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A report on food and diet, with observat
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3 1924 030 293 595
REPORT
FOOD AND DIET,
SUITED Foa
*s ■■■.
ALMSHOUSES, PRISONS, AND HOSPITALS.
THE HON. JOHN STANTON GOULD.
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PilEPARED AT THE REQUEST OP THE BOARD OF COMMISSIONERS OF
EMIGRATION, AND THE BOARD OF GOVERNORS OP THE
NEW YORK ALMSHOUSE DEPARTMENT.
The original of this book is in
the Cornell University Library.
There are no known copyright restrictions in
the United States on the use of the text.
http://www.archive.org/details/cu31924030293595
(3i^J^^- '^'-Vlv^-^ ^
A
REPORT
FOOD AND DIET,
■WITH 0BSEEVATI0N3 ON THE
DIETETICAL REGIMEN,
SUITED FOE
ALMSHOUSES, PRISONS, AND HOSPITALS;
ALSO ON
HEATING, VENTILATION, &c.,
WITH
PRACTICAL RECOMMENDATIONS.
BY
THE HON. JOHN STANTON GOULD.
PEEPAEED AT THE BEQUEST OF THE
BOARD OF COMMISSIONERS OF EMIGRATION,
BOARD OF GOVERNORS OF THE NEW YORK ALMSHOUSE
DEPARTMENT.
(published bv joint resolution oy the boards.)
NEW YORK:
Wit, C. BRTANT & CO., PRINTERS, 18 NASSAU STREET.
1852.
A Ix.xi^
^
INTRODUCTORY LETTER.
Hudson, 1st Mo. 1st, 1852.
I herewith submit a report on the matters submitted to my ex-
amination by you. You need no information relative to its history,
but others may desire to know something of the motives which in-
duced you to seek the information, and me to attempt to give it.
The Commissioners of Emigration were organized under circum-
stances of peculiar difficulty. An immense flood of emigration set
upon our shores in consequence of the famine in Ireland, and civil
commotion in other portions of Europe. The emigrants were
mostly very poor, they were landed in a state of great destitution,
and many were suffering from severe disease. This state of things
could not be adequately met by private charity or by any existing
institution. In this emergency, the legislature of 1847, organized
the Board of Commissioners of Emigration, granting them funds
barely sufficient for the 'ordinary support of the masses who were
seeking relief from their hands. It was impossible to hire buildings,
the fears of the community lest contagion might reach them from the
asylum, imperatively demanded that it should be placed in an
isolated position. These circumstance requiring a large outlay, at
once, and without delay, imposed a necessity on the Commissioners
to practice the most rigid economy in all the details of their man-
agement.
Among other plans of economy, the attention of the Commis-
sioners was directed to the best mode of feeding the persons under
their care, but nothing could be found in books to guide or assist
them in their inquiries. Under these circumstances, my friend,
Cyrus Curtiss was appointed by the board, in the spring of 1860,
a committee to procure a suitable agent to visit the best institu-
tions in our country, who should study the system of management
pursued in each, and also seek information in relation to the
cheapest and most nutritious kinds of diet, with the most economi-
cal processes for their preparation.
Knowing that my attention had been turned to these subjects for
many years, he did me the honor to invite me to accept the agency*
but owing to pre-existing engagements I was at that time unable
to accept it, nor could any suitable person be obtained^ The next
year, the Ten Governors (having in charge the charitable and cri-
minal institutions of the city) feeling the same difiSculty, and being
desirous of more full information on the subject of diet than they
possessed, appointed a committee toco-operate with the committee
of the Commissioners of Emigration, with a view to procure infor-
mation on the subject. Being again invited, I accepted the agency
and visited many of the best managed institutions in the country,
and under the instructions of the joint committees (Messrs. Min-
turn and Curiiss, of the Commissioners, and Messrs. Halstead and
Henry, of the Ten Governors,) I endeavoured to study as well as
I was able the details of their dietetic and hygienic arrangements.
The result of that study I herewith respectfully submit, in the hope
that it may prove of some assistance to you in the prosecution of
your arduous and uncompensated labor.
John Stanton Gould,
To Messrs. Gulian C. Verplanck, Prest.,
Robert B. Mintuen,
Gregory Dillon,
Cyrus Curtiss,
Charles H. Marshall,
Frederick Karck,
Elias Hicks,
Jamks Kelly,
A. C. KiNGSLAND,
CoNKLTN Brush,
Commissioners of Emigration.
To Messrs. Simeon Draper, Prest.,
Richd. S. Williams,
j. j. coddington,
S. Halstead,
J. J. Herrick,
Isaac Townsend,
P. Henry,
P. McLaughlin,
W. M. Evarts,
J. Daly,
Governors of Aims-House Department.
To the Commissioners of Emigration and the Board of the Ten
^ Governors of the JVew York Jllms House.
Genteemen, — The undersigned begs leave respectfully to offer
for your acceptance the following
REPORT:
I propose to speak, 1st, Of the objects of Investigation. 2nd, Of
the obstacles to a correct solution of the proposed problems. 3rd,
General considerations respecting diet. 4th, To review the bills
of fare given in this report. 5th, Of the consumption of food in
families. 6th, Of various articles of food and the influence of
cooking on their value as aliments. 7th, Of kitchens and cooking
utensils. 8th, Of dining rooms and dining room furniture. 9th,
Of dormitories. 10th, Of heating and ventilation. 11th, Of
washing. 12th, Hygiene. 13th, Of labor. 14th, Practical re-
commendations. 15th, Conclusion.
I. — Objects of Investigation.
1st. What is the least amount, and what is the cheapest kind of
food by which a prisoner or pauper can be supported so as to
preserve his health and strength.
2nd. By what process of cookery can the nutriment in any given
kind of food be most thoroughly extracted.
3rd. To ascertain what collateral circumstances influence either
favorably or unfavorably the digestion and assimilation of
food.
4th. To ascertain the relative values of all the usual varieties of
aliments, with a viewto the establishment of a scale of dietetic
equivalents. For example, if a given number of ounces of
beef will support a man in his full vigor for twenty-four hours,
how many ounces of mutton, pork, or potatoes will support
him in equal ' vigor for the same time ; or how much of rice,
peas or beans will be equal to a pound of potatoes in health
and strength giving properties.
