Elsie Inglis took up practice in Edinburgh, and worked in a happy partnership with the late Dr. Jessie MacGregor, until the latter left Scotland for work in America.

When the University of Edinburgh admitted women to the examinations for degrees in medicine, Dr. Inglis graduated M.B., C.M. in 1899. From that date onwards her practice, her political and suffrage work, and the founding of the Hospice in the High Street of Edinburgh, as a nursing home and maternity centre staffed by medical women, occupied a life which grew and strengthened amid so many and varied experiences.

Her father’s death deprived her of what had been the very centre and mainspring of her existence. As she records the story of his passing on, she says that she cannot imagine life without him, and that he had been so glad to see her begin her professional career. She was not one to lose her place in the stream of life from any morbid inaction or useless repining. She shared the spirit of the race from which she had sprung, a reaching forward to obtain the prize of life fulfilled with service, and she had inherited the childlike faith and confidence which inspired their belief in the Father of Spirits.

Elsie lost in her father the one who had made her the centre of his thoughts and of his most loving watchfulness. From the day that her home with him was left unto her desolate, she was to become a centre to many of her father’s wide household, and, even as she had learnt from him, she became a stay and support to many of his children’s children.

The two doctors started practice in Atholl Place, and later on they moved into 8 Walker Street, an abode which will always be associated with the name of Dr. Elsie Inglis.

Mrs. M‘Laren says:—

‘My impressions of their joint house are all pleasant ones. They got on wonderfully together, and in every thing seemed to appreciate one another’s good qualities. They were very different, and had in many ways a different outlook. I remember Jessie saying once, “Elsie is so exceptionally generous in her attitude of mind, it would be difficult not to get on with her!” They both held their own opinions on various subjects without the difference of opinion really coming between them. Elsie said once about the arrangement, “It has all the advantages of marriage without any of its disabilities.” We used always to think they did each other worlds of good. I know how I always enjoyed a visit to them if it was only for an afternoon or some weeks. There was such an air of freedom in the whole house. You did what you liked, thought what you liked, without any fear of criticism or of being misunderstood.

‘I do not know much about her practice, as medicine never interested me, but I believe at one time, before the Suffrage work engrossed her so much, she was making quite a large income.’

Professionally she suffered under two disabilities: the restricted opportunities for clinical work in the days when she was studying her profession, combined with the constant interruptions which the struggle against the medical obstructionists necessitated; secondly, the various stages in the political fight incident to obtaining that wider enfranchisement which aimed at freeing women from all those lesser disabilities which made them the helots of every recognised profession and industry.

When in the Scottish Women’s Hospitals abroad, Dr. Inglis rapidly acquired a surgical skill, under the tremendous pressure of work, which often kept her for days at the operating-table, which showed what a great surgeon she might have been, given equal advantages in the days of her peace practice.

Dr. Inglis lost no opportunity of enlarging her knowledge. She was a lecturer on Gynecology in the Medical College for Women which had been started later than Dr. Jex Blake’s school, and was on slightly broader lines. After she had started practice she went to study German clinics; she travelled to Vienna, and later on spent two months in America studying the work and methods of the best surgeons in New York, Chicago, and Rochester.

She advocated, at home and abroad, equal opportunities for work and study in the laboratories for both men and women students. She maintained that the lectures for women only were not as good as those provided for the men, and that the women did not get the opportunity of thorough laboratory practice before taking their exams. She thus came into conflict with the University authorities, who refused to accept women medical students within the University, or to recognise extra-mural mixed classes in certain subjects. Step by step Dr. Inglis fought for the students. ‘With a great price’ she might truly say she had purchased her freedom, and nothing would turn her aside. If one avenue was closed, try another. If one Principal was adamant, his day could not last for ever; prepare the way for his successor. Indomitable, unbeaten, unsoured, Dr. Inglis, with the smiling, fearless brow, trod the years till the influence of the ‘red planet Mars’ opened to her and others the gate of opportunity. She had achieved many things, and was far away from her city and its hard-earned practice when at length, in 1916, the University, under a new ‘open-minded, generous-hearted Head,’ opened its doors to women medical students.

