DULLUNDA ASYLUM.
25
take their meals. Formerly the verandahs and wards were used; this was, for many reasons,
objectionable. The first improvement was the distribution of food in a part of the work-sheds
cleaned daily for the purpose. As work increased, space here became scarce, and the people
were fed in the open air. The ground, however, could not be kept clean; and the swarms of
flies which collected on the food, and were often swallowed with it, made the inspection of meals
a nauseating task. There is now completed a large, substantial, and handsome building, devoted
solely to the preparation and issue of food. The cook-room and bakery occupy one end of
it. They are thus removed, with all their inconvenient belongings, from the dwelling-
houses of the lunatics; and the issue of food taking place under the same roof, there is no
need of carrying it about or uselessly exposing it. Ultimately the whole interior will be
protected from flies and other vermin by complete walls of perforated zinc. This material,
and its iron frame-work, are expensive. Hitherto the cook-room and bakery only have been
provided with it. It so fully answers its purpose that I cannot doubt that the money is well
spent, although perhaps to any one who had not watched the people at their meals, such a
provision as this might seem fanciful. The money value of the building estimated, as in the
department of public works, in its present state, is Rs. 4,168. Other smaller buildings for
various purposes, and a moderate estimate for improving the large tank, raise the total value of
unpaid lunatic labour to the sum given in tables 10 and 11.
17. General treatment and management.—General treatment and management have in no
way differed from the practice of former years. The use of a bag made of soft, but strong,
woollen material for the confinement of men in dangerous phrenzy, has been continued with
the best results, and has met with your approval, as well as with that of every professional
visitor.
Its use is not confined to preventing a mad man from damaging himself or his neigh-
bours ; it is constantly found to tranquillize excitement, which yields to no other treatment:
and this not by any terror that it inspires, or pain that accompanies it, but because it simply
restrains mischievous movement without causing discomfort or alarm. It is more gentle, safe
and strong, than the hands of the best tempered attendants, and is thus the best preventive of
one principal cause of fatal exhaustion in mania.
I have never seen the smallest reason to regret its employment; but in the case of the
man who died from violence, I have since regretted much that the bag had not been used.
The current of opinion, though turning fast, has not yet set strongly in favour of mechanical,
that is, passive, restraint, as distinguished from the active, and often impatient, exercise of main
force ; so that even the most humane and successful contrivance of the kind is instinctively
avoided as much as possible.
Of the physical diseases treated, there is nothing to be said. The treatment of anæmia
and anasarca by pure milk is still very successful—not used as an article of extra diet merely,
but as a substitute for all diet, nothing else being allowed to the patient until amendment
appears.
18. Conduct of establishment.—The overseer, Mr. Bancroft, continues to deserve every
thing that can be said of a subordinate who devotes the whole energies of a very energetic
character to the improvement of the asylum and the care of the people. It matters little
what the nature of the work in hand may be—whether a refractory lunatic is to be soothed,
a servant's misconduct investigated, a garden plot to be laid out, a building erected, or
an elaborate account prepared, his activity and resources are never at fault. The matron
also is indefatigable in the female ward; industry has progressed greatly under her hand
in various branches. She derives but little assistance from female servants, and night work
makes her post an arduous one.
G