5th. The most effectual means of preventing peculation and waste
of food in large institutions.
6th. To ascertain the influence of the various modes of warming
and ventilating, and the effect of different trades and occupa-
tions on the health and longevity of prisoners and paupers.
7th. To ascertain the most profitable means of employing paupers
and prisoners consistently with their health and well being.
8th. To learn any other economic or hygienic improvement in the
various Institutions of the country which might profitably be
applied to the Institutions under your care.
To sum up the whole matter, it was my intention to learn how
prisoners and paupers could be supported with the least burden
to the community, and with the greatest benefit to themselves.
II. — Obstacles to the Solution of the Phoposed Problems.
When I commenced my researches, I hoped to be enabled to
present you with satisfactory answers to all these questions, but
now, when I have ended them, I find that I have signally failed.
Nevertheless, I have succeeded in bringing together a great deal
of information, highly interesting to all who are concerned in the
management of public charities, and which, I believe, has never
been collected and collated before.
Perhaps the best service that I shall be able to render you, is, to
point out the causes of my ill success, and the means by which
future inquirers may overcome the obstacles which so formidably
obstructed my own path.
It might be supposed that when an inquirer had found an insti-
tution where the support per capita was the least, and where the
health of the inmates was adequately maintained, he had accom-
plished his task, and that every other institution might insure
similar success, by the adoption of similar means.
This, however, is a mistake, and if carried into practice would
lead to the most disastrous results.
There are in fact scarcely any two institutions in the county,
where the same diet in quantity and quality would preserve the
partakers in equal health and strength.
This is exemplified clearly enough, unJer your own inspection.
The Refuge at Ward's Island has for its neighbor on the north,
The Nurseries at Randall's Island ; and on the south, The Lunatic
Asylum, and the Penitentiaries on Blackwell's Island. It is obvi-
ous that the dietary best suited to any one of these, must necessarily
be ill-suited to the others in view of the difference between the cir-
cumstances of the individuals residing in them. The greater
number of persons in the Emigrant Refuge, have been for a long
time exposed to the double influence of an impure, and almost
poisonous atmosphere engendered in the crowded steerage of a ship,
and a miserably deficient allowance of food, both with respect to
quantity and quality. As a necessary consequence of this priva-
tion of food and pure air, all the tissues of the body have become
wasted and deteriorated ; hence the hygienic indication, is clearly
to supply them with food, in quantity and quality, sufiicient not
only to recruit the daily waste of the system, but to rebuild the
tissues, wasted and worn down, by previous disobedience to physio-
logical laws. As a farther consequence of their peculiar conditions,
the power of the organs of digestion has become so far impaired,
as to be unable to digest and assimilate the ordinary kinds of food
in quantities sufficient for their restoration to the normal physical
condition; the quality of their food, as well as the quantity, should
therefore receive special and continued attention.
The prisoners at the Penitentiary, on the other hand, are most-
ly robust men, engaged in hard labor, who are blessed with diges-
tions which will easily convert into chyle, almost any alimentary
substance in quantities which would well nigh cause the death of
the feeble, pauper at the Refuge.
Still less would the diet of the establishment just named, serve
as a guide for the regulation of the diet of either the Lunatic Asy-
lum or the Nursery. The formes: demands a far superior, and
more various diet, than any of the others. The united testimony
of all the intelligent physicians who have been intrusted with the
management of the insane, establishes the fact with indubitable
clearness, that a generous and attractive diet is one of the first ele-
ments of success in the treatment of this afflicted class of our fel-
low creatures. The little children at the Nursery, reared in the
sickly atmosphere of cellars, and reeking with scrofula in all its
protean forms, obviously require an entirely difi"erent diet from
either of the others.
8
The above enumerated institutions are widely different from each
other in their character and design ; it therefore can be easily un-
derstood, that a diet that was well adapted to the one, would be no
guide in the establishment of a dietary for one of the others. But
even in institutions devoted to the same objects, a widely different
scale of diet may very properly obtain. On consulting the table
marked A, it will be seen, that in the House of Correction at Bos-
ton, 18 lbs. 10 oz. are allowed weekly to each prisoner, while at the
State Prison, which is only three miles distant,3i8 lbs. ^8 oz. is the
weekly allowance. We are not entitled to assume that the former
allowance is too little, or the latter too much, without farther in-
quiry. In point of fact, the labor performed in the State Prison,
which is chiefly hammering stone, is much more severe than that
performed in the House of Correction ; the daily waste of muscular
and adipose tissue is greater in the one than in the other, and
therefore requires a greater amount of alimentary reparation.
From what has been said, it is clearly apparent that the diver-
sity of the circumstances of different institutions is an obstacle to
our availing ourselves of their dietetic experience.
Another formidable obstacle to the acquisition of knowledge on
the subject, is the little attention which has been paid to it by those
whose especial duty and interest it would seem to be to collect and
diffuse information in relation to it.
In the army f of a pound of pork or bacon, or Ij lbs. of beef,
are allowed per diem to each soldier. I enquired at the provision
offices, and at the medical offices of each department whether any
experiments were on record, by which it was established that | lb.
of pork afforded as much nourishment as Ij lbs. of beef. I was
assured that there were no such experiments on record, that no one
had ever thought of trying them, and that this regulation was
purely empirical. All the ofiBcers acknowledged the desirableness
of determining the relative values of different articles of diet, and
expressed their willingness to afford aid in any investigations which
might be deemed proper for settling the question.
I wished to ascertain what proportion of animal and vegetable
food the average number of men spontaneously used when left free
to regulate the proportion. I hoped to ascertain this point from
the keepers of hotels, who of course are in the daily habit of pro-
viding for large numbers of guests ; but among those to whom my
9
inquiries were addressed, not one was able to inform me wliat was
the average consumption of food by their guests, and what is singu-
lar, not one would admit that he ever thought of the question
before.
