The evening telegraph. [volume] (Philadelphia [Pa.]) 1864-1918, 1866-08-24

| nicipality, while pretending to support and
protect the poor creatures thrown upon her
charity, is really exposing them to almost
certain death. Lest we be thought to ex-
aggerate, we will quote the exact words OF
the report
"Entering the yards of the Insane Depart
ment, we found them full of living beiuul in a
| helpless and almost hopeless condition of mind.
| These yards are complete hollow squares. one
side formed by he insane Hiding an the other
| three built up with high walls, badly ventilated
| and The atmosphere grossly impure From the
WELL placed IN the ceDtre OF The mems yard
ho1id efiluvium is sent forth, loaling the atmo-
| sphere with volumes OF sulphuretteG and car.
| buretted hydrosen gas. The same state of
| things prevails IN toe women's yard. In the
next place we made a Visit TO their sleepinr
apartments. These we found to be Gro ded be-
ytnd excess, many In large rooms, the epijeptics
on the floor. With mattresses 80 c'osr together as
TO leave scarcely room for the night watchman
to pass without troadng on the seaorrs
while other inmates were Gro Tdcd INTO dark
unventlated cells, in one OF which we found
seven beds, with no outside ventilation. When
we learned that there are from six to seven
hundred feeble-mindcd and crazed people
crowded into this limited asylum your com.
mittee are unable TO express any surprise at
me appearanCe OF pestllence among them.
1t IS no wonder chat the cholera has attacked
them; It only needed tn. touch OF tie poison to
start the disease aBd death around. They have
had up TO this time about forty cases. the most OF
which have proved fatal. Your committee de-
clare this department o. the institution to b9
nu'sance, preudical to the health of its in.
mates.n
The almost unlimited power conferred by
the law on the Board of Health enables it to
exercise powers which are not allotted to any
other body of men; and in their capacity of
watchmen over the lives of our ci izens, it is
their duty not only to declare the institution
a nuisance. but alqo to have that nuisance
abolished. "Delendd est Cdjbargo"i is the only
law which should be brought into play. 1t is
crying disgrace to the great city OF Philadelphia,
that such statement of the way it cares for
those who are thrown by nature helpless upon
its hands should go abroad. The disgrace does
not lie in its being known, but in its existing
AS the report states, there have already been
forty fatal cases in the pestilential den into
which we have thrust the pauper idiots ;andu
less prompt measures be taken, the epidemic
will spread, like fire on the rairies, amoag the
wards, and from the wards Of the Hospital to
the wards OF The city. Ii a sense of what is
due to common humanity does not prompt
the City Councils to attend to the recommen-
uation Of the Board. a sense OF selfish considc-
ration should urge hem to obey its dictates.
Unless we protect the residents of the Aims
house, We ourselves are liable to be attacked,
and in protecting them we protect ourselves.
What is now needed, what is now impera.
lively demanded, is that we follow the recon-
mendation OF the Board and cause a new
A lDnsb fp ha of O.,
OF our city. In the course of very few
years, what is now the bare and marshy
meadow Of the property over the river will
be the site of houses and factories, of
mechanics homes and railroad depots. The
intersection of four powerful roads directly
opposite the AlmshOuse marks this locality
as the destined situation for those vast ware
houses in which goods can be stored,
The presence of the pauper asylum will tend
to retard this advancement, while, il it be re-
moved the advance in value of the public pro-
perty will be such as to probably cover all the
expense of cree ing the new building. In
order, however, that this advance be secured,
it is necessary that some means OF communi-
cation be established between that part of
West Philadelphia and the east bank. A
bridge anywhere along the front of the Aims
house property would cause, beyond all queS-
ton, such rise in its value that the entire
cost OF the structure would be covered, and
sufficient left to pay for the new Almshouse.
The old one seems to us to be we'll fitted for
a depot or warehouse, and could probably be
disposed of at a fair price for such pur-
pose. 1t is q mistake for the city to allow the
vast lots belonging to her to lie year after
year unimproVed. If prompt steps were
taken, mighty revolution could be wrought.
and The disgrace of thrusting paupers in the
pen described by the Board of Health wiped
out. However that may be, it is certain that,
unless our City Fathers act promptly in the
matter, the Board will, and we earnestly hope
they may have nerve to compel the total re-
moval Of the nuisance. The seeds of cholera
and disease generated there will spread over
our fair city, and selt-interest, If not a sense
OF Christian charity, demands that the vile
wrong now being perpetrated on the insane
be at once corrected.