In the yard of a poorhouse in the southern part of the State, I was conducted by the mistress of the establishment to a small building constructed of plank; the entrance into a small cell was through a narrow passage, bare and unlighted. The cell was destitute of every description of furniture, unless a block of wood could be called such; and on this was seated a woman-clothed, silent and sad. A small aperture, opening upon a dreary view, and this but a few inches square, alone admitted light and air. The inmate was quiet, and evidently not dangerous in her propensities. In reply to my remonstrances in her behalf, the mistress said that she was directed to keep her always close; that otherwise she would run away, or pull up the flowers! "How is she warmed in winter?" I inquired. "Oh, we just heat a stone and give her," was the laconic reply. "Your other patient-where is he!" "You shall see; but stay outside till I get a lantern." Accustomed to exploring cells and dungeons in the basements and cellars of poorhouses and prisons, I concluded that the insane man spoken of was confined in some such dark, damp retreat. Weary and oppressed, I leaned against an iron door which closed the sole entrance to a singular stone structure, much resembling a tomb; yet its use in the court-yard of the poorhouse was not apparent. Soon, low, smothered groans and moans reached me, as if from the buried alive. At this moment, the mistress advanced, with keys and a lantern. "He's here," said she, unlocking the strong, solid iron door. A step down, and short turn through a narrow passage to the right, brought us, after a few steps, to a second iron door, parallel to the first, and equally solid. In like manner, this was unlocked and opened; but so terribly noxious was the poisonous air that immediately pervaded the passage, that a considerable time elapsed before I was able to return and remain long enough to investigate this horrible den. Language is too weak to convey an idea of the scene presented. The candle was removed from the screen, and the flickering rays partly illuminated a spectacle never to be forgotten. The place, when closed, had no source of light or of ventilation. It was about seven feet by seven, and six and a half high. All, even the roof, was of stone. An iron frame, interlaced with rope, was the sole furniture. The place was filthy, damp, and noisome; and the inmate, the crazy man, the helpless and dependent creature cast by the will of Providence on the cares and sympathies of his fellow-man-there he stood, near the door, motionless and silent; his tangled hair fell about his shoulders; his bare feet pressed the filthy, wet, stone floor; he was emaciated to a shadow, etiolated, and more resembled a disinterred corpse than any living creature. Never have I looked upon an object so pitiable, so wo-struck, so imaging despair. I took his hands, and endeavored to warm them by gentle friction. I spoke to him of release, of liberty, of care and kindness. Notwithstanding the assertions of the mistress that he would kill me, I persevered. A tear stole over the hollow cheek, but no words answered to my importunities; no other movement indicated consciousness of perception or of sensibility. In moving a little forward, I struck against something which returned a sharp metalic sound; it was a length of ox-chain, connected to an iron ring, which encircled a leg of the insane man. At one extremity, it was joined to what is termed a solid chain-namely, bars of iron 18 inches or 2 feet long, linked

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together, and at one end connected by a staple to the rock overhead. My husband," said the mistress, "in winter, rakes out sometimes, of a morning, half a bushel of frost, and yet he never freezes"-referring to the oppressed and life-stricken maniac before us. "Sometimes he screams dreadfully," she added; " and that is the reason we had the double wall, and two doors in place of one: his cries disturbed us in the house!" "How long has he been here?" "Oh, above three years; but then he was kept a long while in a cage first: but once he broke his chains and the bars, and escaped; so we had this built, where he can't get off." Get off! No, indeed; as well might the buried dead break through the sealed gates of the tomb, or upheave the mass of binding earth from the trodden soil of the deep grave. I forbear comment. Many persons, after my investigations here, visited this momument of the utter insensibility and ignorance of the community at whose expense it was raised. Brutal, wilfully cruel, I will not call them, black as is the case, and fatal as were the results of their care! But God forbid that such another example of suffering should ever exist to be recorded.

sane.

New York, according to the census of 1840, had 2,340 idiots and inI am convinced that this estimate was below the certain number by many hundreds. In 1841, the Secretary of State reported 803 supported at public charge. In 1842, the trustees of poorhouses estimated the number of insane poor then confined in the jails and poorhouses at 1,430. In 1843, I traversed every county in the State, visiting every poorhouse and prison, and the insane in many private families. The hospital for the insane at Utica was opened in January, 1843, and during the year received 276 patients-all, with the exception of six, being residents of the State of New-York. On Blackwell's island were above 300; at Bloomingdale, more than 100; 26 were at Bellevue. Besides these, I found, chiefly in the poorhouses, more than 1,500 insane and idiots, 500 of whom were west of Cayuga bridge. In the poorhouse at Flatbush were 26 insane, not counting idiots; in that of Whiteplains were 30 insane; at Albany, between 30 and 40; at Ghent, 18; in Greene county, 46; in Washington county poorhouse, besides "simple, silly, and idiotic," 20 insane. Nearly every poorhouse in the State had, and still has, its "crazy house," "crazy cells," "crazy dungeons," or "crazy hall;" and in these, with rare exceptions, the inevitable troubles and miseries of the insane are sorely aggravated.