Can it then be a matter of surprise that I have failed to solve
the problems which you submitted to me for elucidation, when
those whose duty and interest alike conspire to prompt them to
procure information on the subject, have never even given a single
thought, or made a single effort to master its diflSculties. I have
failed to collect the information required, simply because it is not
in existence. It remains to be created.
Another difficulty arises from the fact that much of the little
knowledge we possess is ambiguous, from inattention on the part
of collectors to the collateral circumstances which modify the ob-
served facts.
If you glance over the table marked A, you will be struck with
the difference in the quantity of food consumed weekly, at different
institutions, you will also be struck with the variation in the kinds
of food deemed proper. For instance, you will see, that in the
States Prison, at Massachusetts, 28 lbs. 8 oz. of food are given
weekly to each prisoner ; at the House of Correction, 18 lbs. 10 oz.
are deemed sufficient, and at the Washington Penitentiary, 15 lbs.
14 oz. is the allowance ; again, 7 lbs. 8 oz. of meat are allowed
weekly to each prisoner at Blackwell's Island, while 1 lb. 12 oz.,
are all that are allowed to the prisoners at Pentonville in England.
The allowance of bread is alike at both places, while 6 lbs. 10 oz.
more of potatoes are allowed at the latter than at the former. It
would be a most interesting fact, if we could establish it, that these
6 lbs. 10 oz. of potatoes could replace the 5 lbs. 12 oz. of meat, by
which the allowance at Blackwell's Island exceeds that at Pen-
tonville.
I was myself much struck with these differences, and made every
effort to account for them.
I was assured at every place I visited, without a single excep-
tion, that their men left them in a much better condition than thev
came to them. Every chief superintendent appeared to state this
fact with great pride, each one seemed to suppose his own institu-
tion was distinguished from all others, by the improved physical
condition of their men.
2
10
I have not the slightest doubt that every one of these officers
really believed that it was so, but I was unable to verify the fact,
because, except in two instances, no records of the weights of the
men at the times of their reception and departure had been pre-
served. Had this been done at all places, with due attention to
collateral circumstances, we should have been in a condition to set-
tle the question in relation to the quantity of food required in a
tolerably satisfactory manner.
Another obstacle to the settlement of these questions arises
from the fact, that different constitutions require very different
quantities of food. Very carefully conducted experiments made
at Pentonville, show that tall men require more food than short
ones, which fact would lead to a very different classification with
respect to diet than any which has heretofore been established.
Two hundred men were divided into two classes of one hundred
each. One class was over 5 ft. 6 in;, and the other class was un-
der that stature. They were all fed alike, and at the end of three
months they were weighed. Of the class over 5 ft. 6 in. in height,
59 lost weight, 30 gained, and 11 remained at their original weight.
Of the class under 5 ft. 6 in. 35 lost weight, 50 gained, and 15
remained at their original weight,. ''
The average loss of the tall men was 2 lbs. 8 oz. Their. average
gain was 1 lb. 7 oz.
The average gain of the smaller men was 2 lbs. 8-rV oz. Their
average loss was "1 lbs. Oyo- oz. There are no experiments on this
side of the water, by which these experiments at Pentonville can be
tested.
The result of another set of experiments at Pentonville, was,
that those prisoners whose muscular exertions were greatest, re-
quired the most food. This result seems perfectly conformable to
common experience, nor should we have any doubts of its correct-
ness, had it not been that it was in direct opposition to the only
set of experiments which have been instituted in this country in
relation to it. At the Baltimore Penitentiary it was found, that
with the same food, all the blacksmiths engaged in making railroad
spikes, gained in weight, while the men in the broom shop, where
the muscular effort is very greatly less than in the blacksmith shop,
almost every man lost weight. I shall hereafter give the full de-
tails of the Baltimore experiments ; I only alluded to them here to
show the difficulty I experienced in collecting authentic facts.
11
Other obstacles will slppear in discussing the remaining points con-
nected ■ffith our inquiry. '
General Considerations Respecting Diet.
Since a very large proportion of the anxieties and labors of man-
kind have from the earliest ages been directed to the procuring of
their food, it might reasonably be supposed that greater progress
in our knowledge of its properties, and of the best modes of pre-
paring it, would have been made than in any other branch of hu-
man science.
We have seen how little such an expectation has been justified
amongst practical men ; nor has much more been accomplished by
men of science. Yet it seems ptoper, in the present connection, to
give a brief summary of their labors and their conclusions in this
most important and extensive field of inquiry.
All matter is made up of certain elementary principles, which
relatively considered, are few in number. These principles have
hitherto resisted the utmost efforts of chemical skill to decompound
them, or resolve them into simpler substances, hence they are
called elements, or original forms of matter. They are as follows,
being fifty-five in number.
1
Aluminum,
18
Glucinum,
2
Antimony,
19
Gold,
3
Arsenicum,
20
Hydrogen,
4
Barium,
21
Iodine,
5
Bismuth,
22
Iridium,
6
Boron,
23
Iron,
7
Bromine,
24
Lanthanium,
8
Cadium,
25
Lead,
9
Calcium,
26
Lethium,
10
Carbon,
27
Magnesium,
11
Cerium,
28
Mangenese.
12
Chlorine,
29
Mercury,
13
Chromium,
30
Molybdenum,
14
Cobalt,
31
Nickel,
15
Columbian,
32
Nitrogen,
16
Copper,
33
Osmium,
17
Fluorine,
34
Oxygen,
12
35 Palladium, 46 Tellurium,
36 Phosphorus, 47 Thorium,
37 Platinum, 48 Tin,
38 Potassium, 49 Titanium,,
39 Rhodium, 50 Tungsten,
40 Selenium, 51 Uranium,
41 Silicon, 52 Vanadium,
42 Silver, 53 Yttrium,
43 Sodium, 54 Zinc,
44 Strontium, 55 Zirconium,
45 Sulphur,
Of these substances, all terrene compounds are formed. Most
of these bodies are only capable of combining in certain unde-
viating proportions.
The character of the compounds formed from the union of some
substances, vary amazingly, according to the proportions in which
they are united ; thus, atmospheric air and nitric acid are both
formed from the union of oxygen and nitrogen, only those elements
are united in different proportions.
