Volume 2

Health lectures for the people.

Date:
1883-1892
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Health lectures for the people. Source: Wellcome Collection.

    18/600 (page 6)
    opened up if we inquire into the reasons for this difference of intensity of feeling between the two countries. My own impres- sion is that this phase of popular belief was never deeply rooted in Scotland, in consequence of the long existence of those noble institutions—the Eoyal Chartered Asylums. It is true somewhat similar hospitals existed in England, but these, for the most part, were administered by close corporations. In Scotland, however, the Committees of Management of the Royal Asylums have always been largely representative, consisting of delegates from the municipal, clerical, legal, and medical bodies connected with the cities or towns in the neighbourhood of which these in- stitutions are situated, of county magistrates, and of other eminent citizens. In some instances Committees of Management are very numerous, in one instance numbering over a hundred, and in another forty. Such large memberships, although some- what cumbersome, have had the good effect of keeping the public mind at rest, and the administration of these institu- tions has always been characterized by liberality and judg- ment. The Royal Asylums of Scotland came out of all official enquiries with unsullied, nay enhanced reputation, and as a con- sequence their original constitution has never been interfered with. Another important agent, which has kept down doubt and mistrust in Scotland, is the legal procedure by which an insane person is received and detained in an asylum. In this country, when such a step becomes necessary, a responsible person, such as the Inspector of Poor, or a relative of the patient, must obtain two medical certificates that the person proposed to be confined is insane; which having been obtained, he must present a peti- tion, accompanied by a statement of particulars and the medical certificates to a Sheriff, who, if satisfied, grants an order to the superintendent of an asylum to receive and detain. This is a calm judicial process, which is applied alike to pauper and to private patients—the rich and the poor are detained on identical legal instruments. In England matters stand otherwise. In the case of private patients it is necessary to have what is termed an order/' signed by any one having a reasonable right to inter-