To proceed. The Commissioners calculate on an addition of 4817 beds to the number provided in January 1858 (according to our correction, in round numbers, 4500), and proceed to say, that "if to this estimate ... we apply the ratio of increase in the numbers requiring accommodation observable during the last year, some conclusion may be formed as to the period for which these additional beds are likely to be found sufficient to meet the constantly increasing wants of the country, and how far they will tend towards the object we have sought most anxiously to promote ever since the establishment of this Commission, namely, the ultimate closing of Licensed Houses for pauper lunatics. On the 1st of January, 1857, the number of pauper lunatics in County and Borough Asylums, Hospitals, and Licensed Houses, amounted to 16,657. On the 1st of January, 1858, this number had increased to 17,572, showing an increase during the year of 915 patients; and of the total number 2467 were confined in the various metropolitan and provincial Licensed Houses.
"Assuming, then, that during the next two years the progressive increase in the number of pauper lunatics will be at least equal to that of the year 1857, it follows, that on the 1st of January, 1860, accommodation for 1830 additional patients will be required; and if to this number be added the 2467 patients who are now confined in Licensed Houses, there will remain, to meet the wants of the ensuing year, only 520 vacant beds. It is obvious, therefore, that if Licensed Houses are to be closed for the reception of pauper lunatics, some scheme of a far more comprehensive nature must be adopted in order to provide public accommodation for the pauper lunatics of this country."
This conclusion must indeed be most unwelcome and discouraging to the rate-payers, and to the magistracy, in whose hands the Government reposes the duty of providing for the due care of pauper lunatics in County Asylums. To the latter it must be most dispiriting, when we reflect on the zeal and liberality which have generally marked their attempts to secure, not merely the necessary accommodation, but that of the best sort, for the insane poor of their several counties. It is, indeed, an astounding statement for the tax-payer to hear, that, after the expenditure of one or two millions sterling to secure the pauper lunatics of this country the necessary protection, care, and treatment, and the annual burden for maintenance, that a far more comprehensive scheme is demanded. No wonder that the increase of insanity is viewed as so rapid and alarming; no wonder that every presumed plan of saving expense by keeping patients out of asylums should be readily resorted to.