The body of man, like all other compound substances, is made up
of a certain number of these elements, united in definite proportions ;
generally, among healthy persons, there is a perfect correspond-
ence, of chemical combinations, but this is not invariably the case,
while other animals are incapable of living, except on confined
zones of the earth's surface. Man is able to exist and propagate
his species on every part of it, from the equator to the poles. The
vast disparity of food and climate between these extreme points,
causes a slight difference in the chemical composition of their
bodies. Disease in some cases has been demonstrated to consist
in a change in the chemical composition of the body. Thus in
diabetes, sugar exists in the blood. In yellow fever, the salts
which naturally exists in the blood, are either totally absent or ma-
terially reduced in quantity. In consumption and in albumenaria,
there is an abnormal amount of albumen in the system. In gout,
an acid vapor exudes from the skin, as is shewn by the reddening
of litmus paper in its vicinity. In certain urinary diseases oxalic
acid is found in the system, and many other diseases are charac-
terized by the presence of substances, oi^ the removal of which
life and health are dependent.
13
In other diseases, chemists have hitherto been unable to detect
any change in the chemical constitution of the body, but guided
by analogy and by pathological indications, it is deemed by the
most judicious physiologists fair to infer, that disease in general
consists in a change more or less extensive in one or more of the
tissues of the body.
Although the body may with sufficient accuracy for our purpose
be considered as chemically unchangeable, yet the matter of which
it is made, is momentarily changing. The man of to-day is not
the man of yesterday, even when viewed as a mere mass of matter.
The man who came from France during the war of the revolution
to aid us in that conflict, and he who 1824 landed on our shores as
the guest of the nation to behold our prosperity and growth, and
to receive the warm and grateful homage of our people, was known
by the same name and had one soul ; but not a single particle of
the body which cam^ in the hour of our danger and our desola-
tion was here to be the witness of our prosperity and our exalta-
tion.
Every time we move a limb, and every time we think a thought,
a number of particles of our muscles or brains are spoiled and
rendered unfit for any farther use in the body ; and the number of
particles thus spoiled is in proportion to the energy of the muscu-
lar efifort or the intensity of the intellectual action. Just so when
we look at a landscape, or smell the perfume of a flower, or listen
to the music of an oratorio, a certain number of the particles of
these nerves which transmitted the view, the odor, or the sound,
were rendered utterly unfit for the purposes of vision, olfaction,
or audition.
By an ingenious (so to speak) provision of nature, machinery is
provided by which these particles, as soon as they are spoiled are
seized, and through various channels are ejected from the system.
If this process were to continue long without repair, it is obvious
that the body would very soon be totally disintegrated.
It is to repair this continual waste of the system, that the fre-
quent reception of aliment is necessary.
But this is not the sole cause of its necessity. Warmth is a ne-
cessary element of human vitality, and food combined with oxygen
in the lungs and in the capillaries is the agent employed in its pro-
duction.
14
Since the human body is made up of certain definite chemical
compounds, it is obvious that our food, with respect to quality,
should contain all the elements which are contained in those com-
pounds, and with respect to quantity, it should equal in amount
the aggregate daily waste which occurs in the tissues and the ca-
lorific apparatus of the body. It is not so obvious, but experience
has shown it to be equally true, that these elements must not only
be presented to the body, but presented in certain mechanical
forms, and in certain chemical conditions. Thus, kernels of wheat,
if swallowed, contain the elements of many of the compounds re-
quisite for the formation of the tissues of the human body, yet
they would not sustain life for any lengthened period, unless they
were comminuted by mechanical means.
Common salt is an aliment of the greatest value. It is com-
posed of muriatic acid and soda. The former is the chief constitu-
ent of gastric juice, the latter is the basis of the solvent principle
of the bile ; yet it would not answer to give these substances separ-
ately ; they must be taken into the stomach in combination, and
afterwards decomposed by the wonder-working chemistry. of the
body. We cannot always assign a reason for these preferences of
the digestive organs, but the fact of their existence is well as-
certained.
Some of the elements of the human body exist in much greater
abundance than others, and some are wasted much more rapidly
than others, but there is not one of them which is not subject'to
waste sooner or later. And therefore no system of diet is perfect
which does not contain every element of the body in such mechanical
forms and such chemical condition as is best adapted for nutrition
and assimilation. This has been confirmed by innumerable ex-
periments. Sugar is very nutritive, but dogs confined to its use,
with pure water for a drink, perished in about 32 days.* Fed
exclusively on olive oil and water, they died in 36 days ; and with
gum and butter the same result was obtained. Fed with pure
wheaten bread and water, they perished in 50 days.
Rabbits, or guinea-pigs, fed with a sirif^le substance, as wheat,
barley, oats, cabbage, carrots, &c., will die within a fortnight, and
sometimes much sooner ; but if the same substances be given to-
gether, or after short intervals, the animals live and do well.
f Magendie's Physiology, p. 483.
15
In all the articles of diet above mentioned, there was either a
total want, or a great deficiency of azote, a substance which enters
largely into the composition of the muscular, and other tissues of
the body. To remedy this defect, gelatine, a compound in which
azote abounds, was added to the bread, but it did not support life.
It was necessary to add a small proportion of ozmazone, the sub-
stance which gives to meat its peculiar taste, before perfect nutri-
tion was effected. This is the more singular, as ozmazone is a
substance so minute in quantity, and so subtle in its nature, as
hitherto to have bid defiance to chemical analysis.
A curious illustration of the narrowness of the line which sep-
arates deficiency of food from sufficiency, is afforded by the fol-
lowing account of an experiinent tried at the Pentonville Prison.
Fifty prisoners were fed for one month on the following diet, which
gives the weekly allowance : meat, 28 ounces ; bread, ll!2 ounces ;
soup, 3^ pints ; potatoes 3 5 pounds ; gruel, 7 pints ; cocoa,
5y pints ; molasses, 1| gills.
At the end of one month it was found that on this diet, 70 per
cent, lost weight, 14 pe'r cent, gained weight, and 16 per cent, re-
mained at their original weight. The average gain was 1.21
pounds. The average loss was 1.75 pounds.
