UPON SALUBRITY OF A SURGICAL HOSPITAL 125 



these wards upon the ground-floor had been unhealthy, but that they had not 

 been absolutely pestilential. Yet at the very time when this shocking dis- 

 closure was being made, I was able to state, in an address which I delivered 

 to the meeting of the British Medical Association in DubUn,^ that during the 

 previous nine months, in which the antiseptic system had been fairly in operation 

 in my wards, not a single case of pyaemia, erysipelas, or hospital gangrene had 

 occurred in them ; and this, be it remembered, not only in the presence of con- 

 ditions likely to be pernicious, but at a time when the unhealthiness of other 

 parts of the same building was attracting the serious and anxious attention 

 of the managers. Supposing it justifiable to institute an experiment on such 

 a subject, it would be hardly possible to devise one more conclusive. 



Having discovered this monstrous evil, the managers at once did all in 

 their power to correct it. The extent of the corrupting mass was so great that 

 it seemed out of the question to attempt its removal ; but it was freely treated 

 with carbolic acid and with quicklime, and an additional thickness of earth 

 was laid over it ; and, further, a high wall at right angles with the end of the 

 building, and reaching up to the level of the first floor, so as necessarily to confine 

 the bad air most prejudicially, was pulled down, and an open iron railing was 

 substituted for it. 



There can be no doubt that these measures must have proved salutar}'. 

 But even if it were admitted that they cured completely the particular evil 

 against which they were directed, it would still have to be confessed that the 

 situation of the surgical hospital has been far from satisfactory Besides having 

 along one of its sides the place of sepulture above alluded to, one end of the 

 building is conterminous with the old Cathedral churchyard, which is of large 

 size and much used, and in which the system of ' pit burial ' of paupers has 

 hitherto prevailed. I saw one of the pits some time since, having been requested 

 to report upon it by one of the civic authorities, who is also a manager of the 

 infirmary, and who, having accidentally discovered what was going on, at once 

 took steps to prevent for the future the occurrence of anything so disgraceful. 

 The pit, which was standing open for the reception of the next corpse, emitted 

 a horrid stench on the removal of some loose boards from its mouth. Its 

 walls were formed, on three sides, of cofiins piled one upon another in four 

 tiers, with the lateral interstices between them filled with human bones, the 

 coffins reaching up to within a few inches of the surface of the ground. This 

 was in a place immediately adjoining the patients' airing ground, and a few 

 yards only from the windows of the surgical wards. And the pit which I in- 

 spected seems to have been only one of many similar receptacles, for the Lancet 



' Sec p. 45 of this volume. 