At A, in the cell first opened, was a madman. The fierce command of his keeper brought him to the door-a hideous object: matted locks; an unshorn beard; a wild, wan countenance, disfigured by vilest uncleanness; in a state of nudity, save the irritating incrustations derived from that dungeon, reeking with loathsome filth. There, without light, without pure air, without warmth, without cleansing, absolutely destitute of everything securing comfort or decency, was a human being-forlorn, abject, and disgusting, it is true, but not the less a human beingnay, more, an immortal being, though the mind was fallen in ruins, and the soul was clothed in darkness. And who was he-this neglected, brutalized wretch? A burglar, a murderer, a miscreant, who, for base, foul crimes, had been condemned, by the justice of outraged laws and the righteous indignation of his fellow-men, to expiate offences by ex

clusion from his race, by privations and sufferings extreme, yet not exceeding the measure and enormity of his misdeeds? No; this was no doomed criminal, festering in filth, wearing wearily out the warp of life in dreariest solitude and darkness. No, this was no criminal-"only a crazy man." How, in the touching language of Scripture, could he have said: "My brethren are far from me, and mine acquaintance are verily estranged from me: my kinsfolk have failed, and my familiar friends have forgotten me: my bone cleaveth unto my skin and my flesh. Have pity upon me, have pity upon me, for the hand of God hath touched me."

I turned from this sickening scene only to witness another yet more pitiable. In the far corner of a damp, dark dungeon on the right was a human creature-" a woman dreadful bad," said the attendant, who summoned her in harsh tones to "come out :" but she only moved feebly amidst the decaying mass of straw, uttering low moans and cries, expressive both of physical pain and mental anguish. There she lay, seemingly powerless to rise. She, too, was unclothed; and in this dungeon, alone, in want, and pain, and misery; no pure air, no pleasant light, no friendly hand to chafe the aching limbs, no kind voice to raise and cheer, she dragged out a troubled existence. I know nothing of her history; whether forsaken by able kindred, or reluctantly given over to public charity by indigent parents, or taken in, a wandering, demented creature. I only know that I found and left her reduced to a condition upon which not one who reads this page could look but with unmitigated horror. Do you turn with inexpressible disgust from these details? It is worse to witness the reality. Is your refinement shocked by these statements? There is but one remedy: the multiplication of well organized hospitals; and to this end, creating increased means for their support. In the same poorhouse, in the " crazy cellar," were men chained to their beds, or prostrate on the ground, fettered, and painfully confined in every movement. There were women, too, in wretched, unventilated, crowded rooms, exhibiting every horrible scene their various degrees of insanity could create.

In Bpure air.

In T

the cells in the crazy cellar admitted neither light nor

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the cells for the insane men were in a shocking condition. In A- were above twenty insane men and women in the poorhouse, mostly confined with chains and balls attached to fetters. By adopting this plan," said the master of the poorhouse, "I give them light and air, preventing their escape; otherwise I should have to keep them always in the cells." A considerable number of women, mostly incurables, were "behind the pickets," in an out-building: there was a passage sufficiently lighted and warmed, and of width for exercise. There was no classification; the noisy and the quiet mutually vexed each other. One woman was restrained by a barbarous apparatus to prevent rending her clothes: it consisted of an iron collar investing the throat, through which, at the point of closing in front, passed a small bolt or bar, from which depended an iron triangle, the sides of which might measure sixteen or eighteen inches. To the corners of the horizontal side were attached iron wristlets; thus holding the hands confined, and as far apart as the length of the base line of the triangle. When

the hands and arms were suddenly elevated, pressure upon the apex of the triangle, near the point of connexion at the throat, produced a sense of suffocation; and why not certain strangulation, it was not easy to show.

Not distant from the poorhouse I found a woman in a private dwelling, supported by two invalid sisters; she was in the highest state of phrensy, and nearly exhausted the patience of love in those who toiled laboriously for her and their own scanty maintenance. She had once been transferred to the poorhouse; but patience was never there exercised in behalf of the unruly; and bearing the marks of harsh blows, she was taken again by her sisters, to share "the little they could earn so long as they or she should live."

In E, the insane, as usual, were unfitly disposed of. To adopt the language of a neighboring farmer, "those damp dreary cells were not fit for a dog to house in-much less for crazy folks."