They were next allowed the following weekly diet : meat, 28
ounces ; bread, 140 ounces ; soup, 3^ pints ; potatoes, 7 pounds ;
gruel, 7 pints ; cocoa, 5y pints ; milk, 14 ounces ; molasses,
I5 gills. With this diet, 16 per cent, lost weight, and 58.66 per
cent, gained weight ; of those who lost weight, very few declined
in strength, the loss being chiefly made up of adipose tissue, which
rather improved than injured their condition. A comparison be-
tween the two tables shows an addition of 28 ounces of bread,
3^ pounds of potatoes, and 14 ounces of milk weekly, made all the
difference.
Since we have seen that all portions of the body are subject to
waste, and that our food should be such as shall contain all the
elements necessary for its repair, it becomes a question of great
interest to know all the substances of which the body is composed.
Most of these are contained in the blood, which, according to
Le Cann, consists of the following substances :*
* Copland's Dictionary of Medicine, Art. Blood.
16
First Analysis. Second Analysis.
Water, 780,145 786,590
Fibrine, 2,100 3,565
Albumen, 65,690 69,415
Coloring matter, 133,000 119,626
Crystalizable fatty matter, , 2,430 4,300
Oily matter, 1,310 2,270
Extractive matter soluble in alcohol
and water, 1,790 1,920
Albumen combined with soda, 1,265 2,010
Chloruret of sodium and potassium and
alkaline phosphates, sulphates,
and sub-carbonates, 8,370 7,304 ,
Sub-carbonate of lime and magnesia,
phosphates of lime, magnesia and
iron, peroxide of iron, ,... 2,100 1,414
Loss,...,, 2,400 2,586
From the foregoing proximate analysis, we may infer the follow-
ing as the essential constituents of the human body :
1. Carbon,
2. Hydrogen, 5. Phosphorus, 8. Chlorine, 11. Potassium,
3. Oxygen, 6. Sulphur, 9. Sodium, 12. Magnesium,
4. Nitrogen, 7- Iron, 10. Calcium, 13. Fluorine.
Alimentary principles are divided by Magendie into the azotic,
and the non-azotic* Dr. Prout divides them into four classes,
viz : the aqueous, the saccharine, the albuminous, and the oleag-
inous. f But as Dr. Pereira justly remarks, these divisions cannot,
without unwarrantably straining the language, be made to include
all the articles which seem necessary for food.t He therefore adopts
the very simple division of food into alimentary principles, and
compound aliments.
Practically, if we give men enough of food containing carbon
and nitrogen, we shall be pretty sure to feed them sufficiently ;
all food, having enough of these two elements, will be combined
naturally, with all others that are necessary.
* Human Physiology, p. 19.
f Stomacli and Renal Diseases, p. 354.
X Food and Diet, p. IV.
ir
As these two elements are of so much importance, I have given
in the table marked F, the amounts of those substances contained
in many of the most common articles of food.
Dr. Pereira, after dividing food into alimentary principles and
compound aliments, subdivides the former into the following classes,
viz. : 1st. The aqueous. 2d. The mucilaginous, of which gum is
the representative. 3d. The saccharine, of which sugar is the
representative. 4th. The amylaceous, which is represented by
starch. 5th. Ligneous, represented by wood. Tth. Pectinaceous,
represented, by vegetable jelly. 7th. The acidulous, represented
by vinegar. 8th. Alcoholic, represented by rum. 9th. Oleagi-
nous, represented by sweet oil. 10th. Proteinaceous, repre'sented
by albumen. 11th. Gelatinous, represented by isinglass. 12th.
The saline, represented by common salt.
We have already remarked that food is necessary for supplying
heat to the body. That portion of the food taken into the system
which contains carbon, is the portion which keeps up the warmth
of the body. Whenever carbon and oxygen unite chemically, heat
is disengaged ; and the amount of heat disengaged by a , given
quantity is always constant. If the union takes place slowly, the
heat is dissipated nearly as fast as it is engendered, and the tem-
perature is not considerably raised; if, on the contrary, the union is
accomplished rapidly, there is no time for the dissipation of the
heat, and the temperature is considerably elevated; nevertheless, the
absolute amount of heat generated is precisely the same in the one
case as the other. If the carbon and oxygen are both surrounded by
ice during their combination, whether they unite slowly or rapidly
the amount of ice melted will be the same, which proves that the
absolute heat engendered in both cases is alike.
Innumerable trials show that the heat of the body is the same,
whether it is placed under the burning skies of the equator or the
frigid regions around the poles. Since vastly more heat is neces-
sarily radiated at the latter than the former, it is clear that a
much greater amount of oxygen and carbon must unite chemically
within the body. Accordingly, we find that persons living at the
equator require less food than those within the polar regions. The
most amazing accounts are given by travellers of good authority
of the gormandizing powers of these races. Sir W.- E. Parry*
* Second Voyage for the Discovery of the Northeast Passage, 1824.
3
18
says that as a matter of curiosity he one day tried how much food
a young Esquimaux, scarcely full grown, would consume, if freely
supplied. He eat in 20 hours the following articles, which were
carefully weighed by Capt. P., and eaten in his presence :
lbs. oz.
Sea horse flesh, hard frozen, 4 4
Sea horse flesh, boiled, 4 4
Bread and bread dust, 1 12
10 4
Rich gravy soup 1? pts.
Raw spirits, 3 wine glasses.
Strong grog 1 tumbler.
Water 1 gall. 1 pt.
Capt. Cochrane* says, that one of Takuti consumed in 24
hours the hind quarter of a large ox, 20 lbs. of fat and a propor-
tionate quantity of melted butter for his drink.
Admiral Sanchefi", in order to test the truth of this statement,
gave him a thick porridge of rice boiled down with .3 lbs. of but-
ter, weighing together 28 lbs. Although he had already break-
. fasted, he sat down with great eagerness, and consumed the whole
without stirring from the spot. By reference to table F, it will be
seen that nearly ten pounds of pure carbon were thus consumed.
