There were, when I visited Broadmoor, 500 inmates--400 men and 100 women, or thereabouts. When we consider that of these unfortunate people, more than 300 have either murdered some one, or attempted to murder or maim some one, it may well cause reflection, alike sad and philosophical, on what a disordered brain may lead its possessor to do, what acts to commit. Ninety had killed their own children as well as, in some instances, the wife or husband; upwards of twenty, their wives; eight, their mothers; four, their fathers; and one, both parents. And another reflection may be made, to the credit of the institution, that no case of actual murder has occurred since it was opened, and that, taking the year before we write, good order was maintained, no premeditated act of violence was committed, and there was no suicide.
And yet no mechanical restraint was resorted to, no fetters, no strait waistcoats, no leg-locks or straps. Some patients are, of course, secluded in a single room in which a bed made on the floor is the only furniture allowed, and in which the window is protected by a shutter if the patient breaks glass. The room is, when the shutter is closed, only partially dark, as there are two small windows near the ceiling, out of the patient's reach. By the side of the door is an inspection plate, or narrow slit in the wall, with a movable glazed frame, opening outwards, through which the occupant of the room can be observed when necessary. These rooms are well ventilated, and are warmed by means of hot water. I should not proceed further without stating that, in addition to the class of cases to which I referred in the beginning of this paper--those, viz., detained during Her Majesty's pleasure, including those certified to be insane while awaiting their trial, or found insane on arraignment, or acquitted on the ground of insanity, or reprieved on this ground immediately after their sentence--besides these there are convicts who become insane while undergoing their penal servitude. As a rule, however, male convicts of this class are no longer sent to Broadmoor; the superintendent[210] having discovered that it was necessary to keep insane convicts distinct from the other class, to secure their safe detention more completely and certainly; that is to say, to separate lunatic criminals from criminal lunatics, or, as they are usually called, "Queen's pleasure men"--a distinction sometimes really as important as that which exists between a horse-chestnut and a chestnut horse. It will be readily understood that the convicts--really criminals, and often desperate criminals, they are--may differ widely from those who in an access of insanity have committed a crime, and that men who leave prison discipline at Pentonville, or elsewhere, to enjoy the comparative comfort of asylum life at Broadmoor, are very likely either to sham madness in order to stay there, or escape in order to avoid having to complete, on recovery, their term of servitude. Anything better than _that_. In insisting on this distinct classification and accommodation, Dr. Orange did not, in the first instance, intend, I suppose, to prevent the convict class being provided for at Broadmoor; but having set the ball in motion, it went on and on; and instead of an additional building being erected for the convict men, a regulation was made in 1874 preventing their being sent in future to Broadmoor. For the women of this class there was and is ample room, an additional wing having been erected fifteen years ago.