Soyer's Culinary Campaign: Being Historical Reminiscences of the Late War.: With The Plain Art of Cookery for Military and Civil Institutions

who were busily employed making their pudding. Having questioned them upon their method of cooking, and visited the cook-house, I at once perceived what facilities were offered to me for making an immense amelioration in the present system of naval cookery, especially in the method of cooking salt meat, &c. (See naval recipes in Addenda.) I took the opportunity of giving them a few hints. Miss Nightingale heard that there were some invalids on board, and she asked to see them. One poor fellow, who had been suffering from an attack of fever since our departure, refused to take his medicine. Miss Nightingale asked the reason of his objection. He replied, “Because I took some once, and it made me sick; and I haven’t liked physic ever since.” We could not help laughing at his simple remark. Miss Nightingale said, “But if I give it you myself, you will take it, wont you?” The soldier, looking very hard at her, replied, “Well, sure enough, ma’am, it will make me sick just the same.” For all that he took the medicine, and seemed to feel very grateful. None but an eye-witness or a disinterested observer can judge of the effect produced by a female’s attention to the sick soldier. Far from home, he seems to hear the voice of her who nursed him in childhood--a mother or sister. He will listen to and receive advice, finding sudden relief from the cheering accents of a woman’s lips, while he would scarcely take the slightest notice of the kindest orderly’s attentions. The man was not aware that it was Miss Nightingale. A woman’s friendly voice had spoken to his heart, and he felt more composed. The sun darted his rays almost perpendicularly upon the deck of the beautiful ship, the _Robert Lowe_, which glided rather than floated over that inconstant ocean--the whimsical Mother Black Sea, called in French “La Mère Noire,” who safely bore her children upon her tranquil bosom in the morning, and at night rocked the cradle with such furious love, that she changed the smile of comfort to sickness and