, if by any means she could, (1) an executive sanitary authority in India, (2) an expert controlling (and, incidentally, an inspiring) authority in London, and (3) the publication of an annual report on the work done, so as to make both parts of the machinery amenable to public inspection.

On the first of these points, Miss Nightingale was doomed to some disappointment. Neither at the time with which we are here concerned, nor in her later years, nor yet to the present day, has any supreme and executive sanitary machinery been established in India. "It was true,"

said the Secretary of State during a debate in the House of Lords on Indian sanitation in 1913 (June 9), "that the present system fell very far short of a great independent Sanitary Department supreme over the Provincial Governments and forming one of the main departments of the Government of India." That was Miss Nightingale's ideal at this time, though in later years, as we shall learn,[90] she recognized that sanitary progress in India could not be turned out by clockwork; but at the opposite pole stood the scheme by which she was threatened in 1867 for consigning sanitary administration in the Local Governments to a sub-head of the prison department. She had the satisfaction before Sir John Lawrence left India of seeing another scheme adopted, which was at any rate as far removed from the Prison as from her Ideal. On the other two points, stated above, she was at the time completely successful.

She had in all this a valuable ally; and it was her way to see something like special providence in fortunate circ.u.mstances. The most logical mind sometimes admits exceptions; yet there was in fact no exception.

Providence, according to her belief, is Law; and it had become a law that men interested in her interests should go to her. Hence it was that she made at this time a friendship with one whose disinterested devotion to the cause of sanitary reform in India equalled her own, and whose co-operation was to prove of the greatest value. The new friend was Sir Bartle Frere.

[90] See below, p. 405.

II

For a year and more the question of the Public Health Service in India had slumbered, so far as organization was concerned. Sir John Lawrence's dispatch had been lost at the India Office for some months (p. 109).

Then, when it had been found and Miss Nightingale had drafted the reply, Lord de Grey had gone out of office before the reply could be sent (p. 110). She had opened communications with his successor, Lord Cranborne (p. 114); but his stay at the India Office was brief, for when Disraeli's Franchise Bill was introduced, he resigned. He was succeeded by Sir Stafford Northcote, with whom as yet Miss Nightingale had no acquaintance. She had been diligent in writing to Sir John Lawrence, who continued to ask her advice and send her papers; but she had held her hand on this side. The reason was that all her friends told her that "the Tories would be out in a week." Dr. Sutherland, greatly daring, went further and talked treason against Sir John Lawrence: "He is our worst enemy," and "we had better wait." Miss Nightingale ascribed this ribaldry to a desire of Dr. Sutherland to be off cholera-hunting in the Mediterranean, and reproached him in some impromptu rhymes.[91] Sir John Lawrence was her hero. If he did amiss sometimes (as she had to admit), she put it down, I suppose, to his Council, with whom he was notoriously not on good terms; whatever was done aright was his doing.

And meanwhile the weeks pa.s.sed and the Tories did not go out; they looked, on the contrary, very much like staying in. Miss Nightingale determined to wait no longer. She announced her determination in a letter to Captain Galton (May 28, 1867). He was in touch with Indian sanitary business as a member of the War Office Sanitary Committee, to which such business was often referred, and she attached considerable weight to his judgment. "Our Indian affairs," she wrote, "are getting as drunk as they can be"; she was resolved to have them put straight. She had been "strongly advised to communicate direct with Sir Stafford Northcote"; advised, I imagine, by Mr. Jowett (for was not Sir Stafford a Balliol man, and therefore specially amenable to reason?) What did Captain Galton advise? He agreed that things were not going well, and was glad that she meant to move. He would give her an introduction, if she liked, to Sir Stafford, and he advised her to see Sir Bartle Frere, "as I fancy you could make him useful." He had just returned from the governorship of Bombay, and had been given a seat on the India Council in London. A fortnight later (June 14) he and Miss Nightingale met:--

(_Miss Nightingale to Captain Galton._) 35 SOUTH STREET, _June_ 16 [1867]. I have seen Sir Bartle Frere. He came on Friday by his own appointment. And we had a great talk. He impressed me wonderfully--more than any Indian I have ever seen except Sir John Lawrence; and I seemed to learn more in an hour from him upon Indian administration and the way it is going than I did from Ellis in six months, or from Strachey in two days, or from Indian Councils (Secretaries of State and Royal Commissions and all) in six years. I hope Sir B. Frere will be of use to us. I have not yet applied to you to put me into communication with Sir S. Northcote.

