(54 
PATHOLOGY. 
dily and completely to ventilate the apartments. The 
beds are placed two feet and a half from each other. 
The bedlleads are of wood ; and are without curtains 5 
but fquare pieces of dark green cloth, hung from wooden 
fupportsin the form of the letter T, are occafionally ufed 
to fupply the want of curtains : for inftance, in mode¬ 
rating the light around a particular bed, or in conceal¬ 
ing a patient, during the laft moments, from the view of 
thofe who are lying around him. Though long accuf- 
tomed to the daily view of hofpital-wards where no fub- 
ftitute was employed for curtains, we confefs ourfelves 
favourable to their ufe, having feen their great advan¬ 
tages in thfe Hotel-Dieu of Paris, and in other hofpitals. 
In beds without curtains, the patients areexpofed to the 
eye of every flranger ; whereas, when the contrary is the 
cafe, they may look upon themfelvesas in fome meafure at 
home ; they can guard themfelves from the cold of a large 
apartment, and are not forced to crowd around the fire¬ 
place ; they can procure for themfelves a certain degree 
of obfcurity, favourable to repofe; and conceal them¬ 
felves from thofe by whom they are furrounded. The 
beds of the General Hofpital are indifferent: the cover¬ 
ings good. A few minutes before the vifit of the phyfi- 
cian or furgeon, a quantity of juniper-wood is burned on 
a fhovel carried round in each ward. We never oblerved 
this praiSiice produce any irritation even in the patients 
affefled with pulmonary complaints, and it completely 
removes the foetor of a lick room. The wards are 
heated by a large earthen ftove placed in the centre of 
each. 
The patients treated in the General Hofpital, inde¬ 
pendently of the Lunatic and Foundling Hofpitals, are 
arranged into five claffes. Of thefe, lying-in women 
form one; the remaining four confift of patients aft’edted 
with internal difeafes, external difeafes, difeafes of the 
eye, and venereal difeafes. To each of thefe five claffes, 
different parts of the hofpital are appropriated. The to¬ 
tal number of beds is 2000; and in the winter-feafon 
this number is nearly filled. The following are the 
numbers of patients treated during the years 1810, 1811, 
and 1812, in the General, Lunatic, and Foundling, Hof¬ 
pitals : 
General. Lunatic. Lying-in. Foundlings. Total. 
1810 12,374 251 747 2928 16,300 
1811 11,709 5 12 1 1 1 5 A 8 43 16,179 
1812 10,358 212 1489 2809 14,868 
The average number yearly in the General Hofpital 
alone, has, in the fucceeding years, amounted to from 
15,000 to 17,000. 
Three claffes of the patients of the General Hofpital 
pay for their maintenance : the fourth, and, we believe, 
the moll numerous clafs, are admitted gratuitoully. The 
liigheft rate is eleven-pence daily. Thofe who enter 
upon this rate have a feparate room, particular attentions, 
and a very good bed : but they muff provide themfelves 
with flieets and walhing. Forty feparate rooms are appro¬ 
priated for this clafs. The fecond rate is lix-pence daily: 
the patients of this clafs have no feparate room; but, in 
other refpefts, are treated as the former. The third rate 
is, for the inhabitants of Vienna two-pence, and for 
ftrangers two-pence half-penny, daily. However great 
and undeniable'the advantages may be, of inftitutions in 
which thofe of fmall fortune may receive medical atten¬ 
dance on paying a moderate ftipend, and thus the patri¬ 
mony of the poor be preferved to the poor, yet the mix¬ 
ing of thofe who pay and of thofe who are admitted 
gratuitoully in one hofpital, nay, even in the fame wards, 
by no means appears a proper arrangement. Neither are 
we friendly to thofe immenfe palaces, we had almolt faid 
little towns, which we meet with fo frequently in Italy, 
and occafionally in Germany, under the name of hofpi¬ 
tals. Whenever the number of patients in an hofpital 
exceeds a few hundreds, the public may look for abufes 
and mifmanagement. 
