O thou Light most pure and blest, Of thy faithful company. Where thou art not, man hath naught: What is soiled, make thou pure; What is rigid, gently bend; Strengthen what goes erringly. Fill thy faithful, who confide With thy sevenfold mystery. And in heaven felicity. O lux beatissima, Sine tuo numine, Lava quod est sordidum, Da virtutis meritum, 515 Amen. (Alleluia.) Mr. A. Johnson for the Executive Committee reported the following change to be made in the Rules of the Conference: "After the word 'three' adding the words 'or more,'" allowing the election of more than three Vice-Presidents. Voted. The Committee on Organization reported, and the report was accepted and adopted. The list of officers elected will be found on page ix. The report from the Committee on the Finances of the Conference reported through the chairman, Mrs. E. E. Williamson, as follows: The committee appointed to consider the finances of the Conference respectfully submits the following report: For several years past it has been customary for the Conference to ask the Local Committee of the city where the Conference meets to make a contribution of about $800 for the expenses of advertising and reporting the Conference. mittee believes that, while the localities should be invited and enAfter full consideration your comcouraged to assist the educational work of the Conference, the Conference itself should provide further funds for this purpose. Your committee respectfully recommends that a sustaining membership be created at ten dollars ($10) per year, and that at least one hundred (100) such memberships be secured. 1 We also recommend that, in accordance with the foregoing, Rule I., paragraph 3, of the Conference, be amended to read as follows: :The annual membership fee shall be $2.50, and the sustaining membership fee shall be $10 annually. These membership fees shall entitle each member to a copy of the Proceedings and other publications of the Conference. EMILY E. WIlliamson. The PRESIDENT.— This report has been already submitted to the Executive Committee, and meets with its approval. On motion the report was accepted and adopted. Mr. B. Pickman Mann moved that a registration fee of one dollar should be made a condition of registration. The motion was not seconded. Mrs. Williamson asked that the Treasurer might make a statement to the Conference on the matter of publication of the Proceedings. The President called on Mr. Crozier. It was Mr. ALFRED O. CROZIER, Treasurer of the Conference.thought best to make some change of this kind. When we go to a city, we do not feel like asking $800 toward the reporting and publishing of our Proceedings, putting ourselves in a mendicant attitude in asking for money which, they might think, we should furnish ourselves. I am in favor of receiving money from the locality where we meet, but not in asking it as a gift, nor for the purpose of publishing the Proceedings. I think the money we ask should be for the local expenses, such as halls, advertising, etc. Instead of asking for $800, I think it would be better to ask each locality to furnish us with three or four hundred members at $2.50 per member, to whom the Proceedings would be sent. One of the purposes of this Conference is educational, and you cannot get educational benefit unless the people become interested in it and read the Proceedings. I think this method a good one, that it will be properly received, and that it will give us just as much money and at the same time relieve us of the embarrassments of the past. We want to put our work on the right basis, so that it will occupy a dignified position. I believe the time has come when the Conference should occupy a larger place in the field of philanthropy. Discussion should be followed by action. If we here find from the wisdom and experience of the distinguished delegates in attendance that a certain line of action in charities and correction is the most practical, why not give the world the benefit by taking definite steps to spread the gospel? If organized charity is the thing, why not undertake to organize charity, and not wait for charity to organize itself? If we need trained and intelligent workers, why not provide methods to train and instruct them and means to secure and maintain them? Why simply talk, and then leave the introduction of new and improved methods to mere chance? We need money for these purposes, and to syste matically acquire and put in form for use the widest and best information on these matters. I believe generous philanthropists of means can be found who will endow this great movement and kindred matters with one million dollars. The Treasurer was authorized to negotiate, and, if possible, induce philanthropists so disposed to establish a fund to that end. The report was then unanimously adopted. Mrs. Alice N. Lincoln said that she hoped the Committee on Dependent Children would have something to report about the care of crippled children and their education in manual training. Mr. F. B. Sanborn said that, as Dr. Knopf had proved that tuberculosis was following very closely after "original sin," original sin being supposed to include 100 per cent. of humanity, and tuberculosis 98 per cent.,- he hoped the Conference would pay still more attention to those two elements of human misfortune. Mr. Stonaker asked that special attention might be given next year to the subject of juvenile courts, with lawyers upon the committee. Mr. Fox called the attention of the Conference to the fact that the subject of child labor would be discussed at the next Conference. At the suggestion of the President a unanimous vote of thanks was given to the Committee on Organization for the work it had done so satisfactorily. The President appointed Mr. R. W. Hebberd, New York, Mr. J. R. Elder, Indiana, and Miss Julia S. Tutwiler, Alabama, an auditing committee. The Secretary announced that the