There were other things, besides her practice, which Dr. Inglis subordinated in these years to the political enfranchisement of women. It has been shown in a previous chapter how keen were her political beliefs. She joined the Central Edinburgh Women’s Liberal Association in its earliest organised years. She acted as Vice-President in it for sixteen years, and was one of its most active members.

Mr. Gulland, the Liberal Whip, knew the value of her work, and must have had reason to respect the order in which she placed her political creed—first the citizenship of women, then the party organisation. He speaks of her fearless partisanship and aloof attitude towards all local political difficulties. An obstacle to her was a thing to be overcome, not to be sat down before. Any one in politics who sees what is right, and cannot understand any reason why the action should not be straight, rather than compromising, is a help to party agents at rare intervals; normally such minds cause anxiety. Her secretary, Miss Cunningham, says about her place in the Liberal organisation:—

‘Not only as a speaker—though as that she was invaluable—but as one who mixed freely with all our members, with her sympathy, in fact, her enthusiasm for everything affecting the good of women, she won respect and liking on every side. It was not until she became convinced that she could help forward the great cause for women better by being unattached to any party organisation that she severed her connection with the Liberal Party. Regretted as that severance was by all, we understood her point of view so well that we recognised there was no other course open to her. Her firm grasp of and clear insight into matters political made her a most valued colleague, especially in times of difficulty, when her advice was always to be relied upon.’

In 1901 she was a member of the Women’s Liberal League, a branch of the W.L.A. which split off at the time of the Boer War, in opposition to the ‘Little Englanders.’ Dr. Inglis was on its first committee, and lent her drawing-room for meetings, addressing other meetings on the Imperialist doctrines born in that war. When that phase of politics ended, the League became an educational body and worked on social and factory legislation.

Among her other enterprises was the founding of the Muir Hall of Residence for Women Students at the University. Many came up from the country, and, like herself in former days in Glasgow, had to find suitable, and in many cases uncomfortable, lodgings.

Principal Muir’s old Indian friendship with Mr. Inglis had been most helpful in former years, and now Lady Muir and other friends of the women students started a Residence in George Square for them, and Miss Robertson was appointed its first warden. Dr. Inglis was Hon. Secretary to the Muir Hall till she died, and from its start was a moving spirit in all that stood for the comfort of the students. She attended them when they were ill, and was always ready to help them in their difficulties with her keen, understanding advice. The child of her love, amid all other works, was her Maternity Hospice. Of this work Miss Mair, who was indeed ‘a nursing mother’ to so many of the undertakings of women in the healing profession, writes of Dr. Inglis’ feeling with perfect understanding:—

‘To Dr. Inglis’ clear vision, even in her early years of student life, there shone through the mists of opposition and misunderstandings a future scene in which a welcome recognition would be made of women’s services for humanity, and with a strong, glad heart she joined with other pioneers in treading “the stony way” that leads to most reforms. Once landed on the firm rock of professional recognition, Dr. Inglis set about the philanthropic task of bringing succour and helpful advice to mothers and young babies and expectant mothers in the crowded homes in and about the High Street. There, with the help of a few friends, she founded the useful little Hospice that we trust now to see so developed and extended by an appreciative public, that it will merit the honoured name “The Dr. Elsie Inglis Memorial Hospice.”

‘This little Hospice lay very near the heart of its founder—she loved it—and with her always sensitive realisation of the needs of the future, she was convinced that this was a bit of work on the right lines for recognition in years to come. Some of us can recall the kindling eye, the inspiring tones, that gave animation to her whole being when talking of her loved Hospice. She saw in it a possible future that might effect much, not only for its patients, but for generations of medical women.’

With Dr. Elsie one idea always started another, and ‘a felt want’ in any department of life always meant an instantly conceived scheme of supplying the need. Those who ‘came after’ sometimes felt a breathless wonder how ways and means could be found to establish and settle the new idea which had been evolved from the fertile brain. The Hospice grew out of the establishment of a nursing home for working women, where they could be cared for near their own homes. Through the kindness of Dr. Barbour, a house was secured at a nominal rent in George Square, and opened in 1901. That sphere of usefulness could be extended if a maternity home could be started in a poorer district. Thus the Hospice in the High Street was opened in 1904. Dr. Inglis devoted herself to the work. An operating theatre and eight beds were provided. The midwifery department grew so rapidly that after a few years the Hospice became a centre, one of five in Scotland, for training nurses for the C.M.B. examination.

