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Till now there was a separate hospital assistant getting the full pay of his
rank. The full pay of a hospital assistant varies from Rs. 37-8-0 to Rs. 82-8-0,
according to his rank, &c. The last incumbent used to get Rs. 52-8-0 for this
one duty, which was very little after all.
Now, at my suggestion, the Deputy Surgeon-General has given the work to
the dispensary hospital assistant, who gets Rs. 10 only and does the same work
satisfactorily. Besides the general dispensary establishment is so scanty that
the present lock-hospital servants have to be employed on the dispensary work.
This, I think, is not proper. If the dispensary establishment be increased to what
it ought to be as given in Cooke's Manual, page 549, not a single servant,
except a matron, would be required for the lock-hospital. As it is at present,
the municipality saves something and the Government are unfairly out of pocket.
Thus it will be seen that by carrying out the above suggestions the expenses
of this lock-hospital will be reduced very nearly to one-half.
In the Chief Commissioner's Resolution No. 4002-63M. on lock-hospitals, the
following paragraph occurs :—" It is said that the sailors belonging to the vessels
" in port benefit greatly by the protection the lock-hospitals give ; this may be so,
perhaps it is so, but the Chief Commissioner cannot find proof of the statement."
Now, with reference to this, I beg permission to point out that any one who
knows the habit of Jack on shore, on thinking over the matter a little, cannot deny
the fact that sailors must and do benefit by the protection given by lock-hospitals
as a rule ; that the first two places a sailor visits when on shore are the grog-shop and
the brothel-lines. He has not the chance as a permanent resident has of coming
in contact with those women who are not on the register and yet carry on pros-
titution on the sly. Thus he has no option but to resort to those women who are
on register and who keep brothel openly ; and if these women were not looked
after as is done by a lock-hospital, the ravages they would do among the poor
seamen would be incalculable. But with all this to produce actual proof of the
statements as the Chief Commissioner wants I must say it is very difficult, and
the difficulties are the following :
—
In the first place there will not be many among the commanders of vessels
who would take any interest in the matter and give any trustworthy information.
In the second place, what information can we get from these vessels ? It is
rarely the case that the same vessel comes in port year after year. Perhaps the
vessel does so, but it is not probable that the same commander and the same
crew always come back.
Then, again, even if they do come back, they as a rule come direct from
Europe or other places out of India where there may not be lock-hospitals.
Thirdly, to ascertain whether they get any disease in this port or not is also
very difficult. Because as a rule they do not stop very long, or at any rate not long
enough for the disease to make its appearance outside, and even if it does so, it
being not very severe in the beginning, the victim does not seek for treatment
immediately, but keeps quiet till he actually cannot work, and then he is forced to
give it out ; by this time he may very likely be somewhere in the midst of the sea.
Since the receipt of the Chief Commissioner's Resolution there have not been
many ships in the port. There were only three vessels since then,—two foreign ones
(one French and the other Italian) from Europe and one English steamer from
Galle. All had European crew ; they had no sickness of any kind both on arri-
val and on their leaving this port. The commanders of the two foreign ships
had no opinion to offer on the subject, but the commander as well as the chief
officer, more especially the latter, of the English steamer were in favour of main-
taining the lock-hospital.
The commanders of the local steamers are on the whole in favour of keeping:
up the lock-hospital here.
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