At R, and M- and L, and B- were repetitions of the like dismal cells-heavy chains and balls, and hopeless sufferings. After my visit at L, I found one of the former inmates at the hospital in charge of Dr. Brigham. He bore upon his ankles the deep scars of fetters and chains, and upon his feet evidence of exposure to frost and

cold.

In B, several idiots occupied together a portion of a most comfortless establishment. One gibbering, senseless creature was the mother of an infant child.

At A, the most furious were in narrow cells, which were neither cleaned, warmed, nor ventilated. In O―, was an insane man, so shockingly neglected and abused that his limbs were crippled, so that he could neither stand nor walk; he was extended on a miserable dirty pallet, untended and little cared for.

At E, the insane were confined in cells crammed with coarse, dirty straw, in the basement, dark and damp. They are," said the keeper, "taken out and washed, (buckets of water thrown over them,) and have clean straw, once every week."

In H——, were many furiously crazy. Several of the women were said to be the mothers of infants, which were in an adjoining room. pining with neglect, and unacknowledged by their frantic mothers.

I pass over hundreds of desperate cases, and quote a few examples from my notes in New Jersey; altogether omitting Canada East and West, as being without the limits of the United States; though corresponding examples with those in New York were found in almost every direction. In 1841, there were found in New Jersy, upon a rather cursory survey, two hundred and fifty-two insane men, one hundred and sixty-three insane women, and one hundred and ninety-six idiots, of both sexes. I traversed the State in 1844; the numbers in every county were increased, and their miseries were also increased. Sixty patients had been placed in the hospitals in New York and Pennsylvania, but hundreds still occupied the wretched cells and dungeons of almshouses, and of prisons. In the winter of 1845 several froze to death, and several perished through severe exposure and alarm at a fire which consumed a populous poorhouse. At S, of eight insane patients, several were heavily chained, and two were furiously mad.

In one poorhouse was a man who had been chained by the leg for more than twenty years, and the only warmth introduced into his cell was derived from a small stove-pipe carried through one corner.

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I

On a level with the cellar, in a basement room, tolerably decent but bare of comforts, lay upon a narrow bed a feeble, aged man, whose few gray locks fell tangled over the pillow. As I entered he addressed one present, saying, “I am all broken up-broken up!" "Do you feel much weaker, Judge ?" "The mind, the mind is going-almost gone," responded he, in tones of touching sadness. This feeble, depressed old man, in a lone room in the poorhouse-who was he? I answer as I was answered. In his young and vigorous years he filled various offices of honor and trust in his county. His ability as a lawyer raised him from the bar to the bench. As a jurist he was distinguished for uprightness, clearness, and impartiality. He was also judge of the orphans' court, and was for many years a member of the legislature. He was somewhat eccentric, but his habits were always correct. could learn nothing remembered to his discredit, but much which commends men to honor and respect. He had passed the meridian of a useful and active life. The property, honestly acquired, on which he had relied for comfortable support in his declining years, was lost by some of those fluctuations in monetary affairs which so often procure unanticipated reverses. He became insane: soon, insanity took the form of furious mania: he was chained, "for safety;" and finally, for greater security, committed to the county jail-a most wretched place -dreary, damp, and unfurnished. Time passed: a more quiet state supervened. He was placed at board in a private family, till the remnant of his once sufficient property was consumed, and then he was removed to the poorhouse. Without vices and without crimes, he was at once the victim of misfortunes and the prey of disease. A few months subsequent to my visit the almshouse was consumed by fire. The inmates, barely rescued, were hastily removed, and such cares rendered as the emergency demanded. Fires were kindled in the court-house, and a portion of the poor removed thither. Of this number was Judge S. His pallet was laid within the bar, below the bench where he had once presided. The place perhaps revived painful memories he was conscious of his condition; spoke of his trials; languished a few days; and, in the good providence of God, was then released from the pains and afflictions of this mortal life, and, it is believed, passed to that state of existence where all tears are wiped from all eyes, and where troubles are unknown.

In P, the cells in the cellar for the insane were in a most wretched condition. In M, the insane, and many imbeciles, were miserably housed, fed, and clothed. In the vicinity of the main building was one of brick, containing the poor-cells, from eight to nine feet square. A straw bed and blanket on the floor constituted the furniture, if I except the ring-bolts and iron chains for securing the patients. In P, I found the insane, as usual, ill provided for. One madman was chained, clothed only with a straight jacket, laced so as to impede the motion of the arms and hands: cold, exposed, and offensive to the last degree, his aspect, wild and furious, was as shocking as his language was coarse and blasphemous. Such care was bestowed as the keepers of the poorhouse