Dr. Inglis looked forward to a greater future for it in infant welfare work, and she always justified the device of the site as being close to where the people lived, and in air to which they were accustomed. Trained district nurses visited the people in their own homes, and in 1910 there were more cases than nurses to overtake them. In that year the Hospice was amalgamated with Bruntsfield Hospital; medical, surgical, and gynecological cases were treated there, while the Hospice was devoted entirely to maternity and infant welfare cases.

Dr. Inglis’ ‘vision’ was nearly accomplished when she had a small ward of five beds for malnutrition cases, a baby clinic, a milk depot, health centres, and the knowledge that the Hospice has the distinction of being the only maternity centre run by women in Scotland. This affords women students opportunities denied to them in other maternity hospitals.

A probationer in that Hospice says:—

‘Dr. Inglis’ idea was that everything, as far as possible, should be made subservient to the comfort of the patients. This was always considered when planning the routine. She disapproved of the system prevalent in so many hospitals of rousing the patients out of sleep in the small hours of the morning in order to get through the work of the wards. She would not have them awakened before 6 A.M., and she instituted a cup of tea before anything else was done. To her nurses she was very just and appreciative of good work, and, if complaints were made against any one, the wrongdoing had to be absolutely proved before she would take action. She also insisted on the nurses having adequate time off, and that it should not be infringed upon.’

These, in outline, are the interests which filled the years after Dr. Elsie began her practice. Of her work among the people living round her Hospice, it is best told in the words of those who watched for her coming, and blessed the sound of her feet on their thresholds. Freely she gave them of her best, and freely they gave her the love and confidence of their loyal hearts.

Mrs. B. had been Dr. Inglis’ patient for twenty years, and she had also attended her mother and grandmother. Of several children one was called Elsie Maud Inglis, and the child was christened in the Dean Church by Dr. Williamson, who had known Dr. Inglis as a child in India. The whole family seem to have been her charge, for when Mrs. B.’s husband returned from the South African War, Dr. Inglis fought the War Office for nine months to secure him a set of teeth, and, needless to say, after taking all the trouble entailed by a War Office correspondence, she was successful. A son fought in the present war, and when Dr. Inglis saw the death of a Private B., she sent a telegram to the War Office to make sure it was not the son of Mrs. B. She would never take any fees from this family. On one occasion Mr. B. gave her some feathers he had brought home from Africa. She had them put in a new hat she had got for a wedding, and came round before she went to the festival to show them to the donor. Her cheery ways ‘helped them all,’ and when a child of the family broke its leg, and was not mending all round in the Infirmary, Dr. Inglis was asked to go and see her, and the child from then ‘went forrit.’

In another family there was some stomach weakness, and three infants died. Dr. Inglis tried hard to save the life of the third, a little boy, who was evidently getting no nourishment. So anxious was she, that she asked a sister who had recently had a baby, to try if she could nurse the child. This was done, the foster mother going every day to the house, but they could not save the infant. When the next one arrived, Dr. Inglis was so determined the child should live, she came every day, whatever were her engagements, to sterilise the milk. The child throve under her care, and grew up in health.

Another of these patients of her care ‘could not control her feelings’ when speaking of the good physician. It was evident the family had lost their best friend. The husband spoke most warmly of Dr. Inglis’ kindness to them. She would come round, after she had finished her other work at night, to bath the baby. When another child was ill, she told the mother not to open the door even if the King himself wished to come in. The husband said she was so bright one felt the better for her visit, ‘though her orders had to be obeyed and no mistake, and she would tell you off at once if you did not carry them out.’ If they offered payment, she would say, ‘Now, go and buy a nice chop for yourself.’

