Miss Nightingale's interest in the working classes led her in 1865 to draft a scheme which, in some aspects of it, forestalled ideas of a later generation of social reformers. Mr. Gladstone had recently passed an Act enabling a depositor's accumulations in the Post Office Savings Bank to be invested in the purchase either of an Annuity or an Insurance. It would be very advisable, she suggested, to add to these methods of saving facilities for the purchase of small freeholds. There was nothing that the working men more coveted than the ownership of a house or a piece of land. An extension of small ownership would satisfy a legitimate craving, increase the motives to thrift, and raise the social position and independence of the working classes. If the adoption of the scheme would necessitate the enfranchisement of leaseholds, so much the better. Such were Miss Nightingale's ideas, and under different forms and by different methods they have occupied the attention of social reformers to this day. She submitted her scheme to Mr. Villiers, President of the Poor Law Board, who seems to have been somewhat favourable to it. Then she tackled the Chancellor of the Exchequer, artfully suggesting that her scheme was merely, on the one hand, a slight development of his “most successful Savings Bank measures,” and, on the other, an indirect means of meeting his earnest desire to extend the suffrage. But Mr. Gladstone was not to be cajoled. “It would not do,” he told her, “for Government to become land-jobbers”—an opinion which has not been shared, it would seem, by some of Mr. Gladstone's successors. He had further suggested that the scheme should be submitted, in its legal aspects, to his friend Mr. Roundell Palmer, and Mr. Palmer, after reading it, opined that the law already gave adequate facilities for the purchase of freeholds by working men and others. Miss Nightingale then took other legal opinions with a view to meeting objections; but she presently gave up this addition to her schemes. “It was certainly,” she said, “the wildest of ideas for me to undertake it just now when I can scarcely do what I have already undertaken.”
IV
Though Miss Nightingale saw little of her friends or relations at this time, she constantly corresponded with them. There are many letters which tell of her grief at the death of her cousin, Miss Hilary Bonham Carter: “the golden bowl is broken,” she wrote to Madame Mohl (Sept. 8, 1865), “and it was the very purest gold I have ever known.” There are letters from many correspondents—Lady Augusta Bruce, for instance, and Mrs. William Cowper—which show how deeply they had been touched by Miss Nightingale's letters of condolence. Her own griefs left room for sympathy with those of others:—
(To Dr. Farr.) Hampstead, August 5 [1864].… I am sorry to hear of your griefs. I do not find that mine close my heart to those of others—and I should be more than anxious to hear of yours—you who have been our faithful friend for so many years. I had heard of your father's death, but not of any other loss. Sidney Herbert has been dead three years on the 2nd. And these three years have been nothing but a slow undermining of all he has done (at the W.O.). This is the bitterest grief. The mere personal craving after a beloved presence I feel as nothing. A few years at most, and that will be over. But the other is never over. For me, I look forward to pursuing God's work soon in another of his worlds. I do not look forward with any craving to seeing again those I have lost (in the very next world)—sure that that will all come in His own good time—and sure of my willingness to work in whichever of His worlds I am most wanted, with or without those dear fellow-workers, as He pleases. But this does not at all soothe the pain of seeing men wantonly deface the work here of some of His best workers. But I shall bear your faith in mind—that good works never really die. Alas! good Tulloch. But I think his work was done. Pray, if you speak of him, remember—had it not been for him, where would our two Army Sanitary enquiries have been?
