256
THE LAZARETTO.
visions, and for keeping poultry in. Some bamboos have been planted, which will in time afford materials for making baskets, about which one of the men is industriously employed, and by the sale of his work contrives to purchase clothes for himself, at half-price, from the Ladies Clothing Society. All the inmates appear thankful and contented, and some have shewn a readiness to receive scriptural instruction that is very pleasing." Poor creatures I some of them are, indeed, objects for the deepest commiseration, but their sufferings are alleviated as far as possible. Their residence is a delightful situation ; the sea-breeze comes so pure from off the bosom of the ocean, that one would suppose disease must fly before it. From the farthest point of the land runs a causeway over to Rat Island, (the promontory already mentioned as being the site of one of the forts,) made about the year 1748, and which is passable at ebbtide. Upon this promontory, which rises in the form of a steep mount, a lunatic asylum has been built during the past year, (1841,) the legislature having voted a sum for that purpose, for the use of such inmates of the institution as have shewn symptoms of aberration of mind. In 1838, the legislature gave a further grant of 500l. currency to the society, for the purpose of erecting " a separate ward for the male patients, with ten apartments capable of accommodating four persons in each," in that part of the establishment situated near the rectory, which was finished and opened on the 15th July, 1839. An iron tank, capable of holding 7000 gallons of water, has been imported from England, and placed in the yard of the same portion of the institution. In 1840, the title of the society was changed from that of " The Asylum," to " The Daily Meal Society's Infirmary and Lazaretto," by which latter designat ion it is now distinguished. This establishment is, indeed, the only infirmary and hospital in the island, (with the exception of the cast-iron hospital at the Ridge, near English Harbour, for the use of the troops ;) and not only the destitute poor of St. John's, but the