Another family had this story. Mr. G.: ‘That woman has done more for the folk living between Morrison Street and the High Street than all the ministers in Edinburgh and Scotland itself ever did for any one. She would never give in to difficulties. She gave her house, her property, her practice, her money to help others.’ Mrs. G. fell ill after the birth of one of her children. Dr. Elsie came in one night, made her a cup of tea and some toast, and, as she failed to get well, she raised money to keep her in a sanatorium for six months. After she had been there one child, in charge of a friend, fell ill, and finally died, Dr. Inglis doing all she could to spare the absent mother and save the child. When it died, she wrote:—

‘My dear Mrs. G.,—You will have got the news by now. I cannot tell you how sorry I am for you, my dear. But you will believe, won’t you, that we all did everything we could for your dear little boy. Mrs. E. was simply goodness itself. Dr. H. and I saw him three times a day between us, and yesterday we saw him four times. When I sent you the card I hoped the high temperature was due to his teeth, because his pulse seemed good. However, later, Dr. H. telephoned that she was afraid that his pulse was flagging, and he died suddenly about one. Mr. G. has just been here; you must get well, my dear, for his sake, and for the sake of all the other little children. Poor little Johnnie has had a great many troubles in his little life has he not? But he is over them all now, dear little man. And the God in whose safe keeping he is, comfort you, dear Mrs. G.—Ever your sincere friend,

‘Elsie Maud Inglis.’

The caretaker of the dispensary in St. Cuthbert’s Mission in Morrison Street speaks of Dr. Inglis as the true friend of all who needed her. She gave an hour three mornings in the week, and if she could not overtake all the cases in the time, she would occasionally come back later in the day.

Another of her patients was the mother of twelve children; six of them were ‘brought home’ by Dr. Inglis. She was a friend to them all, and never minded what trouble she took. If they did not send for her, wishing to spare her, she scolded them for thinking of herself and not of their need for her services. All the children loved her, and they would watch from the window on her dispensary days for her, and she would wave to them across the street. She would often stop them in the street to ask after their mother, and even after she had been to Serbia and returned to Edinburgh, she remembered about them and their home affairs. She always made them understand that her orders must be carried out. Once Mrs. C. was very ill, and Dr. Inglis came to attend her. The eldest girl was washing the floor, and Dr. Inglis told her to go for some medicine. The girl continued to finish the work she was at. ‘Child,’ said Dr. Inglis, ‘don’t you know that when I say a thing I mean it?’ Another time she had told Mrs. C. to remain in her bed till she came. Household cares were pressing, and Mrs. C. rose to wash the dishes. Dr. Inglis suddenly appeared at the door. ‘What did I tell you? Do not touch another dish.’ And she herself helped Mrs. C. back to bed. Later on two of the children got scarlet fever, and Dr. Inglis told the mother she was proud of her, as, through her care, the infection did not spread in the family or outside it.

The people in Morrison Street showed their gratitude by collecting a little sum of money to buy an electric lamp to light their doctor friend up the dark staircase of the house. These were the true mourners who stood round St. Giles’ with the bairns she had ‘brought home’ on the day when her earthly presence passed from their sight. These were they who had fitted her for her strenuous enterprises in the day when the battle was set in array, and these were the people who knew her best, and never doubted that when called from their midst she would go forth strong in that spirit which is given to the weak things of the earth, and that it would be her part to strengthen the peoples that had no might.

The Little Sisters of the Poor had a dispensary of St. Anne, and Dr. Elsie had it in her charge from 1903 to 1913, and the Sister Superior speaks of the affection of the people and the good work done among them.

‘“How often,” writes one in charge of the servant department of the Y.W.C.A., “her deliberate tread has brought confidence to me when getting heartless over some of these poor creatures who would not rouse themselves, judging the world was against them. Many a time the patient fighting with circumstances needed a sisterly word of cheer which Dr. Inglis supplied, and sent the individual heartened and refreshed. The expression on her face, I mean business, had a wonderful uplift, while her acuteness in exactly describing the symptoms to those who were in constant contact gave a confidence which made her a power amongst us.”’

A patient has allowed some of her written prescriptions to be quoted. They were not of a kind to be made up by a chemist:—

‘I want you never to miss or delay meals. I want you to go to bed at a reasonable time and go to sleep early. I want you to do your work regularly, and to take an interest in outside things—such as your church and suffrage.’

