Letter to Sir James Paget
1874-04-27

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35 South St.
Park Lane W.
April 27/74
Dear Sir James Paget
I was about to write &
thank you for your kind advice
(for Mr. Jowett) to consult
Sir William Jenner [Mr. Jowett
followed it in every respect];
- & also I was going to write
to you about my dear Father,
who, you may perhaps have
forgotten, consulted you at
my house, & about whose
ailment you were so very
good as to write to me:
when that very morning
my dear Father was taken
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from us quite suddenly:
a great blow: to me especially,
whose mind it had never
once crossed that I should
survive him.
In the same month, my
best old friend, Mrs. Bracebridge,
without whom my life &
Scutari would have been
impossible, we lost.
And Quetelet and
Livingstone: nearly all
my heroes, whose great
heroic life gave wings to
me, - something to do & die
for, - in the base perplexities
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of lesser life, - are gone.
I only hope that you
are pretty well:
& pray believe me
ever yours faithfully
Florence Nightingale