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26 A LUNATIC VILLAGE.
Note: This text has been automatically extracted via Optical Character Recognition (OCR) software. The text has not been manually corrected and should not be relied on to be an accurate representation of the item.
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Note: This text has been automatically extracted via Optical Character Recognition (OCR) software. The text has not been manually corrected and should not be relied on to be an accurate representation of the item.
Additionally, when viewing full transcripts, extracted text may not be in the same order as the original document.
Nected Happy Or Not With As Is We The A ...
are seen wandering" about in the streets _sliow that they find good nourishment in the common diet of rye breadvegetables , potatoes ,
, milk , and pork . The general drink is beer ; but patients can procure wine on extra payment , if the medical man allows of it . It is
constantly observed , that in a very few days the patient settles down contentedly to the usual regular meals .
The clothing is at first furnished by the family , the commune , or the asylum sending the insane person , and is renewed by the
administration of Gheel , which repays itself from the allowance paid for him or her . No particular color or shape of ; garment is observed' ;
dressed just like their sane neighbors , the patients are not to be remarked in any crowdunless they misbehave themselves . v Tlms ,
, all those liberties and pleasures which here and there form ( in a limited degree ) the boast of special asylums , are at Gheel the
common custom , assured to every one who is sent there ; and though the visitor "will find in the townand more particularly in the
surrounding hamlets , the signs of simp , licity carried to the very verge of povertythe real leasures and interests afforded to the patients
are greater , than in p the wealthier and best managed asylums of Paris . Luxury * alone is wantingwhich elsewhere serves but to
, hide the prison -walls . We have hitherto only described the passive existence , the
maniere d ' etre of mad people at Gheel ; they are also blessed with the liberty of doing what they likelying in bed or getting up ,
working or idling , reading , writing , and , even corresponding with their friends . Nobody hinders them in any harmless pursuit . The same
man who elsewhere would be shut up as dangerous—an object of terror to women and children—here " sits in the market-place , "
smokes his pipe at the cafe , plays , his game of cards , reads the newspapers , and takes his pot . of beer with his comrades ; only wine and
spirits are forbidden him , under pain of fine to the tavern-keeper . Thus , inside and outside the house perfect freedom prevails ; and the
complaint made by patients in asylums of being rung up in a morning , finds no place here . Dr . Parigot says , that in entering * the cottages ,
he often asked where the patient was , and was answered ,. " Notre petit _Jkfonsietir est encore concheson dejcdner est Id pres du feu qui Vattend "
, and this at ten and eleven o _* clock . If , however , the patient were simpllazyor given to the pernicious habit of lying in bed , ( not an
uncommon y , predisposition among the insane , ) he would be coaxed to rise ; and the natural tone of invitation soon draws him to follow
the general custom . So complete is the fusion , that it is by no means easy always to distinguish who is crazy and who is not . Of
two women , one of whom cooks the dinner and the other waits at tableeach of whom rivals the other in eagernessoften in loquacity ,
the guest , will not always easily discover which , is the mistress and which merely her inmate .
It being beyond question that this free and easy existence is the
happiest for men and women so cruelly afflicted ; we have to ask
26 A Lunatic Village.
26 A LUNATIC VILLAGE .
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Citation
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English Woman’s Journal (1858-1864), March 1, 1861, page 26, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse.ac.uk/periodicals/ewj/issues/ewj_01031861/page/26/
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