‘We should not let these Things (with a capital T) affect us so much. Our cause is too righteous for it to be really affected by them—if we don’t weaken.’

‘My dear, the potter’s wheel isn’t a pleasant instrument.’

‘Go home and say your prayers.’

‘Realise what you are, a free born child of the Universe. Perfection your Polar Star.’

These stories of her healing of mind and body might be endlessly multiplied. Sorrow and disease are much the same whether they come to the rich or the poor, and poverty is not always the worst trial of many a sad tale. Dr. Elsie’s power of sympathy and understanding was as much called upon in her paying practice as among the very poor. She made no distinction in what she gave; her friendship was as ready as her trained skill. There was one patient whose sufferings were largely due to her own lack of will power. Elsie, after prescribing, bent down and kissed her. It awoke in the individual the sense that she was not ‘altogether bad,’ and from that day forward there was a newness of life.

From what sources of inner strength did she increasingly minister in that sphere in which she moved? ‘Thy touch has still its ancient power,’ and no one who knew this unresting, unhasting, well-balanced life, but felt it had drawn its spiritual strength from the deep wells of Salvation.

In these years the kindred points of heaven and home were always in the background of her life. Her sisters’ homes were near her in Edinburgh, and when her brother Ernest died in India, in 1910, his widow and her three daughters came back to her house. Her friendship and understanding of all the large circle that called her aunt was a very beautiful tie. The elder ones were near enough to her own age to be companions to her from her girlhood. Miss Simson says that she was more like an elder sister to them when she stayed with the family on their arrival from Tasmania. ‘The next thing I remember about her was when she went to school in Paris, she promised to bring us home Paris dolls. She asked us how we wanted them dressed, and when she returned we each received a beautiful one dressed in the manner chosen. Aunt Elsie was always most careful in the choice of presents for each individual. One always felt that she had thought of and got something that she knew you wanted. While on her way to Russia she sent me a cheque because she had not been able to see anything while at home. She wrote, “This is to spend on something frivolous that you want, and not on stockings or anything like that.”’

‘It is not her great gifts that I remember now,’ says another of that young circle, ‘it is that she was always such a darling.’

These nieces were often the companions of Dr. Elsie’s holidays. She had her own ideas as to how these should be spent. She always had September as her month of recreation. She used to go away, first of all, for a fortnight quite alone to some out-of-the-way place, when not even her letters were sent after her. She would book to a station, get out, and bicycle round the neighbourhood till she found a place she liked. She wanted scenery and housing accommodation according to her mind. Her first requirement was hot water for ‘baths.’ If that was found in abundance she was suited; if it could not be requisitioned, she went elsewhere. Her paintbox went with her, and when she returned to rejoin or fetch away her family she brought many impressions of what she had seen. The holidays were restful because always well planned. She loved enjoyment and happiness, and she sought them in the spirit of real relaxation and recreation. If weather or circumstances turned out adverse, she was amused in finding some way out, and if nothing else could be done she had a power of seeing the ludicrous under all conditions, which in itself turned the rain-clouds of life into bursts of sunlight.

Mrs. Inglis gives a happy picture of the life in 8 Walker Street, when she was the guest of Dr. Inglis. Her love for the three nieces, the one in particular who bore her name, and in whose medical education she deeply interested herself, was great.

She used to return from a long day’s work, often late, but with a mind at leisure from itself for the talk of the young people. However late she was, a hot bath preluded a dinner-party full of fun and laughter, the account of all the day’s doings, and then a game of bridge or some other amusement. Often she would be anxious over some case, but she used to say, ‘I have done all I know, I can only sleep over it,’ and to bed and to sleep she went, always using her will-power to do what was best in the situation. Those who were with her in the ‘retreats’ in Serbia or Russia saw the same quality of self-command. If transport broke down, then the interval had better be used for rest, in the best fashion in which it could be obtained.