Because why? Your Committee won't sit. It won't sit on Monday because Monday is Whit Monday. And Tuesday is Whit Tuesday. And Wednesday is Ash Wednesday. And Thursday is Ascension Day. And Friday is Good Friday. And Sat.u.r.day is the Drawing Room. And Sunday is Sunday. And that's the way that British business is done. Now you are come back, you must send for the police and make the Committee do something. As for Sutherland, I never see him. Malta is the world. And Gibraltar is the "next world." And India is that little island in the Pacific like Honolulu.

[91] Free as air.

I don't care.

Go away To Malta-y.

I don't care.

Let Sir John Hall Be Director-Genera_ll_.

I don't care.

As for India-y Let her have her way.

I don't care.

Free as air.

I don't care.

Miss Nightingale must have impressed Sir Bartle Frere as greatly as he had impressed her. He now became one of her constant visitors, and a busy correspondence began between them. He and his family became friends too of Mr. and Mrs. Nightingale, whom they visited at Embley. "There are amongst his papers for 1867 and the five following years considerably more than a hundred letters, short or long, from Miss Nightingale to him, mostly upon sanitary questions affecting India."[92] The letters from him to her are not less numerous. "I will make 35 South Street the India Office," he said, "while this affair is pending." Miss Nightingale took note of his conversations, princ.i.p.ally for communication to Dr.

Sutherland, but also for her own guidance. But if she had much to learn from him, he also must have found something to learn, and some inspiration to derive, from her. The work which she had done for the Royal Commission had given her a great knowledge of sanitary, or rather insanitary, details in India; and on the principles of sanitation she was an acknowledged expert. Her acquaintance with the official history of the Indian Public Health question was unique, for no other person had so continuously been in intimate touch with it. The clearness of her mind and her breadth of view impressed every one who saw her. And then something must be allowed, in considering her successive "conquests" (as Mr. Jowett used playfully to call them), to the personal factor. The administrators and ministers who sought or were invited to audience of her would have been more (or less) than men if they had not felt a certain pleased curiosity in meeting this famous woman, who rose from an invalid's bed to receive them. Each of them speedily discovered that her enthusiastic devotion to humanitarian causes was equalled by her soundness of judgment, and that remarkable powers of brain were accompanied by all of a woman's graciousness "She is a n.o.ble-minded woman," said Mr. Lowe of her, "and so charming."

[92] _Life of Sir Bartle Frere_, vol. ii. pp. 38, 39.

Encouraged by Sir Bartle Frere's sympathy, Miss Nightingale set to work in earnest. The first thing was to obtain a colourable starting-point.

This she found in some Indian papers, sent to her by friends on the War Office Sanitary Committee, on the question of "Doors _versus_ Windows."

