Twenty-first annual report of the directors of the Dundee Royal Asylum for Lunatics : submitted in terms of their charter to a general meeting of directors, July 5, 1841.

  • Dundee Royal Asylum for Lunatics.
Date:
1841
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Twenty-first annual report of the directors of the Dundee Royal Asylum for Lunatics : submitted in terms of their charter to a general meeting of directors, July 5, 1841. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    ranted in saying, have been hitherto, during the short period of her official career fully realized ; and they are confident that these powers will con¬ tinue to develope themselves in a stronger light, and with more efficient and beneficial energy, as Mrs Kilgour becomes more habituated to her charge. In truth, this lady has a mind cast in no ordinary mould. That her immediate predecessor, reared, as she had been, at the feet of one who has distinguished himself in his researches and writings on the intellectual faculties, and their operations—on the causes which occasionally and sud¬ denly lead to their obscuration—and on the probable means of their restoration to the power of correct discrimination and rationality—that with such advantages of parental training and instruction, Mrs Hunter should have possessed superior qualifications for the charge which an Asylum for Lunatics imposes upon its Matron, is a fact not, perhaps, calculated to excite much astonishment and wonder : But that a lady who never, till the situation became vacant, had a view to anything of the kind —who had passed all her previous life in domestic retirement—should feel sufficient resolution and confidence in herself to exchange the peaceful duties to which she had been accustomed, for the more laborious respon¬ sibility which now attaches to her, is not a little surprising : But that she should no sooner enter upon the responsibility, but exhibit all the quali¬ fications necessary for its due discharge, is a proof of a strength of moral powers truly wonderful, and must excite the highest admiration. The fact is, that from the moment Mrs Kilgour commenced her official duties, not a difficulty seemed to present itself to her. The patients, both male and female, won by her gentle and urbane manner, evinced towards her from the first, and continue to evince the most unbounded affection and respect. The servants in every department of the House fell cheerfully and readily under her sway, and speak of her as a mistress whom they are anxious to obey and please. In short, the management of the whole interior economy of the Establishment became easy at once, and Mrs Kilgour discharges it as if she had been accustomed to it for years. The Directors, therefore, think it their duty to declare—and they are satisfied that the declaration will give unfeigned pleasure to their late Matron, for no one could have the interests of the Dundee Asylum more at heart than she had—that her place has been in every particular most amply and ably supplied; and that among the events of this prosperous year—for it has been one of great prosperity to the Institution—they regard the appoint, ment of Mrs Kilgour as the principal feature. As the Directors have been expressing their grateful sense of the excel * lence and usefulness of one of the official heads of their Institution, they