294 A Short History of Nursing vents and monasteries, are nursed almost entire- ly by religious orders of men and women. Most of the Florentine institutions whose Italy work is much better than the average, are staffed by semi-secular Sisterhoods under secu- lar control. In these and some few other hospitals in large cities the Sisters do most of the practical nursing, but as a rule, the bodily care of the sick is left to illiterate paid attendants. The first analysis and criticism of Italian hospital nursing was published in 1901 by the wife of Pro- fessor Angelo Celli, a physician distinguished for research work in malaria, who was also at that time a member of the Italian government. Sig- nora Celli had been trained as a nurse in the mod- ern secular school at Hamburg-Eppendorf. The Cellis were both advanced thinkers on social sub- jects, and active in promoting movements for health, conservation of child life, and improvement of working-class conditions. She wrote of the nuns : The discipline of the religious orders is cer- tainly vastly superior to that of the lay nurses. . . . But this admirable discipline has one de- fect ; instead of first recognizing the medical it puts first the religious authority ... to be a competent nurse it is absolutely necessary to be thoroughly taught and not limited to the religious