She determined to attack simultaneously the Governor-General and the Secretary of State on this question. To the Governor-General she wrote immediately; but with regard to the India Office there was a preliminary difficulty. "Dr. Sutherland is so very etiquettish," she wrote to Captain Galton (June 24, 1867), "that he says, But how are you to have seen these papers? I don't know. It seems to me that the cat has been out of the bag so long that it is no use tying the strings now. I will say, if you like, that Broadhead of Sheffield gave me 15 to steal them and to blow you up.[93] I am going ahead anyhow." Captain Galton put aside Dr. Sutherland's etiquette. It had been an established practice for years, he said, as every official person knew, to send Indian sanitary papers to Miss Nightingale; and in the very improbable event of anybody objecting in this case, he, Captain Galton, would a.s.sume full responsibility. Miss Nightingale then proceeded to draw up an indictment, and to suggest reform, basing her case upon the "Doors _versus_ Windows" papers. Upon the merits of the controversy I am happily not called upon to offer an opinion. To Miss Nightingale and the War Office Sanitary Committee the ventilation of barracks or hospitals by open doors was a pestilential heresy; to the Government of India it was the ark of the covenant for salvation in hot weather. Sir John Lawrence in reply to Miss Nightingale's remonstrance told her bluntly that nothing but an imperative order from home would make him close the doors, and even then that he would first send the most energetic protest. But, though she attached some importance to the matter on its merits, her real object was something different. She objected to the manner in which the case had been handled. The sanitary experts at home had said that new barracks and hospitals should be ventilated by open windows, and their report to that effect had been sent to India. Then the matter had been referred in succession to the Government of India, the local governments, sanitary commissions, medical authorities, military authorities, district authorities, and then to the Government of India again. Next it had come back to London, where the experts were still of their original opinion. There seemed no reason why the travels of the "Doors and Windows" papers should ever come to an end. If every sanitary question were to be treated in the same way, no sanitary progress could be made; and the idea of "sanitary administration by universal suffrage" was impossible. Sir John Lawrence hardly made proper allowance for her way of putting things when he a.s.sured her in reply that she was mistaken in thinking that such matters were referred to a vote in India. The case showed conclusively, it seemed to her, that the time had come for organizing the health service on a business-like footing. She suggested schemes on the basis of the Three Points already defined--a Sanitary Department in India to do the work; a Sanitary Department at the India Office to control the work; and annual publication of what work had been done. With regard to the second point, she regarded the War-Office-c.u.m-India-Office Sanitary Committee as only a makeshift, as we have seen.[94] She knew whom she wanted at the head of a separate India Office Sanitary Department. "If only," she had written to Captain Galton (July 24), "we could get a Public Health Department in the India Office to ourselves with Sir B. Frere at the head of it, our fortunes would be made."

[93] For William Broadhead and the rattening outrages at Sheffield, see M^cCarthy's _History of our own Times_, vol. iv. p. 156.

[94] Above, p. 33.

III

Such was the substance of successive letters which Miss Nightingale now sent to the Secretary of State. The first of them is an admirable doc.u.ment; closely reasoned; with a pleasant pungency of phrasing here and there, such as might occur in a despatch by Lord Salisbury; with a touch of emotion kept well in reserve. She begged the minister to go back to the point at which the matter had been left when Lord de Grey went out, and "to put the Indian Health Service once for all on a satisfactory footing. This would indeed be a n.o.ble service for a Secretary of State to render to India." She submitted her letter to Sir Bartle Frere, who p.r.o.nounced it excellent. He carried it off, and delivered it to the minister in person. This was on July 27. On July 30 Sir Stafford Northcote answered, promising early attention to the subject, and adding, "I attach great weight to any suggestions from one who is so well qualified to speak with authority as yourself." Without going into the question, he made the general remark that "due regard should be had to local information." This criticism was just what she wanted; it afforded an opening for unfolding her schemes in greater detail. Sir Stafford Northcote must have been impressed by the letters; for he gave the matter immediate study, and then, on August 19, wrote to know if he might call for "a little conversation." Miss Nightingale told Mr. Jowett of this new opening. "I am delighted to hear," he wrote (Aug.

