( 2 )
of recoveries was too small to render a calculation of averages of any value,
there were altogether 27 cures out of a total population of 469. The mortality
per cent. of mean strength was 9.51, as compared with 6.53 in 1877 and 10.85
in the six years, 1872-77.
4. The returns for the past year show a further increase in the number of
criminal lunatics in confinement, the number of this class on the 31st December
1878 being 288, against 278 in 1877, and a daily average of 196.3 during the
ten years from 1868 to 1877. The admissions for the past ten years have been
nearly constant, having been 70 in 1878, 68 in 1877, and an average
of 66 for the ten previous years. In the resolution on the report for 1877,
the Lieutenant-Governor drew attention to the question of segregating
bond fide criminal lunatics from ordinary insane patients, and it was
stated that the question had been referred to a Committee for considera-
tion. The Committee, when submiting their report at the close of the past year,
pointed out that, however desirable it might be to have a special asylum for
criminal lunatics, the object was practically unattainable in Bengal. It would be
scarcely possible to assemble in any one building all classes of insane criminals,
those under trial, those acquitted on the ground of insanity, and those under
sentence in jails, scattered throughout the whole province. The proposal for
a special asylum for criminal lunatics has therefore been abandoned.
Recovered criminal lunatics who cannot, with reference to their previous
history, be safely discharged will in future be transferred to jail for confine-
ment under section 430 of the Criminal Procedure Code and be employed
on the jail establishments, or on light labour. The presence in the asylums of
these recovered lunatics, whom it was impossible to discharge, has long been
found to be detrimental to discipline and good management, and with their
removal the principal reason for a special criminal asylum will, as pointed out by
the Committee, have disappeared. The transfer to jail of 15 recovered criminal
lunatics has been ordered by Government since the close of the past year.
In each case the visitors certified that the prisoner had for years shown no
sign of insanity, and could safely be removed to jail, while the history of
the case showed that the man's release would not be right, though while kept
in confinement, away from the temptation of intoxicating drugs, there was no
reason to fear a fresh outbreak of insanity. In such cases as these, the removal
of the prisoner from the depressing surroundings of a lunatic asylum by his
transfer to active life in jail is an act of humanity to the prisoner as well as
desirable in the interests of good discipline and economy.
5. Of 1,264 persons who were under treatment during the year, 259 were
suffering from acute mania, 487 from chronic mania, 114 from melancholia,
61 from acute dementia, and 297 from chronic dementia. There was a satis-
factory falling-off in the number of cases of chronic mania and chronic dementia,
the number of cases of these forms of lunacy, which are seldom capable of cure,
having been respectively 548 and 331 in 1877. There were 11 cases of idiocy
and 5 of imbecility in each of the past two years, one case of dementia in 1878
against two in 1877; and 29 cases were described as "not insane," against 36
similarly entered in 1877. No explanation is given regarding these cases, but
the persons described must, it is assumed, have been sent to the asylums on the
certificate of the Civil Surgeon, or after acquittal on the ground of insanity,
although on arrival at the asylums they may have shown no signs of insanity. Of
123 new admissions, in which the predisposing cause of insanity was ascertained
and recorded, 111 are assigned to physical and 12 to moral circumstances. Of
the former, 85 cases were attributed to the excessive use of ganja, bhang and
churrus, 5 to spirits, and 3 to opium. In 5 cases the cause assigned was heredi-
tary predisposition, and 9 cases were attributed to grief. Of the whole number
of patients in the asylums in 1878, the cause of insanity is given in 601 cases, and
405 of these are assigned to the excessive use of ganja, bhang, churrus, spirits
and opium. Out of the 405, only 69 completely and 14 partially recovered
during the year. The previous occupations of only 199 out of 227 patients
admitted and re-admitted during the year were ascertained: of these, 111 were
cultivators, coolies, beggars, or unemployed; of the remainder, 25 were
servants and 11 shop-keepers.
6. The health of lunatics in confinement was better during the past
year than in any of the three previous years. The average daily number