The Iola register. [volume] (Iola, Allen County, Kansas) 1875-1902, 1885-11-13
THE MADRID HOSPITAL.

| THE MADRID HOSPITAL.
Description Of visit to tAs cholsr. Hoo
pital ut the Spanish Capital.
The first wards we entered were those
| Of the convalescents. They consisted
Of two large, light and airy rooms.
beautifully clean rs, indeed. the whole
Of the hospital was). in the first Of
which were about six or seven men sit
ting about and seemingly doing nothing
hut passing the time away by chatting.
They looked to me quite well, though
mostly very thin. It was q novel sight
to see 70 many poor Spaniards in SO re-
markable state Of cleanliness. l ex.
pect it was the only part of their treat
ment they found unpleasant baths.
There is no door between the mems and
women's wards. and we merely had to
step through doorway innocent of cur
tain or anything. I saw just about
the same number of women, some
of them. poor things. looking very
i'll indeed. Their faces were not pale,
but thin and drawn. One PLEASANT
looking girl 1 asked how she was. ''very
tired, very weak, but getting better"
II it had not been for the assurance of
the nurse, I should have thought she
was dying. He said that in one or two
days at most all these cases would be
discharged. just IS I was about to
leave the ward, in came q sister with
the afternoons chocolate. It was worth
while to see the way in which she was
welcomed. The patients adore the
good sisters, and not without reason.
Before leaving the convalescent ward I
was shown poor little fellow whose
father and only brother has been swept
away by the disease. and the little chap
left alone. His mother had long been
dead. The boy seemed quite . pet in
the ward, and was evidently we'll salts
fed with his present quarters.
Coming out of the ward, we turned
sharp round to the left and entered room
M. 2. This was long. narrow room,
along one side of which were ranged
twenty beds, each one tenanted by .
man. These were bad cases, and all
seemed in quite stupor. One thing l
must not omit to notice. On entering
this ward l had removed my hat. One
man, who seemed in the last stage of
exhaustion, and who was lying staring
at ms with fixed, CLASSY eyes, slowly
and with painful effort raised his hand
to his head, and took off sort of skull
cap he was wearing. Polite are these
people to the last. Three or four beds
further on l noticed, close together,
two beds, in which were the two
worst cases. The men were q terrible
sight. Their lips were the color of old
parchment, their eyes closed. seemingly
Unconscious. and dreadfully. terribly
thin. Their cheek bones seemed almost
as if they would start through their
faces. To-day" said the nurse, .'they
t1ie." And thought they would be glad
enough to do so from their appearance.
On reaching the end of this ward we
turned again to the left into square
room, in which were few women, all
very i'll. In one corner of the room
saw little cot. II was tenanted by
quite young infant should think not
more than nine or twelve months old.
1t had been in the hospital
for over twenty days. and, poor child.
bore traces of having suffered very much.
One of its arms was lying outside the
coverlet, and looked like q little stick Of
wood. To me this little wait, lying
there alone and in such a state, was the
most painful sight in the whole hospital,
and l do not mind confessing-why
should I?-that for moment had to
bite my lips pretty hard, and choke down
that would have been very
InalapropOs in person viewing the
eases in quite professional capacity.
In this ward had chat with one of
the sisters, a bright, bonny woman.
whose very presence must have been of,
one would think, as much efficacy as the
physic.
After my chat was conducted up a
large staircase to see the six new
cases which had come in and been put
to bed. They were all girls, and all in
mates of the orphan school here; one or
two of them seemed to be in pain. con-
vulsively lifting their arms and drawing
up their legs. Here was another sister,
who gave me at some length the treat
ment TO which patients are subjected
and the symptoms by which cholera ia
lOld. As these are pretty well known
shall not repeat them here, except per-
maps to mention that for six days q per-
ION ill of cholera is kept without any
'oOd whatever beyond little tea and