THE Wairarapa Age MORNING DAILY. TUESDAY, JANUARY 14, 1908. A MATTER FOR INVESTIGATION.

Wairarapa Age, Volume XXXI, Issue 9027, 14 January 1908, Page 4

THE Wairarapa Age MORNING DAILY. TUESDAY, JANUARY 14, 1908. A MATTER FOR INVESTIGATION.

In a Wellington ; contemporary of •yesterday's date appears an article occupying nearly three columns in length narrating the adventures of a man who was a few weeks ago committed to the Purirua Asylum as a dangerous lunatic and released as perfectly sane after about a mnoth's detention. The story is a most remarkable .cue, hut is apparently frank and consistent throughout, and, we think, calls for investigation. The matter lias been submitted by our Wellington contemporary to Dr. Hassell, of the Porirua Asylum, who, while holding it improper for him to I express any opinion, seemed to agree that the ex-inniatj "had told a very clear and circumstantial story."'' lie i pointed out, however, that "a man could not ; be trusted as a judge of his own sanity." A local doctor who was approached on the subject declined to make any statement, because to do so would infringe the canons of "professional etiquette." All he could say was that the man's story was remarkable for its detail and eonsecutiveness. Briefly put, the story is this: —A working man was entrained at Wellington for employment up country. He had been drinking heavily, but was not nearly bordering upon delirium tremens, and by the time he had reached a certain station he felt too ill to proceed further. Alighting at that station he consulted a medical practitioner, who, after examining him, told him he required a couple of days' roßt in the hospital. Thither

he went, and remained five days, seeing the doctor daily. While there he was annoyed by the skylarking of the matron and a young man who visited her every evening, and, his rest being disturbed, he remonstrated with the woman, who became very angry. He threatened to report her to the hospital doctor if the annoyance continued. She forestalled him, and reported him by telephone for "using abusive language.'" The doctor refused to listen to his explanation. Subsequenty the matron said she would have him sent to a lunatic asylum for his interference, rang up the doctor again—at about 11 p.m. — and told him a story about the patient having hallucinations and singing out in his sleep. This the patient denied. Ten minutes later a policeman arrived, arrested him and took him to the lock-up without preferring any charge against him. A certificate of lunacy had been given ,by one doctor, who had never spoken to him, and the man was marched to the train next morning, where a second doctor was brought by the police, a constable whispering "there's no doubt he's just a bit mad, because he told the matron he was tired of life and meant to commit suicide." This, the man states, was an untruth. The policeman also told the doctor that the matron bad told him the man had said that two of his relations in the Old Country had committed suicide, and that he himself had been in an asylum there. This also the man declared to be untrue. The rest of the story relates to the doctor's questioning of the "patient" (and if th.2 account is true the questions were not such as could decide the matter of sanity); the issue of a warrant describing him on this evidence as a "dangerous lunatic," the mental sufferings he underwent as he was haled to Porirua and placed in a padded cell; the inferential verdict of the doctor by his liberation from the maniac division, and the kindly treatment he had received in the institution until he was released after he had served the time of incarceration provided by the law for all persons committed to the asylum, whether sane or insana. Tint period, it would seem, 13 one month. The day the man was released he proceeded to Wellington and immediately ontained employment. 'lt is dear from the above epi_ tome that the matter cannot be allowed to rest where it is. Should tha story in the main.be found unworthy of credence, it still opans up the important question of the methods aJopted to decide whether a person is sufficiently insane to be • committed to a lunatic asylum, or, as we now euphemistically term it, a hospital for,.the treatment of mental diseases. 'There are cases, of cours?, in which there'can ba no doubt about the insanity of the persons alleged to be insane, but thercj are many instances in which sanity or otherwise is not to be satisfactorily settled in a few minutes by putting a number of queries to the suspected person; and "this we have reason to believe is a common method of deciding the mental state of a prospective patient; in the first instance. Of course, after committal to an asylum the patient is placed under more or le3s strict observation, and - if the examiners' diagnosis is found to be incorrect liberation will follow; but meanwhile the sufferings of the unfortunate victim may be savere enough to shake his whole mental fabric. The taint of the asylum may never be entirely removed from such a person. Tha danger of wrongful committal would doubtless be minimised by having suspected persons examined in the first instance by experts in mental diseases. At present any two madical men may give a certificate of insanity; but how many medical men have made that special study of mental diseases which warrants them in declaring in all cases whether a man is insane or sound of minO? Possibly I very few. Herein lies thd danger to the suspect, and any man may during his lifetime give some cause to doubt his entire sanity. In face of the case under notice the public conscience will not be satisfied until a full investigation is made and the defects of the system remedied where defects are demonstrated. Other questions of public concern may arise out of the particular case under notice if the authorities undertake to have a full investigation made.