The Sun.
London, England, 1841-03-24 00:00:00

TREATMENT OF THE INSANE
POOR.

A pamphlet with this title, published by Ridgway,
contains much useful information on the want of reme-
dial treatment for the poor of unsound mind in England,
and on the proposal to confine them in the wards of
workhouses. The writer, a medical man long acquainted
with the treatment of the insane in rural districts, ob-
jects to the clauses in the New Poor-law all transfer-
ring tho insane to the care of the Poor-law Commis-
sioners, as well as to certain clauses in an Act for the
treatment of paupers renewable this Session, and recom-
mends that in each county or in certain districts of two
or more counties lunatic asylums should be ercc!el
distinct from the union workhouses.

As under these Acts," he says, " the treatment of all
paupers of unsound mind not in public asylums is regu-
lated, and as by the Parliamentary return in 1837, Et ap-
pears that of 13,667 lunatics and idiots on the palish books,
2,780 only were in public asylums, while 1,491 were in
private institu ions, and 9,396 were subjec!cd to no reme-
dial treatment, but under the care and management of
the guardians of the poor were maintained as in or out of
door paupers,' the present time seems highly favourable
fur obtaining more effective laws, and a more humane
treatment, for this most destitute class of society."
Iti another place he adds—

" The cure of lunacy seems to depend almost entirely
upon its being immediately dealt with. Lord Lyndhurst in
his invaluable speech on the subject, Dec. 23, 1830, Ee's
down the ratio of cures under ordinary circumstances,
where no pans are taken as to early treatment, as lin 2 1-
6Ji and 1 in 21 ; but the testimony of asylum kt epere as to
success where immediate measures are taken, is far more
gratif)ing. Dr. Willis declares 9 lunatics out of JO
recovered if they were placed under his care within three
months from the attack ; Dr. Burrowes has reported 221
cures out of 242 recent cares ; Dr. Finch has stated that
61 out of 69 patients have recovered, who were received
into his asylum within three months after the first attack
of this disorder, and at the Retreat, near York, 7 out of
8, or perhaps a larger proportion of recent cases Isaac ter-
minated in recovery. It has been found.' says the
Gloucester Asylum Ilepert last year, ' that thirteen fif-
teenths are cured, if sent within the first eight weeks."
The following extracts expose the absurd tests of
sanity too often acted upon in Courts of Law and Com-
missions of inquiry into Lunacy :
" A man otherwise sane thought Dr. Sims our Saviour,
and a person likewise. intelligent ordinarily imagined he
corresponded with a princess in cherry juice, and the
judges, the visitor, and jury, respectively in each ea-,e,
thought the patient deserving of confinement. On the
second, Mr Blundell'e will cause, a barrister is sail to have
He entertained strange opinions as to the Corn-
laws The witness replied, Most strange, very like
what I have read in the House of Commons specchee'
Then a gentleman misspelt the word through in a letter,
threw,' and found it labelled 'this is lunacy.' In another
irstaure a mart's sanity was to be tested by his knowledge
of the multiplication table ; and Dr. Pritchard mentions a
case of a person of property, who imagining Queen Char-
lotte was in love with him, the Chancellor granted a Com-
mission against him, and when declared a lunatic, his
accounts were found by his committee so intricate that they
could not unravel them. But the lunat:c enabled his sane
friends to surmount all difficulties, and became actuel!y, if
not formally, the steward of his own estate. The ab-
surdity, because a person has a delusion on one point, of
assuming that he is altcgether of unsound mind, has been
exposed in all ages, and yet we are dilly acting as though
no experience had warned us on the subject."
England has done less in this respect (the treatment of
lung ics) than most other countries, and it is paiefal to
compare the institutions for mental diseases in the poorest
Roman Catholic communities with those of rich and Pro-
testant England. Tho proposal to shut the poor up in
wards of wcrkbouses, if adopted, will not only inflict
long years of pain and suffering on those upon whom we
have already imposed sufficient torment, but must degrade
the country in the eyes of those other European nations who
estimate highly the discharge of this undeniable duty to
our neighbour. The plan of inclosing in one ward the
furious and the fatuous, mutually to torment each other
for the rest of their lives, seems borrowed from the ima-
gination of some Dante, and not gathered from sources
which should influence a Christian Legislature. A recom-
mendation t > destroy these sufferers would be mercy in
comparison to leaving them to drag out such an existence.
The proposal of the Poor-law Commissioners leaves the
Government no longer the power of halting between two
opinions. The cry is loud for inquiry; the Magistrates in
Middlesex petition for it ; all the authorities, Combo,
Browne, Pritchard, and even Dr. Conolly, i❑ the last
Hanwell Report, agree as to the deplorable state of many
of the asylums in England; and Mr. Pcrceval's book has
been very generally read, which bears a strange testimony
on the subject.
with three efficient
The public asylum not kept for gain,
bead officers, the chaplain, the superintendent, and the

