TRANSACTIONS OF THE SECTIONS. 105 



attempt to apportion tlie dietaiy to the different conditions of separate confinement 

 in cells, of activity, and of forced laboiu- of most vaiying degTee ; but schemes have 

 been in use, some of which are very far below the food obtained by the worst-fed 

 men in freedom, and others quite equal to that of the labouring- middle class in this 

 country. One having- conmiitted a small offence against the law will be fed upon 

 a dietaiy of bread and water or bread and gruel, and be compelled to carry on the 

 hardest labom- known; whilst another, and perhaps an old offender, having 

 conunitted a serious breach of the laws, will be fed upon food much better than he 

 ordinarily obtained in freedom, and be kept in inactivity, or engaged in light handi- 

 craft or in occupations which are not laborious. 



The Earl of Carnarvon's Committee, fidly impressed with these defects and 

 anomalies, recommended that a Commission should be issued with power to deter- 

 mine various questions of dietary by exact research — a Commission which, from the 

 difficultv of the iuquirj^, must have comprehended some of the best men of the day ; 

 but instead of this a Committee of medical officers of convict prisons was appointed, 

 who, without experiments of any kind, omitting the chief subjects of inquiiy, and 

 avowedly discarding scientific Imowledge, have recommended a new scheme, which 

 in its nutriment leaves the dietary much as it foi.md it — lowering, however, the low, 

 and raising the high dietaries, whilst they believed that they had effected the con- 

 verse — but which throws upon the medical officers of the prisons the most serious 

 responsibility of deciding whether a given prisoner shall be submitted to the " pro- 

 gressive dietaries " which they have ordered, and of bring-ing down the labour to 

 the dietary if, after trial, the dietary which they have ordered with labour should 

 be foimd insufficient to maintain health and strength. 



In this, as in other changes, the order of things has been inverted, and instead of 

 proof being first obtained as to the fitness of a dietary, the chaijge is made and the 

 proof of its fitness sought afterwards. Hence the whole procedure has increased 

 the anomaly ;-for the magistrates have now before them the old government scheme 

 which has been decisivelj'^ condemned by the Committee of the House of Lords, and a 

 new government scheme, confessedly uot buUt upon exact scientific research, fenced 

 about by several restrictions, left to the discretion and responsibility of the surgeons 

 of jails, submitted for a trial of nine months' duration, and to be judged of by gentle- 

 men who do not claim au}' special knowledge on the subject. 



Did I say too much wheu I affirmed that the state of the dietary in prisons is 

 very imsatisfactory ? The subject of dietary in hospitals involves too many purely 

 medical details to justify me in discussing it here ; but I may remark that, although 

 each case of disease must be considered on its own grounds only, it has been found 

 possible to aiTange several classes of diets in all hospitals under some such heads as 

 low, middle, and high diets, and consequently there can be no reason why each one 

 should not be arranged according to the nutriment required imder the conditions in 

 which they are severally used ; and it is clear that an approach to uniformity is 

 possible in all our English hospitals. At present the amount of nutriment in each 

 diet is onh' inferred in a general way ; and if there should be found two hospitals 

 having the same dietary tables, it is fi-om the accident that one has been copied from 

 the other. I will also add that the amoimt of nutriment contained in many low 

 diets (often called tea diets) is so low as to bear no proportion whatever to the 

 daily requirements of a man, and would justify any medical man in calcxdating the 

 amount and calling the attention of his professional brethren to the residt. 



As each hospital has and recognizes its own medical authorities in the fonnation 

 of such tables, and as each medical man must be allowed to exercise his own dis- 

 cretion in the ti-eatment of disease, I doubt if the uniformity which seems to me 

 to be so important will ever be attained except after full inquiry made by some 

 central authority which has power to remimerate those who would imdertake so 

 large an amount of labour; and hence the public and the profession are justified in 

 looking to the Medical Department of the Privy Council for the performance of 

 this service. 



There is, I think, the best reason to believe that the dietary of our private schools 

 and colleges, and of our charitable institutions for the maintenance and education 

 of the young, has greatly improved in our day; but it is a subject which stUl 

 demands public attention. There are multitudes of cheap schools throughout the 



