Page:Portraits of celebrated women Florence Nightingale.djvu/10

110 general art, science, and literature were of no common order. Her command of modern languages was extensive, and she spoke French, German, and Italian fluently as her native English. She has visited and studied the various nations of Europe, and has ascended the Nile to its farthest cataract. While in Egypt she tended the sick Arabs with whom she came in contact; and it was frequently in her power, by judicious advice, to render them important services. Graceful, feminine, rich, and popular, her influence over those with whom she came in contact was powerful as it was gentle and persuasive. Her friends and acquaintances embraced a large circle, and included persons of all classes and persuasions; but her happiest place has ever been her home, where, in the center of numerous and distinguished relatives, and in the simplest obedience to her admiring parents, she dwelt. Her personal appearance is described by Mr. Trenery in his Crescent City, as he saw her engaged in her mission of mercy. He says she is one of those whom God forms for great ends. You can not hear her say a few sentences, nor even look at her, without feeling that she is an extraordinary being. Simple, intellectual, sweet, full of love and benevolence, innocent—she is a fascinating and perfect woman. She is tall and pale. Her face is exceedingly lovely; but better than all is the soul's glory that shines through every feature so exultingly. Nothing can be sweeter than her smile. It is like a sunny day in Summer; and more of holiness than is expressed in her countenance one does not often meet on a human face as one passes along the dusty highways of life. Through all her movements breathes that high intellectual calm which is God's own patent of nobility, and is the true seal of the most glorious aristocracy—that of mind, of soul!

From infancy she had a yearning affection for her kind—a sympathy with the weak, the oppressed, the destitute, the suffering, and the desolate. The schools and the poor around Lea Hurst and Embley first saw and felt her as a visitor, teacher, consoler, and expounder. Then she frequented and