stay away from this meeting. My heart was here, and I came, not so much to speak, as to hear what is to be done about this dreadful trouble. For something must be done. I have to pray God night and morning that He would find some way to stay this terrible tide of slaughter.... I recall the first action of Florence Nightingale when she went to take care of the sick and wounded in the Crimean War. She found many things wanting for the comfort of the soldiers in the hospitals, but she could not get at them. Some seal or mandate was waited for. “The men are suffering,” Florence Nightingale said. “Break in the doors — open the boxes-give me the blankets and medicines. I must have them!” and so she did. Now, the fleets of the Western nations are waiting for some diplomatic development which shall open the way for action. I think that we, the United States of America, are now called upon to play the part of Florence Nightingale; to take our stand and insist upon it that the slaughter shall cease. Oh!
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and lovely tribute to her memory the office has since then remained vacant.
In the early nineties all Christendom was aroused by the outrages committed by the Turks in Armenia.
From almost every Christian country rose a cry of horror: indignation meetings were called; protest, denunciation, and appeal were the order of the day. In Boston a meeting was held at Faneuil Hall (November 26, 1894), called together by the Boston Armenian Relief Committee.
She was on the platform, and spoke from her heart.
“I could not,” she says,
Houghton Mifflin Company, Boston and New York. 1916.
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