20), "that you are casting your toils about Sir Stafford Northcote. Do you know that he was elected a scholar of Balliol with A. H. Clough? I think that you may do him as well as the cause immense service. May I talk to you as I would to one of our undergraduates? Take care not to exaggerate to him (I mention this because it is really difficult to avoid when you are deeply interested). You will make him feel, I have no doubt, that you can really help him. Of course he will have heard things said against you by the officials; and you will have to produce just the opposite impression to these reports. But I don't really suppose that the art of influencing others can be reduced to rules. I commend you and your work to G.o.d, and am quite sure that 'it will be given you what to say,' because (I am afraid this is very rationalistic) you know what you mean to say." The interview (Aug. 20), somewhat dreaded on Miss Nightingale's side, had already taken place when Mr. Jowett's letter came. "Much more satisfactory to my hopes," she wrote to Sir Bartle Frere (Aug. 21) "than I expected. I think you have imbued him with your views on Indian administration more than you know. We went as fully into the whole subject as was possible in an hour, seeing that India is rather a big place." Her notes of the conversation show that she had found the minister very keen and sympathetic. "I don't know," she told Dr. Sutherland, "that he saw how afraid I was of him. For he kept his eyes tight shut all the time. And I kept mine wide open." Afraid or not, she had done a great stroke of business:--

(_Miss Nightingale to Captain Galton._) 35 SOUTH STREET, _August_ 22 [1867]. I saw Sir S. Northcote on Tuesday. He came of his own accord--which I think I partly owe to you. The result is (that is, if he does as he says) that there will be a Controlling Committee at the India Office for sanitary things with Sir B. Frere at the head and Sir H. Anderson at the tail, and your War Office Commission as the consulting body. As to the Public Health Service, I told him that we want the Executive Machinery in India to do it, and the Controlling Machinery at the I.O. to know that it is being done. The work of the Controlling Committee will really be introducing the elements of civilization into India. Sir S. N. said something about having Gen. Baker and Sir E. Perry on as members and an a.s.sistant-secretary to Sir H. Anderson. (I wish I could choose the members as I did in Sidney Herbert's time.) But I have the greatest faith in Sir B. Frere, and he asked me to let him bring Sir H. Anderson here; so we shall have the Chairman and the Secretary on our side. I liked Sir S. Northcote; but he appears to me to have much the same calibre of mind as Lord de Grey. He has none of the rapid, unerring perception of Sidney Herbert; none of the power of Sir J. Lawrence; none of the power and keenness of Sir B. Frere. He talks about "talking it all over with Lord Clinton."

Do you know Lord Clinton, and does he know anything about it? But my princ.i.p.al reason for writing to you now is this: I went as fully as I could with Sir S. N. into this, that no time should be lost in sending R. Engineers intended for service in India to examine and make themselves acquainted with improvements in sewerage, drainage, water-supply of towns, and in application of sewage to agriculture, and with improvements in Barrack and Hospital construction, etc., as carried out here. Now, there is no one but you who can properly advise Sir S. N. in this way. Pray do so.

Sir Stafford Northcote did all, and more than all, that at this interview he had promised. She was impressed by his sincerity at the time. "I believe," she told Dr. Sutherland, "he will carry out exactly what he consents to do." But other friends advised her to leave nothing to good intentions, to strike while the iron was hot, and to continue jogging the minister's elbow until the things were actually done.

Presently an occasion offered itself. The Governor-General had written her a long private letter about the ravages of cholera among the troops in the N.W. Provinces. She sent the substance of this letter to Sir Stafford Northcote, and invited him to concur in her opinion that such things ought not to be. But could they ever be prevented until the Public Health Service was placed on a proper footing? The minister, in acknowledging her letter (Oct. 18), said that, the pressure of other business being relaxed, he was now able to give full attention to sanitary questions, and that he would like to have another conversation.

The interview was on October 23. On this occasion the minister came full-handed. He told her, first, as appears from her notes and letters, that he had definitely decided to appoint a Sanitary Committee at the India Office. He read out the list of names; with Sir Bartle Frere, according to promise, as chairman, and Sir H. Anderson as secretary. He then asked her advice with regard to the relations between this Committee and the War Office Sanitary Committee, for there was, as he explained (and as she knew only too well), great jealousy between the two offices. She advised that the India Office Committee should be the controlling and responsible body, and the War Office Committee consultative only; "but I shall be much surprised," she wrote in explaining things to Captain Galton, "if Sir Bartle Frere does not refer many more matters to you than has previously been the case." She had thus won the second of her Three Points.