Miss Nightingale's large circle of correspondents kept her in touch with the literary, as well as with the political, world. She suffered greatly from sleeplessness and read much at night. She seldom read a book without finding something original or characteristic to say about it. “Lately,” she wrote to M. Mohl (Jan. 24, 1865), “I have read an English translation of the Rubáiyát of Omar Khayyám. The way it interests me is theologically. Otherwise he seems a poor weak mixture of Mahomet and a Mephistopheles. But the arguments which he despises seem to me just the real arguments, the only arguments, if only we believe in a Perfect God, for eternal existence. Do tell me a little about this, and about the Sufis and Firdausi—as regards their belief in a God, and whether the God was good or bad, if any.” Omar was new to M. Mohl. Miss Nightingale lent him Fitz-Gerald's version,[66] and M. Mohl read the original. “The tidings,” she wrote (April 21), “that you may perhaps print Al Khayyám's quatrains is diffusing joy among a (not large but) select circle, I having communicated it in the ‘proper quarter’ (see how we are all tarred with the same official stick). If you send me a copy, I shall immediately become a personage of importance.” “I read some of Madame Roland's Memoires,” she wrote to Madame Mohl (May 20, 1865): “but, do you know, I was so disappointed to find out that her patriotism was inspired by a lover. Not that I care much about virtue: I do think ‘virtue’ by itself a very second-rate virtue. But because I did hope that here was one woman who cared for respublica as alone, or as chief, among her cares.” “Do” (to Madame Mohl, Sept. 8, 1865), “read if you have not read Swinburne's Atalanta in Calydon. Forgive it its being an imitation of a Greek play. That is its worst fault. As you said of Macaulay's Lays, They are like an old man in a pinafore; or as I should say of this, It is like a Puritan togged out as a Priest going to say mass. But read it. The Atalanta herself, though she is only a sort of Ginn and not a woman at all, has more reality, more character, more individuality (to use a bad word) than all the jeunes premières in all the men novelists I ever have read—Walter Scott, Lytton Bulwer, and all of them. But then Atalanta is not a sound incarnation of any ‘social or economic principle’—is she? So men will say.”
V
On higher themes the correspondent to whom Miss Nightingale wrote most fully from her heart was from this time forth Mr. Jowett. Their acquaintance, at first confined to paper, had begun, as described in an earlier chapter, with correspondence about her Suggestions for Thought. The work had greatly interested him, and from time to time he continued to write to her about it. He wished her to do something with her “Suggestions,” but to rewrite them in a more connected form and a gentler mood, and he sometimes gave hints for an irony less bitter than hers. Her letters to him are no longer in existence, except in the case of a few of which she preserved copies; but it is clear from the tenor of the correspondence on the other side that she was already (1862) giving to him much of her intimate confidence. She had now met a new friend who was capable of entering into her inmost and highest thoughts, not indeed always with agreement, but always with a sympathetic understanding. “As you have shown me so much confidence,” he presently wrote, “I feel the strongest wish to help you in any way that I can without intruding.” And again: “I cannot but wish you (as sincerely as I ever desired anything) unabated hope and trust and resolve to continue your work to the end, and many rays of light to cheer the way.” A little later, drawing a bow at a venture, Mr. Jowett wondered whether she was engaged about Indian sanitary matters? He had “a reason for being interested about them which is that I lost my two brothers in India.” Miss Nightingale, as we have heard, was interested in nothing else so intently at this time, and here was a fresh bond of sympathy. She asked whether, knowing what he did of her religious views, he would come and administer the Sacrament to her, as she was entirely unable to leave her room. “I shall be very glad,” he wrote (Oct. 3), “to give you the Sacrament. I am sure that many other clergymen would be equally glad. Would you like Mr. and Mrs. Smith, or any of their family, to join you?” The Sacrament was often thus administered, and Miss Nightingale's most intimate friends—such as Mrs. Bracebridge—or some of her family, generally partook of the rite with her. On one of the earlier of these occasions, Mr. Jowett met her parents, and in 1862 paid the first of his visits, which afterwards became frequent, to them in the country. He often figures in their letters as “that great and good man,” or “that true saint, Mr. Jowett.” And from this date also began his frequent visits—usually many times a year—to Miss Nightingale herself; indeed he was seldom, if ever, in London without spending an afternoon with her. If she had friends staying in her house—such as M. and Madame Mohl—he would sometimes come in to dine with them.