medical attendant, wholly independent of each other ; and
ti -e Magistrate, not as a mere visitor, but as proprietor of
the house, engaging, paying, and discharging the per-
sons employed, and yet with no pecuniary interest therein,
is the true remedy for the exiitiog state of things.
The Illadhou,-,.e Bill might perhaps be advantageously
submitted to the following changer. The erection of
asylums made compulsory, and Vie clause retained allow-
ing the junction of c•miniics. Of these asylums it should
be directed that the plans before budding, are pa3Fevi by
the Metropolitan Commissioners Board, or by some ether
compt,teut body, in order to insure that all cDotingeri&es
are provided for, and indeed to prevent that lavish expen-
diture which has done much towards checking the increase
of these asylums. The rich patients should be excluded,
and a junction with other, and anomalous, bodies, is very
undesirable, such as subscribers, or City Magistrates, .SLe
Patients residing in the county, if there is room after the
public paupers were provided for, might be admitted, to
be treated in every respect as the poor, and paying, as is
now the case at Lancaster, such a weekly sum over and
above the board, as would defray their debt to the county
for the use of the buildings. The cost of such a public
asylum, when compared with that of wards provided with
the conveniences ParFarrent would insist upon, if stated,
would show immediately the ire:gibility of the latter plan.

LATEST NEWS FROM AMERICA

(From the Liverpool Times, of 23d March.)
The Oxford, the New York packet ship of the Ist of
Marcb, ariii.ed in tiiia port on Sunday. The pap. rs
which she brings are not of a later date than these
brought by the Colombia steamer, of which we gtvo
a very full account last Tuesday. in a second
edition, but the New York Express of the Ist
March contains a few interesting particulars as to
the business before Congress, not contained in the papers
received last week. From this paper we learn that the
motion of Mr. Salton.stall, for appropriating the sum
of $500,000 to the purpose of building war steamers, in
addition to the sum of $1,495,000, voted for the build-
ing, wear and tear, and repair of the ravy generally,
had passed the House by a majority of sixteen votes, after
having been previously rejected in a committee of the
whole House, by a msjJrity of 67 to 62. It is a curious
proof of the lengths to which party spirit is carrried in the
Uri:ed States, that the warlike Mr. Pickens, and the
Van Burenites generally, who voted for his- gunp)wder
report, voted against Mr. Saltonstall's proposal to build
steam ship,' both in the Committe2 and afterwards in
the House, Mr. Pickens himself assertirg that he had
not the slightest wish for war, nor any expectation of it !
Similar language was also held by other members of the
Van Buren party. The following is the summary given
by the New York Express of the measures carried in the
sitting of the 27th February—by- far ill:, most important
of the session, if estimated by the amount of business done.

NAVY, ARMY AND INDIAN BILLS.
WASHINGTON, FEB. 27,
The Navy and Army Appropria:iin 13:113 both passed
the House of Representatives t,-:-day. The former was
taken from the Committee of the whole last evening, and
the latter this evening at an early' hour. The late period
of the session, and the everla-ting talk upon the va,ious
propositions before both Houses of CongresF, make it ne-
cessary to state results.

The Nary Bill passed with an important amendment,
appropriating the amount askei for in the amendment so
long under consideration, and introduced by Mr. Salton-
stall of Moss. In addition to $1,425,000 far Cie build-
ing, wear and tear and repair cf ships, $575,000 are ;:p-
-propristed for these purposes, $500,000 to be expended
for the erection of steam ships of war of a middling claic.
The same arneodraent was rejected in Committee cf the
whol but passed in the House by a majority of some six-
teen votes.