The minister next handed to Miss Nightingale a dispatch dated August 16, which he had received from the Government of India, and to which an immediate answer was requested. This was not news to her (though she was doubtless too discreet to say so), for the Governor-General had also written to her on August 16 to like effect. In this dispatch the appointment of medical officers in each Local Government for the exclusive duty of Princ.i.p.al Health Officers, paid by the Central Government, was suggested. The Secretary of State left the dispatch with Miss Nightingale, and requested her to favour him in writing with her views on the whole subject, suggesting, if she cared to do so, what answer should be sent to the Government of India. The new proposal of Sir John Lawrence's Government was not all or exactly what she wanted.

The local Officers of Health would be advisory only; and the Commissioner with the Government of India would remain in a like position. What she had wanted was a distinct Executive Department, both central and local, for Public Health. Still, the appointment of State Officers of Health was a step in the right direction, and a great advance on the Prisons scheme. She must see to it that the better opinion was made to prevail, while Sir John Lawrence was still at the helm in India and the Secretary of State in London was friendly to her.

The new policy would win some part of her First Point. It remained to secure Annual Health Reports; and the Secretary of State had given her an opening by inviting her to make suggestions at large.

She had now a spell of very hard work. At the end of it she had sent to Sir Stafford Northcote (1) a draft for immediate reply to the Indian Government, approving the appointment of the Health Officers. This was sent to India on November 29. (2) Secondly, a digest of the Indian Sanitary Question from 1859 to 1867. This was printed in a Blue-book issued by the Secretary of State in 1868. (3) Thirdly, a memorandum on the whole subject full of suggestions and advice. This was sent out to the Indian Government, and printed in the same Blue-book. It was printed anonymously, though there are tell-tale phrases (such as "The result will be the civilization of India"); the ma.n.u.script of the "review," in Miss Nightingale's hand, is amongst her papers. (4) Fourthly, and princ.i.p.ally, the heads of a dispatch on the whole subject which, she suggested, might be sent to the Government of India. "Of course I cannot say," she wrote, "how far these heads may meet with your concurrence."

The heads, in her hand, are also amongst her papers, and a comparison of this ma.n.u.script with Sir Stafford Northcote's dispatch of April 23, 1868, shows that they all met with his concurrence; they were adopted for the most part in her own words. The suggestions of this dispatch const.i.tute one of Miss Nightingale's best services to the cause of Public Health in India. It begins with calling for a Report on Sanitary Progress. It then reverts to the famous "Suggestions in regard to Sanitary Works" of 1864, which Miss Nightingale had so large a hand in writing (above, p. 48). "I consider these Suggestions," wrote the Secretary of State, "to be of very great practical value and to const.i.tute a good foundation for sanitary inquiry and work in India."

The dispatch invites particular attention to some of the Suggestions seriatim, and calls for a report on any progress that has been made in carrying them out. It also includes Miss Nightingale's later suggestion (above, p. 152) that Engineer Officers should be sent to England to study sanitary questions. The whole dispatch, whilst leaving full executive authority to the Government of India, was directed to stimulating its zeal in the cause of Public Health.

The adoption by Sir Stafford Northcote of Miss Nightingale's "heads" for this dispatch secured the last of her Three Points. The reports for which the minister called were duly forwarded. They were printed in the Blue-book above mentioned, together with the other Papers, and with the dispatch itself. This Blue-book[95] was the first of an Annual Series of Indian Sanitary Reports. So, then, Miss Nightingale's intercourse with Sir Stafford Northcote had, with the limitations already explained, secured all her points.

[95] For its t.i.tle, etc., see Bibliography A, No. 52.

