But broken bones hurt even when they are knitting nicely, and the Highland lad cannot sleep; he lies tossing about on his narrow cot, gritting his teeth now and then as the pain bites, but still a happy and a thankful man. He stares about him through the gloom, trying to see who is awake and who asleep. But now he starts, for silently the door opens, and a tiny ray of light, like a golden finger, falls across his bed. A figure enters and closes the door softly; the figure of a woman, tall and slender, dressed in black, with white cap and apron. In her hand she carries a small shaded lamp. At sight of her the sick lad's eyes grow bright; he raises his sound arm and straightens the blanket, then waits in eager patience. Slowly the Lady with the Lamp draws near, stopping beside each cot, listening to the breathing and noting the color of the sleepers, whispering a word of cheer and encouragement to those who wake. Now she stands beside his bed, and her radiant smile is brighter, he thinks, than lampHght or moonhght. A few words in the low, musical voice, a pat to the bedclothes, a friendly nod, and she passes on to the next cot. As she goes, her shadow, hardly more noiseless than her footstep, falls across the sick man's pillow; he turns and kisses it, and then falls happily asleep.
So she comes and passes, like a light; and so her very shadow is blessed, and shall be blessed so long as memory endures.
CHAPTER XII.
O the long and dreary winter! * O the cold and cruel winter! Ever thicker, thicker, thicker Froze the ice on lake and river, Ever deeper, deeper, deeper Fell the snow o'er all the landscape, Fell the covering snow, and drifted Through the forest, round the village.
O the famine and the fever!
O the wasting of the famine!
O the blasting of the fever!
O the wailing of the children!
O the anguish of the women!
All the earth was sick and famished;
Hungry was the air around them.
Hungry was the sky above them.
And the hungry stars in heaven
Like the eyes of wolves glared at them!
Hiawatha," by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow.
HE bad weather commenced about November the loth, and has continued ever since. A winter campaign is under no circumstances child's play; but here, where the troops had no cantonments to take shelter in, where large bodies were collected in one spot, and where the want of sufficient fuel soon made itself felt, it told with the greatest severity upon the health, not of the British alone, but of the French and Turkish troops.... To the severity of the winter the whole army can bear ample testimony. The troops have felt it in all its intensity; and when it is considered that they have been under canvas from ten to twelve months — that they had no other shelter from the sun in summer, and no other protection from wet and snow, cold and tempestuous winds, such as have scarcely been known even in this climate, in winter — and that they passed from a life of total inactivity, already assailed by deadly disease, to one of the greatest possible exertion — it cannot be a matter of surprise that a fearful sickness has prevailed throughout their ranks, and that the men still suffer from
[fragment illegible in the scan of the first edition]
it." — Lord Raglan to Lord Panmure, February,
After the battle of Inkerman, the allied armies turned all their energies to the siege of Sebastopol, the principal city of the Crimea. You will read some day about this memorable siege, one of the most famous in history, and about the prodigies of valor performed by both besiegers and besieged; but I can only touch briefly on those aspects of it which are connected with my subject.
The winter of 1854-5 was, as Lord Raglan says, one of unexampled severity, even in that land of bitter winters. On November 14th a terrible hurricane swept the country, bringing death and ruin to Russians and allies alike. In Sebastopol itself trees were torn up by the roots, buildings unroofed, and much damage done; in the camps of the besiegers things were even worse. Tents were torn in shreds and swept away like dead leaves; not only the soldiers' tents, but the great hospital marquees were destroyed, and the sick and wounded left exposed to bitter blast and freezing sleet. The trenches were flooded; no fires could be lit, and therefore no food cooked; and when the snowstorm came which followed the tempest, many a brave fellow lay down famished and exhausted, and the white blanket covered his last sleep.