GENERAL HOSPITAL.

47

      The Editors of the Englishman and Daily News continue to furnish their respective
newspapers gratis. Mr. Pirie Duff and Mr. Robert Turnbull have been kind enough to supply
the library with English and Scotch newspapers. Messrs. Gisborne and Company have also
supplied old English and Indian newspapers.

NURSING.

      In a note, dated 17th January, to Mrs. Atlay (who has resumed her post of Honorary
Secretary to the Ladies' Committee), I again bore my testimony to valuable assistance afforded
by the nurses to the executive staff of the hospital in the following words: —

Nursing.

      " I have much pleasure in again bearing my testimony to the efficiency of the nurses
attached to the various wards of the General Hospital. Much of the orderliness and
scrupulous cleanliness of the wards is due to their unceasing application to their very onerous
duties. They have now become so essentially necessary to the working of the institution,
that it would be utterly impossible to get on satisfactorily without them.

      "Their position is frequently very trying, requiring for its proper and decorous
maintenance the strictest integrity, urbanity, judgment, patience, and discretion. In the
display of all these qualities the nurses have generally distinguished themselves, and thereby
given pre-eminent assistance to my assistants and myself in the execution of our duties.

      "Still there is room for improvement. But I feel more and more satisfied that perfec-
tion will never be accomplished until they are placed under the control and supervision
of a lady superintendent who has been trained in all the requirements of hospital nursing
in the large civil hospitals in England. I earnestly hope the time is not far off when this
want will not only be recognised, but liberally supplied.

      "As the nurses almost invariably come to us absolutely untrained, the wonder to me
has always been how rapidly they fall into duties which, to be successfully performed,
demand special and protracted training. With the same training as nurses receive in
English hospitals, there is, therefore, every reason for believing that they would soon rival
in excellency the nurses who have done, and are now doing, so much to contribute to the
comfort and recovery of the sick in many of the large London hospitals.

      "The matron, Mrs. Hickey, requires special mention. In addition to her other heavy
duties, she undertakes the duty of attending upon all the lying-in-women. She has always done
this work satisfactorily, and to show how earnestly and zealously she has devoted herself to this
work, I have only to state that during the past year she has attended about 24 cases, and, at
my request, has gone through a course of instruction in midwifery under Dr. Palmer. So
confident am I of Mrs. Hickey's practical attainments as a midwife, that I contemplate asking
the government, through the medical department, to authorize me to grant her a diploma."

Matron.

      I beg now to solicit that the surgeon-general may be pleased to move His Honor the
Lieutenant-Governor of Bengal to authorize me to grant Mrs. Hickey a certificate of
proficiency in midwifery should she on examination prove deserving of the same.

MEDICAL STAFF.

      I have again to speak in terms of the highest praise regarding the assistance I have at
all times received from Doctors Palmer and Mackenzie, the first and second resident
surgeons. Government having been pleased to sanction, with slight modification, the augment-
ation of the establishment applied for in my communication of the 21st October 1872, I have
now been enabled to give practical shape to the decentralized system of working the
institution during the greater part of the year. Both Dr. Palmer and Dr. Mackenzie have a
separate building apportioned to them for the treatment of the sick assigned to them,
with distinct establishments, cook-rooms, &c. I have every reason to be satisfied with the
admirable manner in which the new system has worked under these able officers.

Medical staff.

SUBORDINATE MEDICAL ESTABLISHMENT.

      Senior Apothecary L'Estrange has conducted the very heavy duties appertaining to
his office in a most satisfactory manner. I regret to think that his extension of duty to three
years will expire with the current year. His prolonged experience and aptitude for accounts
will probably more than counterbalance the inroads of age in his case.

Subordinate
establishment.

      No apothecary has yet been appointed to replace Mr. Grassby, transferred to a post
on the Scinde railway. Assistant Apothecary Eliot has conducted the duties of the
apothecary in addition to his own with great zeal and scrupulous efficiency.

      Dr. Palmer reports very favorably of the conduct and ability of Assistant Apothecary
Wilson. Assistant Apothecary Davis, who is employed in my male, female and children's
wards, has carried on his duties to my entire satisfaction.

IMPROVEMENTS AND ADDITIONS.

      The year has been marked by the transfer, under the orders of Sir George Campbell,
with the consent of the governing body, of the in-door department of the Sumbhoo Nath
Pundit's Hospital to the General Hospital. This native department is provided for in
the building alluded to in my annual report for 1872. The opening of the Sumbhoo Nath

Sumbhoo Nath
Pundit's ward.