If we compare the quantity and quality of this meal with one
which suflSces for an inhabitant of the torrid zone, the contrast is
most striking. I have no reliable account of the average quantity
of food consumed by adults in those regions, but all travellers
agree in stating that it is small in amount, and that is chiefly made
up of vegetables and acid fruits.
We have thus seen how the appetite of persons, living in cooler
region?, impels them to lay in a greater store of carbon than those
living in warmer ones, and it will now be seen that a similar pro-
vision of nature impels them to inhale a larger quantity of oxygen
also. Muscular exertion is necessary to quicken the action of the
heart and lungs, and an increased amount of nitrogen is consumed
in Order to provide for the increased muscular action.
* Narrative of a Pedestrian Journey through Russia and Siberian Taitary, 1826.
19
The total capacity of the chest is an unchangeable quantity ;
hence, when the air is of the same composition and of the same
density, the quantities of oxygen inhaled at each inspiration are
equal, but when the composition or the density, or both together,
are changed, the amount of oxygen consumed will also vary in the
ratio of these changes.
These changes are actually effected in practice ; the air, like all
other bodies, is dilated by heat and contracted by cold. If, for exam-
ple, one cubic foot of air at the poles is expanded to two cubic feet
at the equator, it is evident that there must be twice as many parti-
cles of matter at the former as at the latter, and at every inspira-
tion twice as many particles of oxygen will be brought into con-
tact with the lungs, and with the matters circulating through
them, in the cold air as in the warm. Again, in a warm atmos-
phere there is a far greater abundance of aqueous vapor than in a
cold one, which of course displaces so much of the oxygen and ni-
trogen of the atmosphere, and consequently increases the dispro-
portion between the amount of oxygen furnished at each inspira-
tion in the torrid and frigid zones.
These facts guide us to some important practical conclusions.
From them we learn that food can, to some extent, be replaced
by external warmth, and on the contrary, a deficiency of ex-
ternal warmth can be supplied by an increased amount of car-
bonaceous food ; and that a diet which is amply sufiScient for a
southern institution, would be cruelly insuflScient for the inmates
of one farther northward.
Notwithstanding the foregoing demonstration of the importance
of carbonaceous elements in our food, Liebig does not admit it as
a real alimentary principle. His words are as follows* : " Ac-
cording to what has been laid down in the preceding pages, the
substances of which the food of man is composed, may be divided
into two classes : into nitrogenized and non-nitrogenized ; the
former capable of conversion into blood, the latter incapable of
this transformation."
" Out of those substances which are adapted to the formation of
blood are formed all the organized tissues. The other class of
substances, in the normal state of health, serve to support the pro-
* Liebig's Organic Cheipi^try applied to Physiology and Pathology, pp. 95 and
96.
20
cess of respiration. The former may be called the plastic elements
of nutrition ; the latter, elements of respiration."
" Among the former we reckon, — vegetable fibrine, vegetable
albumen, vegetable caseine, animal flesh, animal blood."
" Among the elements of respiration in our food are, — fat,
starch, gum, cane sugar, grape sugar, sugar of milk, pectine,
bassdrine, -wine, beer, spirits."
Acting on these views, tables have been drawn up to show the
relative values of different articles of food, founded on the amount
of nitrogen contained in each ; and one of the prime objects I had
in view, was to confirm or disprove these scientific deductions by
the test of experience in the various prisons and alms-houses of the
country. I have already recorded my failure to do so, because no ob -
servations had been made which would enable me to accomplish my
purpose.
The following table of nutritive equivalents was constructed by
Boussingalt, one of the most eminent organic chemists of the age,
and would be of incalculable value if it were confirmed by practi-
cal experience.
BoUSSINCfALT's ScALE OF NuTHITIVE EQUIVALENTS.
Subetances. ]
EquiralentE
1. Substances. ]
Squivali
Wheat flour,
100
Peas,
67
Wheat,
107
White haricots,
56
Barley meal.
119
Lentiles,
67
White garden cabbage.
810
Barley,
130
Potatoes,
613
Oats,
117
Ditto kept 10 months.
894
Carrots,
757
Ditto dried at 212°
126
Turnips,
1335
Rye,
111
Jerusalem artichokes,
539
Buckwheat,
108
Rice,
177
Horse beans,
44
Indian corn,
138
It must be carefully borne in mind, that these values are solely
based on the power of each article for the re-production of the
wasted tissues of the body. The immense requisitions of the re-
spiratory organs are left wholly out of view. Bearing this in
mind, it will be seen that according to this table, 757 lbs of
parrots will afford as much repair for the wasted organs as 100 lbs.
21
of wheat flour ; 1335 lbs. of turnips "will be equal to 111 lbs.
rye, &c.
Having thus explained the test which science offers for judging
of the Talue of the nitrogenous compounds necessary for human
nutriment, we proceed to explain the test which science proposes
for determining the amount of carbonaceous matters which are
required for the purposes of the animal economy. We make the
explanation in the words of Liebig.* " According to the experi-
ments of Lavoisier and Seguin, an adult man takes into his system
from the atmosphere, in one year, 746 lbs., according to Menzies,
837 lbs. of oxygen ; yet we find his weight at the beginning and
end of the year^ either quite the same, or differing one way or the
other, by at most a few pounds.
What, it may be asked, has become of the enormous weight of
oxygen thus introduced in the course of a year into the human
system?
This question may be satisfactorily answered, no part of this
oxygen remains in the system ; but it is given out again in the
form of a compound of carbon or hydrogen.
The carbon or hydrogen of certain parts of the body have
entered into combination with the oxygen introduced through the
lungs and through the skin, and have been given out in the forms
of carbonic acid gas and the vapour of water.
At every moment, with every expiration, certain quantities of
its elements separate from the animal organism, after having
entered into combination within the body, with the ox;ygen of the
atmosphere. If we assume, with Lavoisier and Seguin, in order
to obtain a foundation for our calculations, that an adult man
receives into his system daily 32^ oz. of oxygen, (46,637 cubic
inches=15,661 French grains weight,) and that the weight of the
whole mass of his blood, of which 80 per cent, is water, is 24 lbs.
it then appears from the known composition, of the blood, that in
order to convert the whole of its carbon and hydrogen into carbonic
acid and water, 64,103 grains of oxygen are required. This
quantity will be taken into the system of an adult in 4 days 5
hours. Whether this oxygen enters into combination with the
elements of the blood, or with other parts of the body containing
* Organic Chemistry, pp. lg-16.
