New Ulm weekly review. [volume] (New Ulm, Minn.) 1878-1892, 1891-09-16
IN A CHINESE HOSPITAL,
How The Mongolians Treat Their Sick
and Injured People.


Recently there was a fire in the
basement of 724 Pacific street. says the
San Francisco Examiner. The police
rushed in and found that a half dead
Chinaman had upset a coal oil lamp
upon himself. His cries were too
feeble to be heard, and it was only the
smoke and the smell of burning rags
and flesh that at length attracted at
tention to him. The Chinaman was a.
fearful sight. He was wasted away
from disease, his BODY was covered
with the most awful sores, and the
flesh burns extended all over the old
ulcers.
In the place he was found were half
a dozen other sick Cinnamon. It was
the hospital of one of the big Chinese
companies. The place is below the
level of the street, full of opium smoke
and lighted with ill-smelling and smok-
ing lamps. In the rear is a Chinese
kitchen.
No one, it seemed paid any attention
to the invalids. A bowl of rice was
placed by each bunk, and the sick man
could eat if he was able or starve if
he was not.
In the largest room the boss of tho
place was pleasantly entertaining
some friends, unvexed by the troubles
of the sick men. Two rows of hunks
along the walls one above the other
were the sick beds. In one of the up
per berths lay a Chinaman, with his
head hanging over the Side. He was
thought to be dead, but was really
only in an opium stupor. Some chairs
and the hunks constituted the only
furniture in this room.
The burned Chinaman was attended
to at the receiving hospital and was
then taken out to the pest house. He
had no Infectious disease, but he had
to go out among the small pox patients
and lepers simply because there was
no other place for him to go.
This, to some extent, explains why
the ugly sick dens in Chinatown exist.
A Chinaman is not particularly gentle
with a sick man. and has positively no
use for dying one. Some time ago
! the police found one of them nearly
dead with dropsy, lying on the side
walk. He had simply been thrown
with his rags of blankets out OF one of
these hospitals.
The Chinese six companies once
! bought lot and subscribed S75, 900 to
| build big hospital for their sick. The
| nelghbors, however, protested, and
! they were not allowed to build. So
they stow their sick around in the
noisome holes of the Chinatown. There
are quite a number of these hospitals
some better and some worse, andsall
crowded. Six. eight or a dozen sick
! Cinnamon will be all together in a
room big enough for two. Then there
| are other places, darker and more
awful, where solitary lepers in the last
stages of disease are hidden. These
are seldom reached by the police, for
they are usually two stories under
ground and in the very center of q
block. In such a locality, under some
stairway, the lepers friends keep him
concealed. He never leaves his corner
until he dies.
Lately the hospital on Pacific
street was visited again. The foul
odors were nearly all gone, the place
had been cleaned up and there was not
a patient there.
Where are the sick men?" was
| asked of the "bOss''
"Allee got well-go way" he
| answered.
They feared that the police would
raid them after the vi1eness of the
place was revealed, and so cleaned up
to be in readiness to receive such a
visit.