4
Compounds.
Amusements.
gives every variety of employment suitable to different ages and physique.
A number of patients are also employed on the actual duties of maintenance
of the asylum-cooking, cleanliness, &c.,—and a large body, some 75 daily, are
required in the gardens which have now reached a very flourishing con-
dition and give an enormous crop of necessary vegetables and fodder. A small
gang of men make munj-matting, which is sold at a large profit, Rs. 2,718, and
the few that remain over are kept cutting grass, for which there is here a great
demand and profitable sale, Rs. 1,925 in 1909-10-11. More men were
formerly employed on this than at present, and much larger amounts were
made; but the growing number of
patients requires more land to bo taken
up for gardening, while the additions to the asylum had already absorbed a
large area formerly used for that purpose. In addition to employment it
has always been the endeavour to provide the inmates with comfortable
surroundings and some means of amusement. For this purpose each com-
p ound has been planted and laid out, and the course of years has now gradual-
ly transformed what were once hideous sunbaked waste into green and shady
gardens much appreciated by the occupants, while these with less destructive
patients are approaching beautiful gardens well provided with fruit trees.
In some tame animals are kept—rabbits, guineapigs, deer, fowls and peafowl,
and there is always one or two among
the insane who while refusing to work
voluntarily, occupy themselves in their care. Some of the sane men have
built themselves little praying platforms, and all are allowed to keep religious
books ; means for gymnastics are provided though rarely used ; a native paper
is taken in, and in addition to various native games the asylum possesses a
gramophone and magic lantern. Tobacco is amply provided, and at all the
native festivals and at Christmas issues of " sweet rice," fruit and sweetmeats
are made, and native jugglers and rag-doll performers engaged. A sanctioned
allowance of 10 rupees monthly is divided in rewards among the best workers
and keenly appreciated, while there are facilities arranged with the contractor
for spending this and any other private money their relatives may have
provided them with. In short everything possible is done to make their
existence as easy as possible and their surroundings pleasant, and it may
reasonably be claimed that they are as comfortable as they can be made, and
are certainly immeasurably better off while in their diseased condition here
than they could be in their own homes, where the only idea of treatment of
a troublesome insane is to bind him hand and foot and keep him a close
prisoner usually strapped to a bedstead or tied to a kikar tree liable to be bled
at frequent intervals or branded with a hot iron on the vertex of the skull
when more noisy than usual. An additional and much needed item of
comfort, however, would be the provision of beds for the large number. There
are some patients so violent and destructive as to be likely to destroy them,
but they are few, and for the vast majority this provision would be a great
boon, and one so much desired that it is to be hoped it may shortly be possible
to provide it.
Sickness and mortality.
There is always, as is usual, among insanes,—and can only be expected
from people unable and often unwilling
to protect themselves,—a large amount
of sickness which, however, varies with the healthiness of each year. After
malaria, relatively far less common among the inmates than among the
attendants outside, bowel complaints due to eating filth and rubbish and
respiratory disorders from exposure are the most frequent, while the remainder
are of a varied character not requiring special comment. The excellent new
hospital and the provision of a special Military Assistant Surgeon to have
charge of it has ensured a great improvement both in the comfort of the
sufferers and their means of treatment. Especially has this been seen in the
cases of mud-eating, which used to be so frequent, and the resulting anæmia
and anchylostomiasis. By segregation of the habitués, the separation of their
clothing and the destruction of their excreta, its spread has been absolutely
stopped and the life of those affected much prolonged ; and the same may be
said of dysentery and chronic diarrhœa, which used to be much more pre-
valent, while the spread of worms has been checked by rigid destruction of the
excreta of those affected by fire. It is a matter of great satisfaction that no
epidemic, such as that of cholera, which caused so much mortality in 1907,
has again broken out. The water-supply is excellent, and cannot well be
contaminated ; the strictest quarantine is now enforced on all new comers;
but, as before said, this greatly taxes the separate accommodation capacity, and