Washington standard. [volume] (Olympia, Wash. Territory) 1860-1921, 1874-09-12


records of insane asylums showed al
most as great percentage of recover
les as thore of hospitals for other dis
eases. Although many of our asylums
in some respects are susceptible of vast
improvement, philanthropists may we'll
point with pride to them, when COM
pared to the "Mad House" of fifty
years ago. Even now, it is not an un-
common belief among those whose op-
portunities have been very limited for
observing this disease, that it invar,
bly, accompanied with violent and dan
gerous paroxysms, which render it alb
solutely necessary that patients be
placed in confinement, to prevent them
from doing injury to the community at
large. This leads to the conclusion
that insane asylums have for their chief
object he-protection.. of the.community,
and as this is one of the objects for
which jails md prisons are provided,
the two classes of institutions are apt
to be regarded in the same light; the
inmates of both being deprived of their
liberty, because unsafe for the people
outside. Perhaps it is not unsafe to
say, that impressions similar to those
mentioned, which may prevail, accord
ing to the amount of knowledge on the
subject, are frequently the cause of great
injustice to patients. For instance:
n man may, have been suffering long
time from bodily disease, Which had
shattered his nervous system; finally
his mind became deranged, and his
friends, or enemies, as the case may be,
have concluded to send him to the insane
asylum. Consequently, he was submit
ted to an examination, and adjudged
insane He was turned over to the
tender mercies' of sheriff, or his
deputy, who made little or no discrim-
inatior between him and other prison
ers placed in his care. Although he
may have been perfectly harmless, and
manifest 10 desire whatever to escape,
he was cast into Jail in common with Grim
inals, and probably handcutfed, until it
suits the convenience of his captors to
remove him to the asylum
There is no form of disease, whose
ctiology has been wrapped in deeper
mystery, nor has been the subject of
more speculation, than that of insanity.
Since, however, more thorough knowl-
edge of its pathology has been devel-
oped, its causes are better understood.
The causes of insanity are usually
spoken of as predisposing and creating
causes. Of the former, such as age
hereditary taint, epilepsy, low degree
of civilization, and the like, can OF
course, only in certain sense, be
termed causes, when being concurrent
conditions, existing i'll the person, who is
insane at the time. An individual who
has hereditary taint, arriving at Il
certain age, meets with some severe
mental shock, or bodily injury, becomes
insane; whereas, a person without these
predisposing causes, survives these mis-.
fortunes with his mind unimpaired.
Inherited insanity does not prove tha,
the patients parents were insane; they
might have been subject to other dis.
eases of the nervous system, such as
epilepsy, chorea, hystoria, hypochon.
dria, or chronic drunkenness, which
decended to their children in some form
of insanity; or, again, persons may in.
herit the disease from grandparents, il
having skipped one generation. This
form of transmission is called otarisn
The age of the individual generally de-
termines the form of the disease. In
youth, we ind it characterized by feel.
ings of eXaltation, often with mania
later i'll life, when vitality begins to
wane, the malady is marked by depres-
sion, or melancholia; and in old age
by imbecility, and dementia. Few
cases of insanity arc met with during
the first decade of life; in the second
it is quite frequent; but in the period
between twenty-five and forty five years
tho number reaches its maximum. At
ter this, the number decreases as age
advances. The difference in the num-
Der of the two sexes, who become in
sane, is not great. OF those admitted
to asylums. the males slightly predom-
mate; but the mortality is also greater
among male patients, so that taking our
asylums throughout the country, we
shall probably find the female patients