450 Pauper Lunatics. [Nov. 



But such protection, it will be said, is already afforded. Lunatics are 

 actually placed under the tutelage of the Chancery ; and, with authority 

 so unlimited, or at least so indefinite, as is that of the court, all abuses in 

 the management of lunatics surely might he promptly remedied. Yes, in a 

 hundred places we read lunatics are so protected ; but books and facts 

 especially law-books and facts are frequently at variance ; and the fact 

 in this case is, that it is the rich lunatic only who is under the Chancel- 

 lor's guardianship. With respect to the rich lunatic, too, it is rather his 

 property than his person with which the court is concerned ; at least, 

 where no property appears, we never yet could learn let law-books say 

 what they will that the lunatic was ever the better for the honour of so 

 distinguished a guardian. So far as the persons even of rich lunatics are 

 concerned, the Chancellor's supposed authority is delegated to a Medical 

 Commission, consisting of five physicians and a secretary, all appointed by 

 the College, but perhaps approved by him. Returns, at all events, are 

 annually made to his court ; but let the reader learn it will probably be 

 new to him that no returns are made of pauper lunatics. The Commis- 

 sioners visit all mad-houses within the pale of their jurisdiction a few 

 miles only round London ; but, in the clause which directs them to make 

 returns of lunatics, pauper lunatics are expressly excepted ; and, if the 

 Commissioners do bend their lofty regards upon them, it is by straining the 

 terms of their authority, and not in consequence of any orders or powers 

 specifically entrusted to them. Remonstrances, it seems, they rarely make; 

 and when they do, they appear and no wonder, unauthorized as they 

 are to be treated with pretty uniform contempt. Mr. Warburton we 

 shall find generally forgetting such remonstrances were ever made, and, 

 when occasionally brought to his recollection, bearing testimony to his own 

 neglect of them. 



The office of this Medical Commission, then, amounts to visiting, once in 

 the year some of the larger establishments twice and reporting upon the 

 condition and management of those lunatics, who may, perhaps, with 

 some small degree of propriety, be said to be under the Chancellor's pro- 

 tection ; and the ultimate object of the visit is to prevent sane persons from 

 being deprived of liberty under pretence of insanity, and of securing to the 

 insane proper treatment while under restraint. How far these objects are 

 accomplished by these means how far the property is protected, liberty 

 respected, and cruelty restrained it is not our present business to discuss. 

 That, in the two last respects, the expedients are effective, can scarcely be 

 predicated. 



The immediate question before us is the fate of pauper lunatics. Our 

 attention is drawn to the subject by a Report, published by the Committee 

 of the House of Commons appointed to inquire into the state of Lunatics 

 and Lunatic'Asylums, and especially into that of the Pauper Lunatics in 

 the County of Middlesex. The report almost exclusively concerns the 

 treatment of the male paupers belonging to the parishes of Marylebone, St. 

 George's Hanover-square, and Pancras, confined in an establishment 

 called the White House, at Bethnal Green, kept by a Mr, T. Warburton. 

 From this establishment, about a twelvemonth ago, the parish of Maryle- 

 bone withdrew their paupers to the number of forty or fifty disapprov- 

 ing of the severity and neglect with which they were treated. This cir- 

 cumstance probably led to the appointment of the committee, and certainly 

 influenced them in first directing their inquiries to the state of the White 

 House. To the report containing the results of these inquiries, we shall, 