"I hope, in this recourse to Sir Stafford Northcote," she had written three months before,[96] "as a last hope. Hope was green, and the donkey ate it (that's me)." "I am inclined to think," Mr. Jowett had written to her at the same time (July 18), "that you have really made a considerable step. I talked about Sir Stafford Northcote to some people who know him. They say, besides what I told you, that he works really hard at Indian affairs. Now, you must get hold of him and fuse him and Sir Bartle Frere and Sir John Lawrence into one by some alchemy or wicked wit of woman, and then something will be accomplished." And this was what had now been made possible; though perhaps the only secret on the woman's part was the combination of singleness of purpose, fulness of knowledge, clearness of insight, and a resolute will.

[96] To Captain Galton (July 16).

IV

Sir Stafford Northcote's dispatch, and the accompanying memorandum, did not immediately have the effect which Miss Nightingale hoped so far as the Supreme Government was concerned. The Government of India somewhat resented the process of hustling by the India Office at home. Miss Nightingale had kept her faith in Sir John Lawrence, but it was put to some severe trials. For some time she had been more ready to praise and pray than he to do her bidding:--

(_Sir John Lawrence to Miss Nightingale._) CALCUTTA, _Feb._ 7 [1867]. Many thanks for your very kind note of the 26th of December. I am quite sure that I in no wise deserve your blessings; nevertheless I am grateful to you for them, perhaps the more so when I bear in mind my own demerits. It is not a very pleasant duty talking to the "Kings of the East," for though they receive all which one in my position may say with gravity and politeness, it makes but a wretched impression on them. You will be glad to hear that the death-rate among the English troops in India for 1866 was only 20.11, while it was 24.24 in 1865. This seems to me a very satisfactory result.... I have had an envoy down in Calcutta for some time, from the King of Bokhara, asking for aid against Russia.

How strange it will be if Russia and England meet in Central Asia!

I hope, if it is to be so, that it will be in amity. There is ample verge and room enough for both powers; and if both would only see this we might be a help instead of an injury to each other.

(_Sir John Lawrence to Miss Nightingale._) SIMLEH, _July_ 9 [1867].... [A pa.s.sage dwelling on the many difficulties he had to encounter.] I do what I can to further the objects to which you have devoted your life--no doubt with slow and faltering steps, but still as fast as circ.u.mstances will permit.

Then on August 16 the Governor-General sent her a letter which must have very seriously shaken her faith. He had asked her (p. 55) to formulate a scheme for female nursing. With her habitual good sense, she had contemplated an experiment in a single hospital and had drawn up a scheme on that basis. Instead of accepting her basis, the Governor-General referred the matter to his medical advisers, who elaborated a scheme for introducing female nursing into seven hospitals.

The cost of this larger scheme was prohibitive; and the Government of India, instead of falling back upon Miss Nightingale's proposals, vetoed the whole thing. Sir John McNeill, who had a.s.sisted her with her proposals, was very angry, and sent her a hot indictment of the Indian officials. "You must wait for a new Governor-General. Sir John Lawrence has greatly disappointed me." Then, afraid, I suppose, lest she might adopt some of his scathing phrases in replying to Sir John Lawrence, he wrote again, suggesting that dignified silence would be the better course. "It would be mere waste of time and hardly consistent with your name and position to argue with men who flounder about in such a hopeless slough of unreason. I would not even point out their inconsistencies. Both the Governor-General and you are high powers, and your correspondence ought, I think, to be conducted with the reserve that is proper to such persons when your opinions do not coincide. I would merely say, etc. etc." What Sir John McNeill suggested she adopted with some slight modifications. In her reply to the Governor-General (Sept. 26, 1867) she thanked him for his letter and for the doc.u.ments he enclosed; explained that she had submitted a scheme only because he had asked her to do so; remarked that the scheme which the Government of India had vetoed was not hers, nor anything like it; and added that if at any future time the question should be revived, she would again be willing, if desired, to give any advice or a.s.sistance in her power.

V