A VISIT TO A LUNATIC ASYLUM IN ENGLAND.

Wairarapa Daily Times, Volume 2, Issue 284, 8 October 1879, Page 2

A VISIT TO A LUNATIC ASYLUM IN ENGLAND.

- Las); week I went to Hanwoll Asylum, I had an order to visit in my pocket, and a letter to the Governor, Mr Larcombe. But this letter I did not deliver, because I thought that, as a casual visitor, I should be more likely to see the every day life of the place. Passing through agate, where I showed my pass to a porter I found myself in an avenue, at the end' of' which were some largo buildings occupying tlnee sides of a quadrangle, with a chapel in the middle. I was directed to go to a door on the left hand and ring. An official opened it and showed me into a large, comfortably-furnished vooafts where some clerks at a table were occupiHSf in noting down a list of tho clothes of patients who had Just'--been, received, Soon an official with a bfoflv 0 f ]j eY g • begged me to follow liini, W® passed through several doors, and found ourselves in the quarters of the male patients. To describe one ward is to describe them all. Each consists of a long wide corridor along the sides of which small tables, with American armchairs before them, are ranged. Opening into the corridor there is a living room, with chairs and tables, a piauo, and a bagatelle board; a diningroom; and one or more larg® sleeping rooms, with 20 or 30 beds. Beyond this there is another corridor, with small rooms on each side, some of them padded. Tha walls of the corridors are prettily painted by the patients, and everything is scrupulously clean. Some of the lunatics were engaged in household work, others paint-' ing and decorating the walls of the corridors. Had I not known the contrary I should have supposed they were perfectly saue. Sitting in the corridors and over the ,fire 3 in the rooms were other lunatics and many of them stood about with a solemn dreary expression like storks on a housetop. Outside there were lunatics working in the fields' attached to the establishment ; others were walking about in the garden, and others were pacing about in large enclosures. What surprised me was the quiet of the place. The lunatics neither addressed each other, nor the attendant, nor me. It was quite a relief when I saw one man violently clapping his hands, and another pacing round and round the enclosure as though lie were walking a race, for I positively began to ask myself whether I was not an intruder amongst a class of philosophers above all sublunary thoughts, and myself the only lunatic. My attendant told me that never under any circumstances, are the patients punished, or even shut up separately. When they arrive they are put into a ward, and they almost invariably behave quietly, They have pianos on which those who can play do play, and they have games with which they occasionally amuse themselves, and a library and newspapers for them to read, but they very'seldom do read. If they do not like to work they are free to be idle, but most of them are glad of an occupation, more particularly because small rewards are given to them for diligence. Many of them are allowed to visit their friends, and to walk in the neighborhood of the asylum, and thev always return to it at the appointed hour, for they seem to - regard it as a comfortable home, and have no desire to leave it. A considerable percentage are cured every year. 'These are. first liberated on probationer a month, and then at the end of the month, if they have shown no signs of relapse,.,®.'definitely discharged, Six J days in the .week they have meatr'aSf fish oil the other day. Many of them are sane, except on some particular point and those who have not some special delusion seem to be mo>'e stolidly stupid than actively insane.-In almost all cases they are aware that they are in a lunatic asylum, and without , precisely understanding why they are there, imagine themselves to be sane, but know that their companions are mad. They seldom quarrel, except like sane people, on some point of meum and teum. Every Mon- 1 day evening they have either a ball or a concert, when they meet the female patients. Occasionally, too, they have picpics, They till about eighty acres, which produces all the fruit and vegetables required for the establishment, and they have the charge of thirty cows. They have a tailoring-room, where they themselves make their clothes. Sometimes a patient is brought in a straight jacket. It is immediately taken off him, and he is introduced into a ward. The attendants speak loudly to him, and he makes himself at once- more or less at home. In each of the large sleeping rooms an attendant occupies a bed, The patients are in bed about ten hours, and far from tho sleep being disturbed, as I always heard was the case with lunatics, they sleep exceedingly well, Those who have separate rooms generally suffer from fits, or are otherwise physically ill, and the few who are in padded rooms are apt to fall about during the night, Then I went to the women's side, which is on the right. I rang tho bell and entered a room with about a dozen women, old and young in it (> and an attendant, They were just going to have tea, and except that one was talking to herself, they seemed very stupid but very sane. A young lady soon came to take me over the wards. They ate built on the same plan as on the men's side, but their inmates are far more talkative.—Truth.