22
carbon and hydrogen, in either case the conclusion is inevitable,
that the body of a man, who daily takes into the system 32^ oz. of
oxygen, must receive daily, in the shape of nourishment, as much
carbon and hydrogen as would suffice to supply 24 lbs. of blopd
with these elements ; it being pre-supppsed that the weight of the
body remains unchanged, and that itretains its normal condition as
to health.
This supply is furnished in the food. From the accurate deter-
mination of the quantity of carbon daily taken into the system in
the food, as well as of that proportion of it which passes out of
the body in the faeces and urine, unburned, that is, in some form
in which it is not combined with oxygen, it appears that an adult
taking moderate exercise, consumes 13.9 oz. of carbon daily.
(See table G, and for calculations see Liebig's Organic Chemistry,
pp. 284-288.)
These 13 /^ oz. of carbon escape through the skin and lungs as
carbonic acid gas.
For conversion into carbonic acid, 13 ,°„ i oz. of carbon require 37
oz. of oxygen.
Since no part of the oxygen taken into the system is again given
off in any other form but that of a compound of carbon or hydro-
gen ; since further, the carbon and hydrogen is supplied in the food ;
it is clear that the amount of nourishment required by the animal
body must be in a direct ratio to the quantity of oxygen taken into
the system."
The contributions of men of science to the solution of aliment-
ary questions which we have sketched above may be summed up as
follows :
1st. The body is continually wasting its substance.
2d. Food is necessary to repair this waste.
3d. Food is also necessary to support respiration, and to sustain
£|,nimal heat.
4th. The food must be sufficient in quantity and quality to repair
the waste of the organs and tissues, and to sustain animal heat.
5th. The higher the external temperature is maintained, the less
food will be required within certain limits.
6th. All the organs and tissues are elaborated from the blood.
7th. Therefore our food must contain all the elementary princi-
ples of the blood.
23
8th. The chief organic element af the blood is nitrogen.
9th. The chief supporter of the heat is carbon.
10th. The wasted organic elements are evacuated in the faeces,
the urine and the sweat ; the sum of the nitrogenized compounds
contained in these, shows the sum of the same compounds which
must be received in the food,
11th. Since oxygen and carbon unite in uniform proportions to
form carbonic acid, the amount of oxygen absorbed into the system
is a measure of the quantity of carbonaceous materials which
must be received in the food.
Review of some of the Bills of Fake given in this Report^
We have already remarked the discrepancy between the amount
of food allowed at the different institutions. If at each of them a
careful record of the weights of the men had been made when
they entered, and their weights at th6 end of three or six months,
it would have given us the most valuable information, but I could
Only obtain it from two of them.
The very intelligent superintendent of the New York Alms
House had carefully noted the weight of 288 paupers on their ad-
mission to the institution, and also their weight when they were
discharged. It is a curious fact that every individual gained
Weight. The particulars, which were politely furnished me by him,
will be found embodied in the following table, which shows the
numbers committed for 2, 3, 4, 6 and 12 months, and the aggregate
and average weight gained during each period, and the average
monthly gain.
If umber
Committed
Period of
committal.
Aggregate
weight gained.
Average W'glit
gained by each
person.
Average
monthly gain.
133
1
81
10
2 mos.
3 "
4 "
6 "
12 "
5 lbs.
355 "
4 "
392 "
99 "
2.6 lbs.
2.6 "
4.0 "
4.8 "
9.9 "
O.sr lbs.
0.80 "
0.82 "
288
24
At the Maryland Penitentiary, 83 prisoners were weigted on ad-
mission, and six months afterwards they were again weighed, with
the results noted below.
48 men gained 245 lbs., average gain 5 lbs., average monthly
gain 0.83 lbs.
35 men lost 236 lbs., average loss 6.75 lbs., average monthly
loss 1.12 lbs. Of the above 83, 49 were white and 34 were
black.
Of the 49 white persons,
31 gained 155 lbs., average gain 5 lbs., average monthly gain
0.83 lbs.
18 lost 157 2 lbs., average loss 8.75 lbs., average monthly loss
1.46 lbs.
Of the 34 black persons,
20 gained 155 lbs., average gain 7.75 lbs., average monthly gain
1.29 lbs.
14 lost 63 lbs., average loss 4.50 lbs., average monthly loss
0.75 lbs.
It will be seen from the New York table, that the rate of gain
was tolerably regular. The average gain during the three periods
of 8, 6 and 12 months, which were the terms for which the
greatest numbers were committed, was yVo of one per cent. The
average monthly gain of those committed for 6 months was less
by T§!r of 1 per cent., and the average gain of those com-
mitted for 12 months was less by tJjt of one per cent. This
shows a gain as regularly progressive as could be expected, and
also shows that their allowance of food was greater than they re-
quired.
I say it was greater, because the great body of the laboring
classes do not obtain food enough to increase their weight, and I
believe the united experience of all nations shows that it is a
capital error to feed paupers and prisoners letter than the cor-
responding class in society who rely on their own exertions for sup-
port. By doing so, you offer a premium to pauperism and vice, and
destroy the spirit of independence and of self-reliance among the
laboring classes, which is the most active spring of industry,
and the surest guaranty they possess for their own elevation in
society.
25
In our statement of the conclusions of science with respect to
food, we showed that nitrogenized compounds served to support the
muscular and other organized tissues of the body, and these por-
tions of the food, if given in greater amount than the waste of
those tissues, would go to increase their volume. We also showed
that the carbonaceous portions of the food served to support the
process of respiration, and if a greater amount of theise com-
pounds were digested than was required for that purpose, the sur-
plus would be deposited in the cellular tissues as fat.
