(Miss Nightingale to Harriet Martineau.) Hampstead, Sept. 24 [1861].… And I, too, was hard upon him. I told him that Cavour's death was a blow to European liberty, but that a greater blow was that Sidney Herbert should be beaten on his own ground by a bureaucracy. I told him that no man in my day had thrown away so noble a game with all the winning cards in his hands. And his angelic temper with me, at the same time that he felt what I said was true, I shall never forget. I wish people to know that what was done was done by a man struggling with death—to know that he thought so much more of what he had not done than of what he had done—to know that all his latter suffering years were filled not by a selfish desire for his own salvation—far less for his own ambition (he hated office, his was the purest ambition I have ever known), but by the struggle of exertion for our benefit.
Happily for her peace of mind there came to her an almost immediate call to be up and doing in the service of her “dear master,” as in her letters of this time she constantly named Sidney Herbert.
The newspapers had at first been somewhat grudging in their obituary notices of him. He had been thought of in connection more with the defects of the War Office during the early months of the Crimean War, than with his services as a reformer. His family and his friends were pained, and on their behalf Mr. Gladstone applied to Miss Nightingale. She did not feel well enough to see him, and, on August 6, he wrote explaining the case, “taking the liberty of intruding upon her for aid and counsel,” and asking “the assistance of her superior knowledge and judgment in a matter which so much interests our feelings.” Miss Nightingale instantly set to work and wrote a Memorandum on Sidney Herbert's work as an Army Reformer. She wrote quickly, but with her usual care in giving chapter and verse for every statement. The Memorandum was anonymous, and was marked “Private and Confidential”; but she had it printed, and circulated it among Lord Herbert's friends and various publicists. Among those who saw it was Abraham Hayward who, when a memorial to Lord Herbert was being mooted a few weeks later, strongly urged that she should be asked to publish the Paper. “No one,” he wrote, “could or would misconstrue her motives. Nothing has been more remarkable in her beneficent and self-sacrificing career than its unobtrusiveness. It has only become famous because its results were too great and good to be shrouded in silence and retirement. Admirably as she writes, she is obviously never thinking about her style; which, for that very reason, is most impressive; and I feel quite sure that the Paper in question would suggest no thought or feeling beyond conviction and sympathy.”[294]
The Memorandum, in so far as it relates to what Sidney Herbert did, has been described and quoted above; but at the end of it, Miss Nightingale was careful to touch upon what he had meant to do and what remained for others to do. “He died before his work was done.” The work on which his heart was set was the preservation of the health, physical and moral, of the British soldiers. “This is the work of his which ought to bear fruit in all future time, and which his death has committed to the guardianship of his country.”
Having finished her Memorandum, Miss Nightingale sent it to Mr. Gladstone. She knew how warm had been the friendship between him and Sidney Herbert. She thought that in the friend who remained the saying might perchance come true: uno avulso non deficit alter. At any rate it was her duty to throw out the hint. So she underlined, as it were, the closing words of her Paper by offering to talk with Mr. Gladstone about the unfinished work which, as she knew, was nearest to Sidney Herbert's heart. To this overture, Mr. Gladstone replied in a letter, giving account of his friend's funeral:
(W. E. Gladstone to Florence Nightingale.) 11 Carlton House Terrace, Aug. 10 [1861]. The funeral was very sad but very soothing. Simplicity itself in point of form, it was most remarkable from the number of people gathered together, and especially from their demeanour. Many men were weeping: not one unconcerned face among several thousands could be seen. But it all brings home more and more the immense void that he has left for all who loved, that is for all who knew, him.… I read last night with profound interest your important paper. I see at once that the matter is too high for me to handle. Like you I know that too much would distress him, too little would not. I am in truth ignorant of military administration: and my impressions are distant and vague. It is your knowledge and authority more than that of any living creature that can do him justice, at the proper time, whenever that may be—do him justice, as he would like it, without exaggeration, without defrauding others. I shall return the paper to you: but of it I venture to keep a copy.…
With respect to your making known to me the “three subjects” I will beg you to exercise your own discretion after simply saying this much; my duty is to watch and control on the part of the Treasury rather than to promote officially departmental reforms. To him I could personally suggest: I am not sure that I should be justified in taking the same liberty with Sir G. Lewis, especially new to his work. On the other hand, my desire to promote Herbert's wishes, as his wishes, was not stronger than my confidence in his judgment as an administrator. (If I now seem reluctant to touch that subject it is for fear I should spoil it.) In the conduct of a department he seemed to me very nearly if not quite the first of his generation.—I remain, dear Miss Nightingale, Very sincerely yours, W. E. Gladstone.
On the afternoon of November 28, in Willis's Rooms—in the same place where, in the same month six years before, Mr. Herbert had spoken in support of a memorial to Miss Nightingale's honour, a public meeting was held to promote a memorial to him. “I think you would have been satisfied,” wrote Mr. Gladstone to her on the same evening, “even if a fastidious judge, with the tone and feeling of the meeting to-day. I mean as regards Herbert. As respects yourself, you might have cared little, but could not have been otherwise than pleased. I made no allusion to you in connection with the paper you kindly sent me, although I made some use of the materials. I acted thus after conference with Count Strzelechi,[295] and with his approval. I thought that if I mentioned you along with that paper, I should seem guilty of the assumption to constitute myself your organ.” Miss Nightingale's Paper, summarizing Lord Herbert's services to the health and comfort of the British Army, formed, indeed, the staple of more than one of the speeches,[296] and the long alliance between them in that cause, which has been the subject of preceding chapters in this Memoir, was frequently referred to at the meeting. General Sir John Burgoyne said breezily that Lord Herbert's “hobby was to promote the health and comfort of the soldier, and his pet was Miss Nightingale, who had for many years devoted herself to the same pursuit.” Mr. Gladstone mentioned as Lord Herbert's “fellow-labourer” the “name of Miss Nightingale, a name that had become a talisman to all her fellow-countrymen.” And Lord Palmerston, the Prime Minister, in associating the Commander-in-Chief with the late Minister for War, added that “they did not labour alone. They were not the only two; there was a third engaged in those honourable exertions, and Miss Nightingale, though a volunteer in the service, acted with all the zeal of a volunteer, and was greatly assistant, as I am sure your Royal Highness will bear witness, to the labours of your Royal Highness and Lord Herbert.”