ANNUAL REPORT ON LUNATIC ASYLUMS.
11
The average monthly cost of feeding a European inmate was Rs. 10-3-5, and a
native Rs. 4-12-11 ; these are the averages for four months commencing September
1891, that is, after the receipt of orders of Government on this point; prior to this,
although the accounts were in a manner kept separate, they are not sufficiently
accurate to admit of the average for the year being calculated from them.
I would here refer to a cause of fluctuation in dieting lunatics which I think
has not been before referred to.
Certain lunatics have to have their whims as to diet humoured either to keep
them alive or to induce them to work. Regarding these insanes, Dr. Dobie reports
as follows :—
" Many become at times crotchety about their food perhaps they imagine
that they are being poisoned, or perhaps they have no reason at all ; but they insist
on its being changed to please them.
" To effect the determination of the disciplinarian and to refuse to humour these
persons would very often throw them into a most undesirable state of excitement
with possible violence to themselves or others, or would produce in them a still
greater evil, the lunatic's refusal of all food with nothing but the use of stomach
pump between him and starvation ; now the stomach pump, though occasionally
necessary, has since the days of humane treatment in asylums, been to a great
extent relegated to the limbo into which have been thrown ' the straight jacket, cold
shower bath and other forms of punishment or restraint.'
" To give examples :—
" Michael Duffy, a Greenock sailor, who has been here 8 years and more, some-
times insists on having 2 chickens and 2 lbs. of bread with custard, and he gets
them.
" Mr. Bacon, the oldest inhabitant of the asylum, receives all his food in the
form of extras : he is a very old man, and has been allowed this privilege for years ;
it would be most inadvisable to deprive him of it.
" Shaik Patcha, a melancholy criminal, lives entirely on 4 pints of milk and
12 plantains. If he were not humoured he would speedily refuse food and have to
be kept alive with the stomach pump.
" Imam Saheb, a queer-tempered hard-working man, is on milk diet and
extras ; if he had ordinary diet forced upon him he would become excited, violent
and dangerous. Then the workers, male and female in the gaol and elsewhere, are
persuaded to work by attention to their wishes as to diet and by rewards in the
form of extras. In consequence, a great deal of work is got out of them. So much
is done in the gaol, and so willingly and skilfully that it has been found unnecessary
to replace a weaver attendant lately dismissed, as they work without one."
Dr. Dobie does not appear to be aware that indulgences to lunatics as a reward
for work is debitable to his manufactures " Statement XI, Debits, item 14."
I have drawn his attention to this point. I would here invite attention to the
improvement in manufactures.
It must be understood that diets and extras are not recklessly lavished on all
patients who ask for them to avoid trouble ; those who work, those whose mental
state renders it advisable, and those whose health demands it, receive concessions;
and, as I before remarked, large discretionary powers must be allowed the Superin-
tendent in these matters. No comparison can be drawn between the management
of these unfortunate irrational beings and convicts in jail, who, if not amenable to
reason, can be forced by punitive measures to conform to rules.
Under Rule 58, laws relating to the management and superintendence of luna-
tic asylums, Superintendents are allowed certain freedom to vary the diet according
to the whim and caprice or the anæmic condition of the patients, the articles
substituted, however, should not in value exceed the cost of ordinary rations. The
latter part sounds well in theory, but it is not possible to always put it in practice.
The attention of the Superintendents, however, has been drawn to the rule, and they
have been directed to keep a record of all cases in which it has not been found
practicable to carry it out.
13. Income.—This is chiefly derived from two sources, viz., earnings from the
manufacturing department and the recoveries effected from the paying patients.
The receipts under both heads show a satisfactory advance over last year. The