Her Sundays, as far as her profession permitted, were days of rest and social intercourse with her family and friends. After evening church she went always to supper in the Simson family, often detained late by pacings to and fro with her friends, Dr. and Mrs. Wallace Williamson, engaged in some outpouring of the vital interests which were absorbing her. One of the members of her household says:—

‘We all used to look forward to hearing all her doings in the past week, and of all that lay before her in the next. Sunday evening felt quite wrong and flat when she was called out to a case and could not come to us. It was the same with our summer holidays. Her visit in September was the best bit of the holidays to us. She laid herself out to be with us in our bathing and golfing and picnics.’

The house was ‘well run.’ Those who know what is the highest meaning of service, have always good servants, and Dr. Elsie had a faithful household. Her cooks were all engaged under one stipulation, ‘Hot water for any number of baths at any time of the day or night,’ and the hot water never failed under the most exacting conditions. Her guests were made very comfortable, and there was only one rigid rule in the house. However late she came downstairs after any night-work, there was always family prayers before breakfast. The book she used was Euchologion, and when in Russia asked that a copy should be sent her. Her consulting-room was lined with bookshelves containing all her father’s books, and of these she never lost sight. Any guest might borrow anything else in her house and forget to return it, but if ever one of those books were borrowed, it had to be returned, for the quest after it was pertinacious. In her dress she became increasingly particular, but only as the adornment, not of herself, but of the cause of women as citizens or as doctors. When a uniform became part of her equipment for work, she must have welcomed it with great enthusiasm. It is in the hodden grey with the tartan shoulder straps, and the thistles of Scotland that she will be clothed upon, in the memory of most of those who recall her presence.

It is difficult to write of the things that belong to the Spirit, and Dr. Elsie’s own reserve on these matters was not often broken. She had been reared in a God-fearing household, and surrounded from her earliest years with the atmosphere of an intensely devout home. That she tried all things, and approved them to her own conscience, was natural to her character. Certain doctrines and formulas found no acceptance with her. Man was created in God’s image, and the Almighty did not desire that His creatures should despise or underrate the work of His Hand. The attitude of regarding the world as a desert, and human beings as miserable sinners incapable of rendering the highest service, never commended itself to her eminently just mind. Such difficulties of belief as she may have experienced in early years lay in the relations of the created to the Creator of all that is divine in man. Till she had convinced herself that a reasonable service was asked for and would be accepted, her mind was not completely at rest. In her correspondence with her father, both in Glasgow and London, her interest was always living and vital in the things which belonged to the kingdom of heaven within. She wandered from church to church in both places. Oblivious of all distinctions she would take her prayer book and go for ‘music’ to the Episcopal Church, or attend the undenominational meetings connected with the Y.W.C.A. Often she found herself most interested in the ministry of the Rev. Dr. Hunter, who subsequently left Glasgow for London. There are many shrewd comments on other ministers, on the ‘Declaratory Acts,’ then agitating the Free Church. She thought the Westminster Confession should either be accepted or rejected, and that the position was made no simpler by ‘declarations.’ In London she attended the English Church almost exclusively, listening to the many remarkable teachers who in the Nineties occupied the pulpits of the Anglican Church. It was not till after her father’s death that she came to rest entirely in the ministry of the Church of Scotland, and found in the teaching and friendship of Dr. Wallace Williamson that which gave her the vital faith which inspired her life and work, and carried her at last triumphantly through the swellings of Jordan.

St. Giles’ lay in the centre of her healing mission, and her alert active figure was a familiar sight, as the little congregation gathered for the daily service. When the kirk skailed in the fading light of the short days, the westering sun on the windows would often fall on the fair hair and bright face of her whose day had been spent in ministering work. On these occasions she never talked of her work. If she was joined by a friend, Dr. Elsie waited to see what was the pressing thought in the mind of her companion, and into that she at once poured her whole sympathy. Few ever walked west with her to her home without feeling in an atmosphere of high and chivalrous enterprise. Thus in an ordered round passed the days and years, drawing ever nearer to the unknown destiny, when that which was to try the reins and the hearts of many nations was to come upon the world. When that storm burst, Elsie Inglis was among those whose lamp was burning, and whose heart was steadfast and prepared for the things which were coming on the earth.