The pharmacy of the General Hofpital is an extenfive 
and well-regulated eftablilhment. The Pharmacopoeia 
Auftriaca, of 1814, is followed. The authors of that edi¬ 
tion have had efpecial regard to the cheapnefs of the ar¬ 
ticles admitted. They have, for this reafon, llruck out 
many articles of foreign produce, fuch as, balfamus co- 
paivse, balfamus peruvianus, cafcarilla; cinnamomum ori- 
entale, nux mofchata, quaffia, farfaparilla, fcammonium, 
fuccinum, zingiber. The medical plants, for inftance 
aconite, are brought chiefly from the fubalpine parts of 
Auftria. For the fake of economy, in the commence¬ 
ment of the cure of intermittent fever, it is almoft gene¬ 
ral in this hofpital to prefcribe a decotlion of the root 
of the common taraxacum ; and in cafes of chancre, in 
ftead of the folid nitras argenti, a folution is employed, 
which is prepared by digefting for fome days, in a warm 
room, a quantity of filed filver with nitric acid. 
There are five clinics in the AUgemeine Krankenhaus, 
two medical, a furgical, an ophthalmological, and an ob- 
lletrical. 
The Schola Prn&ica, or Medical Clinic, was united 
with the General Hofpital in the year 1784. It confided 
of twelve beds, and was under the care of Maximilian 
Stoll. In the year 1787, he was fucceeded by Reinlein, 
and in 1795 by John Peter Frank. It was efpecially un¬ 
der Frank that this inftitution flourifhed, and became 
much frequented by foreigners. The number of beds 
was increafed to twenty-four, and an anatomico-patholo¬ 
gical mufeum was ellablilhed. In 1804, Frank went to 
Wilna, as a Ruffian ftate-counfellor, and thence to St. Pe- 
terfburgh. He was fucceeded, fora (hort time, byBenth; 
and, in 1806, by Hildebrand, who, for thirteen years, had 
been profefforof medicine in Krakau and Lemberg. 
There can be nothing, we think, more certain, than 
that, to be really ufeful, a clinic mud confift of a fmall 
number of patients. For here, the patients are not to be 
merely feen, but to be obferved ; not to be obferved by a 
man of experience merely, but their lymptoms and 
treatment to be made the fubjefts of inveftigation by 
thofe who are yet unaccuftomed to the practice of medi¬ 
cine. The clinical vifit ought not to furpafs the fpace 
of an hour; and, in that fpace of time, it is impoflible 
to vifit more than twenty-four patients. Frank had 
rarely above eighteen in his clinic at Pavia. 
Particular attention ought to be paid, in eredting an 
hofpital, to have the clinical wards both more fpacious 
and more lofty, in proportion to the number of patients 
which they are to contain, than the common apart¬ 
ments, into which it may be fuppofed thatftudents rarely 
come, and where the vifits are performed with greater 
difpatch. In a clinical ward, room ought to be left 
round each bed, for the accommodation of the ftudents; 
and, as they are to remain three or four minutes, at 
leall, by every bed-fide, there ought to be no chance of 
the atmofphere of the ward becoming quickly deterio¬ 
rated. In thefe two particulars, the number of patients, 
and the comparative fize of the wards, the medical clinic 
of Vienna perfedlly correfponds with the above ideas; 
but in another refpedt it llruck us as being extremely 
defective, namely, in the w r ant of fmall feparate rooms 
for patients labouring under contagious difeafes, for 
phrenitic, maniacal, and hydrophobic, patients, for young 
children, and for venereal cafes. 
The number of beds in each ward is twelve. Over 
each bed is hung a black board, on which are written, in 
Latin, the name, age, country, and profeffion, of the pa¬ 
tient, the name and duration of the difeafe, the remedies 
in ufe, and the name of the candidatus ufjijlens, or pupil 
who has the particular charge of the patient. A painted 
ticket, hung up along.with this board, indicates the diet 
of the patient, by the words wealf portion, quarter-por¬ 
tion, third-portion, half-portion, whole, portion, terms cor- 
refponding with thofe of the fixed diet-table of the hof¬ 
pital, which is fufpended in all the wards. It feems to 
be as neceflary to teach the regulation of a patient’s diet 
in 
