The Sun.
London, England, 1832-08-17 00:00:00

CHOLERA IN THE LUNATIC ASYLUMS,

The public will be sorry to hear that the cholera
las appeared in some of the Lunatic Asylums 01
he metropolis, where it has exhibited its most malig-
nant character, and already committed much fatal
havoc amongst the of cred maniacs.
The first cases occurred in the Bethnal-green Lu-
natic Asylum; arid appeared amongst the women
confined in that department of the institution called
the Red-house, many of whom the disease carried
off. Here, it is worthy of remark, were also con-
fined male lunatics; but the epidemic, which, it
would appear, can be capricious as well as dreadful,
passed them by, in the first instance, untouched,
while it was thinning the ranks of the women on
all sides of them. Opposite the Red-house is a de-
partment of the institution called the White-house,
in which numerous lunatics (men and women) are
also confined; every precaution was used to pre-
vent its appearance in the latter by Mr. Beverley,
surgeon of the Asylum, who is known to the public
as having been surgeon in the North Pole expedi-
tion under Captain Parry. The disease, however,
despite his humane efforts, which consisted in
his stopping up the door of communication, set
in a wall between the two buildings sepirating
them, and in his boarding up the windows
of the White-house, broke out in it, and attacked the
women violently, while the men, as in the Red-house,
escaped with impunity. It abated meanwhile in the
Red-house, but after a lapse of some days re-appeared
there with its or ginal violence, and then attacked
the male lunatics. It also, at this period, abated in
the White-house; but again increased there, and
attacked the men as in the Red-house, thus main-
taining its " capriciousness," if one may so use the
word in connection with the subject. Singular to
add, during all the above described time, and down
to the period of this information, a single case of the
epidemic did not appear amongst the lunatics con-
fined in another department of the Asylum, stand-
ing in front of, and in close vicinity to, the two
buildings mentioned. A most interesting and re-
markable phenomenon was observed in the cases
of the lunatics attacked by the epidemic :—Their
mania, it appears, was in every instance suspended
while they were suffering from the cholera; and
they were perfectly collected and subject to the will
of their medical attendants; but in every case of re-
covery the mania returned with the conyalescence. A
similar effect has been observed in France in per-
sons afflicted with epilepsy, and attacked by cholera;
and it goes far to establish Hunter's celebrated
maxim—that " two diseases cannot exist together
in the same body,"

follow-
ing from a letter, dated the 7th instant, written by a .
SALMON FISHING.--We extract the
re-
spectable gentleman to Fort William :—" The take of
salmon has been so great in this quarter this season that
they have run out of ice, and the fishers, for the last fort-
night, have had a number of horses employed in carrying
down snow from Ben Nevis for the purpose of packing
the fish in. There were twenty horses up yesterday, and
it is brought down in creels. This is a new traffic, and
has astonished the natives."—Inverness Journal.