The Press.
London, England, 1855-05-26 00:00:00

THE SCUTARI HOSPITALS.

The following account of the present state of the
military hospitals near Constantinople is given in a
letter of the sth inst. :

There are now four hospitals at Scutari—the " Barrack,"
" General," " Palace," and Harem "—capable altogether
of accommodating 3,000 patients. Fifty-four of the medical
staff died last year. At present the wards are nearly
empty—l,7so spare beds. This morning 800 English
convalescents returned to the Crimea ; 300 more are ready,
and nearly all those remaining are doing well. There are
very few wounded left here ; nearly all the cases are of
fever, of rather a peculiar form, from which the men rarely
die. The internal arrangements of the hospitals are now
perfect, though people who have never visited an hospital
before, even in England, cannot, of course, be expected to
think so. As the men in the field have now more com-
forts as well as necessaries, so it is found that the deaths
in the hospitals decrease.
The arrangements made here by that " King of Cooks,"
Soper, have also tended much to help the sick, who now
revel in chicken-broth, jelly, Arc. The nurses and Sisters of
Charity are a great acquisition ; they add very much to the
comforts of our brave fellows. Miss Nightingale is every-
where. She was seen the other day standing and assisting
at the bedside of a poor fellow whose arm was being
amputated. She must be a woman of wonderful nerve to
witness what she is daily obliged to do. When either the
sick return to England, or the convalescents to the Crimea,
each man receives from her a small bag: for the former the
contents are a few oranges (turum()), tea, or something
suitable for an invalid; for the latter (those going to the
seat of war), pocket-knives, a looking-glass, tooth-comb,
comforters, chocolate, tobacco, Ake. The difference between
the departure of the convalescents and the landing of the
sick is awful. It would make your heart bleed. Many of
the latter are almost dying; others emaciated to the last
degree, with dysentery or fever. One soon, however, be-
comes accustomed to such horrors, and thinks of nought
but " duty." Many a grave in the burial-ground here is
marked but with an old barrel-stave, with a name rudely
carved thereon, and many are without any mark at all.
Turning from these sad scenes, I may tell you that the
Sultan's new palace is nearly completed, and is without
exception the most elegant structure in the world, and
placed in the finest possible position on the liosphorus. It
is open to the inspection of the public, as the Padisha has
not yet removed into it.
Huts are being erected at Scutari on the ground where
the Guards were encamped last year, for a strong force of
artillery, daily expected. The weather is now sultry, the
rains having ceased. We are thinning the rats and mice,
and now expect muaquitoes. We find human hair the beat
thing to stop a rat-hole.
Now that the French camp is so near, Vera has all the
appearance of a French city, and the Tuiks are beginning
to ►aucy that the allies do not intend to vacate in a hurry.
Miss Nightingale has just gone to lialaklava for a short
time to look over the " nursing " in that hospital.