registry of attendance was larger than at any previous meeting. The subject of the session was then taken up, the report of the Committee on Hospitals, Dispensaries, and Nursing. Mrs. Alice N. Lincoln, of Boston, was invited to preside. Mrs. Lincoln said that it was a high form of civilization which demands the services of a trained district nurse for caring for those who cannot command the services of a nurse during the entire day, and who are better treated in their homes than in the hospital. She invited Miss Harriet Fulmer, superintendent of nurses of the Visiting Nurse Association of Chicago, to open the discussion. Miss Fulmer read a paper on "The Work of the District or Visiting Nurse" (page 200). Mrs. Lincoln read extracts of a letter from F. M. Quaife, of New Orleans: In regard to district nursing, I am not directly connected with any association, but have always taken a very deep interest in all their undertakings. I think the district nurse is just as essential, in a large community, as the private nurse. Many times poor families need the services of a nurse, when they may not alway be sick enough; or it may not be convenient, to go to a hospital. I have steadily watched the growth of district nursing in my native city (New York), and feel that a city of any size should at least support one district nurse. I have lived in the city of New Orleans for the past six years, and, to my knowledge, there is not one full-fledged district nurse in the city; and yet trained nurses are being graduated from four institutions each year. I feel it is an innovation that ought to be and must be started to keep up with our sister cities. FRANCES M. QUAIFE, Superintendent Touro Infirmary, New Orleans, La., Graduate of the New York Hospital, New York City. Rev. C. L. Arnold was the next speaker, but at his request his remarks are omitted. Mrs. LINCOLN.— In many cities district nurses are in association with the city physicians. Mrs. IZETTA GEORGE, Denver, Col. I do not agree with those who think nursing a humble subject. The home is the moral basis of society; and, as nurses are workers in the home, we think this subject should take precedence over many others. The best thing about the nurses' association is that it treats the family as a unit. No scheme of philanthropy is adequate that does not do this. An inexperienced charity worker is apt to think that the greatest kindness she can render a sick mother is to put her into a hospital and the children into an institution. Then she can sit and fold her hands in blissful peace, her heart glowing with a self-satisfied feeling of having done her full duty and more. The visiting nurse considers such a proceeding as the last alternative. The Charity Organization Society of Denver has headquarters with the District Nurses' Association, and it sometimes seems as though the only adequate assistance we can render in cases of need is through the work of the visiting nurse. Scarcely a day passes that the nurses do not bring to the central office several reports of suffering eased, advice given, or assistance obtained from the proper authorities. The Denver Nurse Association is the outgrowth of the Denver Flower Mission, which had employed a nurse for ten years; and the Flower Mission is an adjunct of the Nurses' Association, and continues its beautiful work of distributing flowers to the sick in the hospitals in connection with their work. The nurses are also supplied with medicine, infants' wardrobes, surgical things, delicacies, etc. The Denver Association supplies medicines, surgical appliances, and clothing for invalids and children. Many garments are made for it by the Church Aid Societies. The emergency fund of the Charity Organization Society provides the immediate necessities for the sick poor while they await the very deliberate action of our Poor Commissioners. The nurses always prepare the food of their patients, and often under the greatest inconveniences, such as a smoking stove, a handful of dust for fuel, the carrying of water long distances, etc. In fact, they are obliged in almost every instance to bring order out of chaos; and it is always a very different household which the nurse leaves after a week or two of service from that into which she first entered. Do you not look forward, as I do, to the time when we shall have a large corps of these home-trainers in every city? A visiting nurse is practically a home-trainer, and there is no more important mission in life. We meet our Denver nurses at all hours and in all grades of homes, usually in the poorest. Sometimes it is in a dreary basement room into which no ray of sunshine ever enters, or, maybe, in a tent to which habitation the consumptive clings as a more hopeful way of regaining health and strength. Many families live in tents in Colorado all the year; and, with the fierce rays of the sun beating down, the living, eating, and sleeping, the noise and confusion of the children, all under the one canvas, make tent life a miserable existence for many. Yet how deliciously welcome must a visiting nurse be in such a place! With her gentle ministrations, her little gift of money for ice or milk, the fresh cool linen, she brings a veritable glimpse of paradise to a dreary waste. It is often necessary for a visiting nurse to attend cases continuously for a long time, calling for half an hour or so daily. One old lady in our city, who had all her life been well and active, became suddenly helpless. Not only is she herself afflicted, she has a deformed daughter, who is dependent, and has always been upon her crutches for every step she takes; and it is with the greatest difficulty and much physical pain that the three rooms in which she and her mother live are kept clean. But they are kept so, and this crippled girl also earns several dollars a month making lace. I never look at her without feeling that it is a great |