Page:U.S. Department of the Interior Annual Report 1873.djvu/107

Rh boilers. The appropriation for the purchase of land was disbursed by the Department.

The new wards are at least as cheerful and pleasant as any others of the establishment, and great pains has been taken to adapt their construction, furniture and nttings to the care and comfort of the excited classes of patients.

The several sums asked in the last report were appropriated in full, except that, in consequence of a misunderstanding, it is believed, a reduction of $5,500 was made in the grant for the support of the house after the bill containing the amount of the original estimate had passed the House of Representatives.

The estimates already submitted for the year ending June 30, 1875, are as follows:

1. For the support, clothing, and medical and moral treatment of the insane of the Army and Navy and Revenue-Cutter Service, and of all persons who have become insane since their entry into the military or naval service of the United States, and who are in indigent circumstances, and of the indigent insane of the District of Columbia, in the Government Hospital for the Insane, $140,785.

At the close of the year ending June 30,1873, there were under treatment in the hospital 621 patients, 41 of whom paid, on an average, the cost of their support, leaving 580 who were supported wholly by the Government. Under the acts of Congress providing for the care and treatment in this institution of several classes of insane persons at the expense of the Government, more patients were sent to it in July and August of the current year than the average monthly admissions in last year, and it is estimated that the average number of such patients that it will be necessary to provide for under existing laws in the year 1874-75, will be not less than 600. Experience shows that the expenditure of 84.50 per week for the entire maintenance, including clothing and medical and moral treatment of each patient, with a careful economy in purchasing and disbursing supplies, in the management of the farm and garden, and in the staff of assistants and employee, is barely sufficient to afford all the comforts and advantages of treatment to which the insane supported by the Government are entitled, and that the rate cannot be properly lessened. At that rate the maintenance of an average of 600 patients during the year in question, will cost the amounts asked for that purpose.

2. To supply the deficiency in the amount ($125,000) appropriated to support the hospital during the current year, (1873-'74,) $11,366.

The estimates for the current year were based upon the supposition that there would he an average of 555 patients to be supported by the Government, under the requirements of existing laws, at an estimated cost of $130,500, but only $125,000 were appropriated for this object, as before stated in this report; and instead of an average of 555 nonpaying patients, there were 580 at the beginning off this year, or 25 more than were estimated for; and there is the strongest probability that the average number of this class of patients through the year will be larger than at its beginning. The deficiency in the appropriation is $5,500, and the cost of maintaining 25 additional patients will be $5,866, and the sum of those amounts is the amount of this estimate.

3. For repairs and improvements, $15,000. Additions to the original plan of the hospital and the increase in the number of patients under treatment, render it necessary to