Page:The Journal of Nervous and Mental Disease, 1884.djvu/126

She was entrusted to an intelligent and devoted nourricier, who lived on the farms, with instructions to exercise proper supervision and kindness, to make her life as calm as possible, to provide proper occupation for her, and to look after the regularity of the excretions. Mary V. was scarcely installed in her new home before her condition modified favorably. Her delirium became somewhat less active. She mourned less, and soon took part in the household labor with the wife and daughters of her guardian. Her appetite became excellent, her sleep normal, and she increased in flesh. This improvement developed at the end of four months into a permanent cure. Before leaving, the patient came to thank us, and when I congratulated her on her rapid and complete cure, she replied: "I would never, I believe, have recovered at the infirmary. The presence of the other patients fed my delirium and my unrest. As soon as I had entered into the calm and happy home of nourricier G. I felt my senses grow clearer and my heart encouraged."

One is surprised to find that escapes are unfrequent; they range from seven to twelve annually; the patient is always quickly caught and returned.

Acts of violence are likewise, compared to the population, very rare. But three instances of the latter are known: one a homicide in 1840; the second and third, injuries inflicted by farm implements, and not fatal or indeed in the last instance severe. Three suicides have occurred since 1875, a number not relatively large.

Offences against morality, or the occurrence of pregnancy, are also almost unknown. The "confusion of the sexes," so often urged as an objection to the Gheel system, leads to no unfortunate results. In a half century scarcely a half dozen instances of pregnancy among patients have occurred.^[1]

THE HAMLETS.

Leaving the town by any of its principal thoroughfares, one is, in a twenty minutes' walk, out in the open country. Here in every direction are scattered the farmers' homes in

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1. Lettres Médicales sur Gheel, etc., by Dr. J. H. Peeters, Gheel, 1879.