LUNATIC ASYLUMS IN BENGAL.
11
returns of establishment should be so prepared as to show separately the cost of
superintendence and of the lower service. These orders were received too late
to be carried out in the returns now summarised. It is necessary therefore to
mention once more the exceptional position of the Dullunda Asylum in
respect of establishment. Allowing for the difference of salaries of Superin-
tendent, Deputy Superintendent, and Matron, the cost per head on this account,
as it should be stated for comparison, is Rs. 58. The expenditure was less than
before under every head, but in the above statement it appears larger from the
failure of industrial returns to be presently explained. The sum of Rs. 30,900,
entered as expended, represents the total receipts for asylum use from Govern-
ment direct and from the manufactures, less the receipts from paying-patients
remitted to the treasury. The total cost of each lunatic in 1879 was Rs. 138
against Rs. 166 in 1878, or Rs. 142 in 1879, if purchase of land and contin-
gencies for paying-patients be included, against Rs. 173 in 1878. From
the treasury there was drawn Rs. 22,082 against Rs. 28,499 in 1878 and
Rs. 28,926 in 1877. The receipts from paying-patients were less by nearly
one-half than in 1878, and from the manufacturing department more: this
increase is not real. The heading of the return No. 9 is worded to show
the value of manufactured articles, and it has been usual to fix this value by
bazar price-lists corrected each month. This was disallowed in 1878, and
the cost of production only was entered. To make the figure correspond
with the industrial account, no profit was entered on the articles made over
for asylum use. It has been lately ordered that such articles are to be made
over for use without any intermediary, with reference to the practice in some
places of selling produce to a purveyor and repurchasing from him, but it is
not intended, I presume, that only cost price shall be charged, as to do this is
to ignore the contribution which the lunatics make to their own maintenance
without improving the financial statement. The total expenditure at Dul-
lunda therefore is weighted with a charge for profit which it did not bear
in 1878. The rest of the excess is due to diminished receipts and values of
material and produce in store, which resulted in a money profit of Rs. 1,713
only on labour. The reasons for the falling off are these. Fall in market
prices and loss on produce manufactured at a high cost; absence of the
Deputy Superintendent and some loss of business connection; transfer to
jail of recovered lunatics, including the best workmen; absorption of labour
in cleaning tanks and redeeming bustee land annexed to the asylum, for which
no charge was made in the accounts, but which, valued at the price received
for lunatics similarly employed outside, was worth Rs. 2,553.
29. The establishment at Dullunda cost in 1879 less by Rs. 2,115 than in
1878. From the 9th of September the Superintendent drew a reduced salary.
For six months the Deputy Superintendent's salary was not drawn from provincial
funds. There was reduction in the scale of the lower establishment. The cost
of establishment per head was Rs. 77 against Rs. 92 in 1879. After deducting
the difference of special salaries, the figure to be used for comparison with
other asylums is Rs. 58 against Rs. 61 in 1878. This figure was erroneously
given in the Surgeon-General's report in 1878.
30. The cost of diet was less by Rs. 8-7 per man than in 1878.
Prices fell considerably, and the new diet scale was cheaper, even when
bazar prices were charged instead of actual costs. In clothing there is a
trifling increase in charge, which is also unreal, being due to the substitution
of value for mere cost. Bazar medicines were nominal in cost as before.
Contingencies fell, though the list included some charges which elsewhere would
have been met by the Public Works Department, and included also Rs. 557, paid
as compensation to the lessee of the land which was annexed to the asylum
grounds, and Rs. 249 spent on paying-patients.
31. It may be mentioned also that the acquisition of new land involved
the erection of a new garden shed with gardener's quarters, which was charged
to the manufacturing department.
32. In the Dacca Asylum, establishment cost Rs. 9,144 in 1879, against
Rs. 9,007 in 1878. The civil hospital assistant received his allowance for
qualification in English, and the writer the stipulated increment of Rs. 2.
There was also the expense of an officiating overseer during the absence of the