“Dear Miss Nightingale,” wrote Mr. Jowett (Oct. 28), “I shall always regard the circumstance of having given you the Communion as a solemn event in my life which is a call to devote myself to the service of God and men (if He will give me the power to do so). Your example will often come before me, especially if I have occasion to continue my work under bodily suffering. There is something that I want to say to you which I hardly know how to express.” And then followed the first of what became a long series of spiritual admonitions. Mr. Jowett had, it is clear, a very high opinion of Miss Nightingale's genius, the most sincere admiration for her self-devotion, and a deep affection for her. But he thought that she was in some ways not using her life to the best advantage, and that her state of physical and mental suffering was in some measure the result of a too impetuous temper. In letter after letter, full of a beautiful and delicate sympathy, he whispered into her ears counsels of calm, of trust, of moderation. She seems to have kept him informed of every move in her crusades, and he was constantly afraid that she would fight too fiercely or even (in this case a quite needless fear) come out into the open. “The gift of being invisible,” he wrote (April 22, 1863), “is much to be desired by any one who exercises a good influence over others. Though Deborah and Barak work together, Sisera the Captain of the Host must not suspect that he has been delivered into the hands of a woman.” “I hope” (March 1865) “that you won't leave your incognito. It would seriously injure your influence if you were known to have influence. (Did you know the Baron Stockmar whom Sir Robert Peel called one of the most influential persons in Europe? Hardly any one in England excepting Kings and Queens knew of his existence. That was a model for that sort of life.) If you answer (anonymously, as I hope, if at all), may I beg you to answer with facts only and without a trace of feeling?” When he applauds some stroke, he urges her to find rest and comfort in the victory. “All this,” he wrote (Feb. 26, 1865), “I firmly believe would not have been accomplished but for your clearness of sight and intensity of purpose. Is not this a thing to thank God about? I was reading in Grote an account of an attempted Spartan revolution in the times of Agesilaus. One of the great objects of the Ephori was to keep the Spartan youth from getting under the influence of a woman (name unknown) who was stirring the rebellion. Do you not think that woman may have been you in some former state of existence?” Miss Nightingale, perhaps in some justification for her eagerness in action, opened her heart fully to Mr. Jowett about her sense of loss in Sidney Herbert's death; explaining her loneliness in work, and yet her overmastering desire to complete, while strength was still granted to her, the “joint work” of her friend and herself. “I have often felt,” he replied (Aug. 7, 1865), “what a wreck and ruin Lord Herbert's death must have been to you. You had done so much for him and he had grown so rapidly in himself and in public estimation that there seemed no limits to what he might have effected. He might have been one of the most popular and powerful Prime Ministers in this country—the man to carry us through the social and ecclesiastical questions that are springing up. And you would have had a great part in his work and filled him with every noble and useful ambition. Do not suppose that I don't feel and understand all this. (And you might have made me Dean of Christ Church: the only preferment that I would like to have, and I would have reformed the University and bullied the Canons.) But it has pleased God that all this should not be, and it must please us too, and we must carry on the struggle under greater difficulties, with more of hard and painful labour and less of success, still never flinching while life lasts.” Never flinching, but never fretting or fuming: that was the burden of Mr. Jowett's exhortations. “I sometimes think,” he had written (July 9, 1865), “that you ought seriously to consider how your work may be carried on, not with less energy, but in a calmer spirit. Think that the work of God neither hastes nor rests, and that we should go about it in the spirit of order which prevails in the world. I am not blaming the past (who would blame you who devote your life to the good of others?). But I want the peace of God to settle on the future. Perhaps you will feel that in urging this I really can form no notion of your sufferings. Alas, dear friend, I am afraid that this is true. Still I must beg you to keep your mind above them. Is that motive vain of being made perfect through suffering?” It is an idle speculation to wonder whether persons who have done great things in the world would have done as much or more or better if they had been other than they were. Calm is well; but it is not always the spring of action. If Miss Nightingale had been less eager and impetuous, she might, after her return from the Crimea, have done nothing at all. But perhaps already, in moments of weariness during the battle, and increasingly as the shadows lengthened into the pensive evening of her days, she may have felt that there was some truth in the soothing counsels of Mr. Jowett's friendship.
