What
kind of attention would such persons have paid to some middle-
class woman with whom they were not acquainted, who possessed
great experience of Army nursing and had decided views upon
hospital reform? They would have politely ignored her; but it was
impossible to ignore Flo Nightingale. When she spoke, they were
obliged to listen; and, when they had once begun to do that--
what might not follow? She knew her power, and she used it. She
supported her weightiest minutes with familiar witty little
notes. The Bison began to look grave. It might be difficult--it
might be damned difficult--to put down one's head against the
white hand of a lady...
Of Miss Nightingale's friends, the most important was Sidney
Herbert. He was a man upon whom the good fairies seemed to have
showered, as he lay in his cradle, all their most enviable goods.
Well born, handsome, rich, the master of Wilton--one of those
great country-houses, clothed with the glamour of a historic
past, which are the peculiar glory of England--he possessed--
besides all these advantages: so charming, so lively, so gentle a
disposition that no one who had once come near him could ever be
his enemy.
He was, in fact, a man of whom it was difficult not to say that
he was a perfect English gentleman. For his virtues were equal
even to his good fortune.
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