It is worthy cf remark, that those valiant men, like the
Chairmanof the Commi,t2eon foreign relations, who telkcd
so much of tsar in a blustering report, were all found in
opposition to the appropriation of the navy. The whole loco
foco party, always so brave on paper, were net honest
enough to vete an appropriation hardly beginning to carry
out the principles of their report. Yeu have the yeas and
nays, and they arc worth putting upon record. It is the
part of unsophisticated locofocoism, to look one way and
row another. It was only last week that this war report
received so much favour in Congress by the supporters of
the Administration, and to-day the same men stood forth
in resistance of the measure. This is in character.
The Army Bill was passed without amendment. Mr.
Evans, of Maine, presented ouc, which was warmly
cussed, and in reference to an incL eased appropriation for
the Florida service. It was lust in the evening by a ma-
jority of only seven votes.
Tie Indian Bill, making appropriations for the Indian
service for the current year, was considered in Cemmit:te,
and reported to the House.
A 8,11 for defraying the expenses of a delegation
of Indians to Florida was token up and laid aside. A
Bill in relaii-m to destitute Indians was also passed in
Committee and in the House. Before the adjournment
the four Bills were ready for the Se. a'e, and will he
forwarded on Monday. The House (to render honour to
whom honour is due) have done a good day's work.
What las bee.' done, too, has been as well done as it
would have been had the discussion been prolonged for a
month.

In the sitting of the 26th, the House refused to take any
steps for armir g a naval force on the Canadian lake:.

LUPE MAL PARLIAMENT.

HOUSE OF COMMONS, MABcfr 23

The SPEAKER having taken the Chair at the usual hour,
The Glasgow. Paisley, and Greenock Railway Bill was
read a third time and passed.
METROPOLIS IMPROVEMENTS BILL.
Mr. E. J. STANLEY moved " To diiichargc the Or-
der far telerrilig the Metropolis Improvements Bill toCom-
mittee of Selection, a-id to refer 8:11 to Select Committee
of last Session for Metropolitan Improvement., ,viz. Mr.
Edward John Stanley, Sir Matthew Wood, Mr. Herri,s,
Mr. Wakley, Mr. Clay, Sir Benjamin Hall, Col. Thomas
Wood (Middlesex), Mr. Robert Stewart, Lord Viscount
Loather, Sir De Lacy Evans, Mr. George Palmer, Mr.
Barnard, Mr. Kemble, and Mr. Alderman Humphery.
Mr. GREENE felt it his duty to oppose the motion.
The Bill was a private Bill, and although it was
introduced by the Government, be did not think it
ougt tto be dealt with out of the ordinary course. Only
the other day, in the case of the Severn Navigation Bili,
the House refused to alter its rules respecting private Bills
—he thought most wisely, and 11.1. trusted they would fol-
low the same course upon that occasion.
Mr. E. J. S'IANLEY—Tho 13111 before the House
partook mere of a public than of a private character,
and, during the last two or three Sessions, the practice
had been to refer Bills of a similar nature to Select
Committees. He thought it would be extremely inju-
dicious to heve the measure now referred to an entire')
new tribunal, who might take a totally different view of
the question. Od these grounds be hoped the Hon. Ge::-
tleman would not pi rsevcre in I is opposition,
Afer a few words from Mr. BARNARD and Sir R.
INGLIS,

Mr. ESTCOURT said he should feel it his duty to
oppose the motion of the Hon. Secretary to the Treasury.
Sc brig as it sui,eci the views of Vie parties bringing for-
ward the measure they Lad treated it as a private Bill, and
now they chimed the awe plivileges as if it were a public
Bi 1.

Mr. T. DUNCOMI3E hoped the Hon. Member for
Lancaster would riot persist in hie motion.
Mr. STANLEY said be had discotered that there was
an objection in point of form t his motion, and therefore
be should, with the leave of the House, withdraw it, and
move that it be an instruction to the Commice3 of Selec-
tion to refer the 1111 to the Members named in his motion.

M. HUME wished to know from the Speaker whether
the Bill was to be considered a public or a private out?
The SPEAKER was understood to say that the Bill
partook cf the nature of both, being a public Bill affecting
private inte.rezts.

The motion was then withdrawn.
BARNSTAPLE ROADS BILL.

On the motion for the further consideration of the Re-
port of the Committee on this Bill being read,
Mr. FOX M A LTLE said the present Bill was for the
reeea•al of an Act for the construction of roads upon which
considerable sums of money had been expended. In the
present Bill he had been compelled to introduce two clauses,
the first to provide for the security of those who advanced
money on the undertaking, and the second related to the
expenditure of money.
Sir JAMES GRA HA M wished to know whether there
was any felause to maintain the rights of creditors, as at
present established. He would not, however, object to
the printing of the clauses for the purpose of further con-
sideration,

debate was 0-. ea adjourned, and the clauses were
ordered to be printed.

ST. ALBAN'S ELECTION PETITION.
Tbe following Members were sworn in at the table of
the House for the trial of the St. Alban's election petition :
—Wm. S. Dugdale, Wm. Hutt, J. W. Bramston, P. S.
Mildmay, A. Pringle, Hun. E. Elliot, and E. San-
ford, Esgri:._