Diary Written in the Provincial Lunatic Asylum | Page 4

do? I cannot--how can I stay here any longer! and I cannot get away, locked in as prisoners in our rooms at night, fed like paupers. If I were committed to the penitentiary for a crime, I would not be used any worse than I am here. My heart longs for sympathy, and has it not. I have tried to soften Mrs. Mills' heart, and win her sympathy, but I cannot, and I cannot withhold my pity for those poor invalids who fare even worse than I.
March 13.--I must write this while fresh in my mind, for fear I may forget. There is a Miss Short here--a fair-haired, nice-looking girl; she stands up and reads in the Testament as if she were in Sunday-school, recites poetry, and tries to play on the piano. I did not think her much out of order when she came, but she is now. She has grown steadily worse. Her father came to see her, and she cried to go home with him. I wished very much to tell him to take her home, but Mrs. Mills did not leave them, and I dared not speak to him. She has grown so much worse, she tears her dress off, so they have to put leather hand-cuffs on her wrists so tight they make her hands swell. I say, "Oh, Mrs. Mills, don't you see they are too tight, her hands look ready to burst--purple with blood." She paid no heed: "It does not hurt her any." Yesterday she tied a canvas belt round her waist so tight that it made my heart ache to look at it. I am sure it would have stopped my breath in a short time; they tied her to the back of the seat with the ends of it.
March 17.--Another poor victim has come to our ward today--a black-eyed, delicate-looking girl. She looked so sad, I was drawn to her at once. I sat beside her in Mrs. Mills' absence, and enquired the cause of her trouble; she said her food gave her pain--she is dyspeptic. If the Doctor would question the patients and their friends as to the cause of their insanity, they might, as in other cases of illness, know what remedy to apply. This dear child has been living at Dr. Wm. Bayards' three years--chambermaid--that is enough to assure me she is a good girl. I think she wears her dress too tight. I unloosened her laces and underskirts to make them easy; they are all neat and tidy, as if she had come from a good home.
Another day is here. That poor girl is in great trouble yet. When I went out into the hall this morning, she was kneeling by the door; she laid her cheek on the bare floor, praying for her sins to be forgiven, murmuring something of those who had gone before. I cannot think she has sinned; poor child! she has lost her health in some way; she has transgressed some law of nature. I think it has been tight lacing that caused some of the trouble, for she sat up on the floor when I invited her to stand up for fear some one would open the door and walk over her, and rubbed the calf of her leg, saying it was all numb. Anything too tight causes pain and distress by interrupting the free circulation of the blood. She is so pitiful and sad! How could Mrs. Mills speak so unkindly to her, pushing her with her foot to make her rise up? She treats them like wicked school-boys who have done something to torment her and merit punishment. I cannot but pity Mrs. Mills, for this is an uncomfortable position to fill, and if she has always obeyed her Superintendent, she has done her duty, and deserves a retired allowance. The younger nurses are all learning from her, and will grow hard-hearted, for they think she is one to teach them; they come to her for help in case of emergency, and they go all together, and are able to conquer by main strength what might in most cases be done by a gentle word. "A soft answer turneth away wrath;" I have known this all my life, but I never felt it so forcibly as now.
There is a lady here from Westmoreland; her hair is cut short, and her eyes are black and wild. The first time I spoke to her she struck me, lightly, and I walked away; I knew she was crazy. After I had met her a few times and found she was not dangerous, I ventured to sit down beside her. She was lying on her couch in a room off the dining-room; she lay on her back knitting, talking in a rambling