That Miss Nightingale reciprocated his feelings of affectionate esteem is shown very clearly by the way in which she received his admonitions. She was not usually meek under even the gentlest reproaches of her friends; but, so far as Mr. Jowett's letters tell the story, she never resented anything he said; she expressed nothing but gratitude. I do not suppose that she never retorted. He advised her, as he advised everybody, to read Boswell. I gather from one of his letters that she may have reminded him of Dr. Johnson's love of a good hater, for Mr. Jowett promises to try and satisfy her a little better in that respect in the future. And, as far as it was in him to do so, he seems to have kept his word. “Hang the Hebdomadal Council,” he wrote; or, of a certain meeting of another body, “I was opposed by two fools and a knave.” There are passages about “rascals” and “rogue Elephants” and “beasts,” which are almost as downright as was Miss Nightingale herself in this sort. She returned to the full the sympathy which he gave to her. She was solicitous about his health. He promised to cut down his hours of reading, and never to work any more after midnight. “I cannot resist such a remonstrance as yours. I think that you would batter the gates of heaven or hell. Seriously, I shall think of your letter as long as I live, dear friend.” She asked to be kept informed of every move in the academical disputes which concerned him, the judgment in the case of Essays and Reviews, the dispute about the Greek Professorship, and so forth. He told her even of stupidities at College meetings—“not to be beaten,” he said of one, “even by your War Office.” “I think you are the only person,” he wrote (1865), “who encourages me about my work at Oxford. I cannot be too grateful for your words.” “I am delighted,” he wrote again (Oct. 27, 1866), “to have a friend who cares two straws whether I succeeded in a matter at Oxford.” She, as is clear from his letters, wrote to him, not only about her struggles and interests, but also about his; and he, on his side, discussed all her problems. He wanted her to spend herself no longer “on conflicts with Government offices,” but to devote her mind to some literary work in which successful effect would depend only on herself. In such work, moreover, he could perhaps help her. She, on her side, would like to help him with a sermon, the preparation of which was teasing him, and there is a long draft amongst her papers of the heads of a discourse, suggested by her, on the relation of religion to politics. “I sometimes use your hints,” he had written earlier. “A pupil of mine has a passion for public life, and having the means, is likely to get into Parliament. I said to him, ‘You are a fanatic, that cannot be helped, but you must try to be a “rational fanatic.”’” Each of the friends thought very highly of the powers and services of the other. “There is nothing you might not accomplish,” he says to her. He turns off what she must have said of him with playful deprecation: “About Elijah—you must mean the Honble. Elijah Pogram. There is no other Elijah to whom I bear the least resemblance.” And each valued the friendship as a means of enabling them both to serve God more truly. “The spirit of the twenty-third Psalm and the spirit of the ninetieth Psalm should be united in our lives.”
Her friendship with Mr. Jowett was, I cannot doubt, Miss Nightingale's greatest consolation in these strenuous years. She was immersed in official drudgery, never forgetful, it is true, of the end in the means, but sorely vexed and harassed by the difficulties and disappointments of circumstance. Her friend's letters and conversation raised her above the conflict into a purer and calmer atmosphere. Not indeed that Mr. Jowett was a quietist; she would little have respected him had he been so; but though in the world, he was not of it; he was unsoiled by the dust of the great road. She had, it is true, other and yet more unworldly friends—nuns in convents and matrons or nurses in hospitals. With them, too, she exchanged intimate confidences in spiritual matters; but their standpoint was not hers, and the exchange could only be with mental reservations on her part. To Mr. Jowett she was able to open unreservedly her truest thoughts. And then, too, the dearest of her other friends paid her an almost adoring worship, whilst some who were estranged offered only unsympathetic criticism. It was from Mr. Jowett alone that she heard the language of affectionate and understanding remonstrance. She heard it gladly, because she knew that it was sympathetic, and because she felt that her friend's character was attuned to her own highest ideals.