Now if we find, as in the case of the Ne\/ York Alms House,
that the paupers are increasing in weight, and therefore seek to
make such reduction in their food as shall prevent it, the first
practical question that presents itself is, shall we reduce the
amount of carbonaceous or nitrogenous food 1
The answer to this question will be : If the increase is in the or-
ganic portions of the body, diminish the nitrogenous aliments. If
in the inorganic portions, diminish the carbonaceous aliments.
It will be seen from these answers that the question which we
proposed practically resolves itself into another. Is the gain in
the weight of these paupers caused by the increase of the organic
tissues or the inorganic deposits 1 Both of these are indicated by
the scales. We cannot determine, by simple weighing, which -i
the two are in excess. There may be methods- of doing this of
which I am ignorant. But the only method of discrimination that
I am acquainted with, is to compare the amount of nitrogen in
the food taken with the amount contained in the urinary and alvine
evacuations. If the nitrogen received with the food exceeds the
sum of the nitrogen contained in these excretions, we conclude that
the increase is organic, and therefore lessen the amount of nitro-
genized food. If, on the contrary, the two sums are equal, we con-
tent ourselves with reducing the carbonaceous aliments.
It will be easy for any one to ascertain the amount of nitrogenized
compounds in any article of food, by a simple calculation founded on
the statements in table F, annexed to the report, but to ascertain
the amount of nitrogen in the excrements would require a greater
amount of chemical skill, and greater delicacy of manipulation,
than could be secured by the greater number of institutions in this
country. It might, however, be done in New York, Boston, or
Philadelphia, and I hope that it may be done in each of those
places. 4
26
Experienced and well educated physicians are familiar with cer-
tain external sig^ns, by which the deposition of. fat, or organic tis-
sues, can be approximatively ascertained. Guess-work is always
less satisfactory than the severer determinations which can be ex-
pressed by weight and measure ; but if this point were carefully
attended to by physicians attached to our public institutions,
much good might be done. Hitherto they have given little atten-
tion to the subject. From the examination I made at the New
York Alms House, I am inclined to JDelieve that the increased
weight was chiefly organic, but my information is too imperfect to
allow me to offer anything beyond conjecture.
In table H, I have endeavored to calculate the amount of car-
bon and nitrogen contained in the bills of fare of the institutions
mentioned in the table. The amount of food given in each is ex-
hil;)ited in table A, and must therefore be vitiated livith the am-
biguities of the table. From most of the places visited, I could
only obtain the weight of meat including bone. And from many,
I could only obtain the amount of meat purchased weekly, with
the number of persons of all ages fed during the week, including
those of all ages from infancy upwards. I have therefore calcu-
lated the meat as though the bone yielded as much carbon and
nitrogen as muscle, and watery potatoes as though they contained
as much carbon as mealy ones. There is in reality less difference
between the amount of carbon and nitrogen consumed, than ap-
pears from the table, from the fact that the Emigrant Refuge at
Ward's Island has a greater proportion of nursing infants
than th« Alms House at Providence, yet these infants were esti-
mated in calculating the weekly consumption ; though they do not
immediately consume, their proportion is consumed by the adults,
and therefore they actually consume so much more than appears
from the table. Nevertheless, with all these sources of error, (to
which I must add my own want of practice in such calculations,)
the table will be found useful as an approximation towards the
truth .
On comparing the weight of nitrogen and carbon consumed at
the New York Alms House in a week, with the weights of those
articles consumed at the other Alms Houses, as given in table H,
it will seem that it stands at the head of the list. It exceeds the
Providence Alms House, which is next to it in the consumption of
27
nitrogen, by 4.04 oz. ; and it exceeds the Baltimore Alms HousOj
which stands next to it in the consumption of carbon, 13.54 ounces.
It exceeds the Alms House at Washington, which stands lowest
on the list, by 8:37 ounces of nitrogen and 34.40 ounces of
carbon.
On comparing of these elements, as given in the tables, it will be
seen that there is a tolerable approximation to uniformity among
the Alms Houses, and among the Prisons, and that there is a wide
difference between the Alms Houses and the Prisons, the diet in
the latter being much fuller than in the former. To this unifor-
mity almong the Alms Houses, that at New York forms an
exception ; its diet is a prison diet, and as it exceeds all other
Alms Houses in the amount of food, and as the uniform increase
of weight afnong its inmates shows that they receive more than
sufficient to repair the waste of tiie system, and as the fare is
better than that enjoyed by the self-sustaining poor in the vicinity,
I think it is clear that it may be safely reduccid.
The table also shows that, with the single exception of the
Massachusetts State Prison, the Penitentiary at Blackwell's
Island has the most liberal allowance of food of any prison men-
tioned in it. I had much conversation with the Superintendent
and Clerk, in relation to the food of the prisons, and they were
both very Sure that the prisoners left there in very much better
condition than they entered ; in many cases, they assured me, the
prisoners who were discharged could scarcely be recognised by
their old acquaintances, so greatly had they increased in bulk ; and
the Warden of the Massachusetts Prison, that his prisoners were
almost invariably discharged in a similarly improved condition.
I cannot doubt that the allowance of food at both these prisons is
unnecessarily large.
The bill of fare at Pentonville, which is given in this Report,*
has been used there since 1844, and has been found amply suflBcient
to keep up the Jiealth and strength of the men, all of whom are
kept at hard labor. One hundred men on this diet, for one month,
showed the aggregate weight of the men considerably increased.
We have also seen that at Baltimore eighty-three men gained nine
lbs. in the aggregate. These facts also concur in showing that
* Page 12.
28
the food at the Penitentiary is unnecessarily abundant ; still, it
would be more satisfactory if we could have the weights of the
men at the periods of their commitment and discharge. The diet
at Ward's Island corresponds very nearly with the average of
other institutions of a similar character, and, on the wbole, seems
judiciously adapted to the requirements of that institution.
Of the Consumption of Food in Families.
It would be very desirable, for the purposes of our inquiry, could
we ascertain the exact consumption of food in private families,
where each member was free to consult his own appetite ; and also
the consumption in those families where poverty interposed a bar
to the full satisfaction of the appetite. Could we ascertain these
facts with accuracy, we should be supplied with the maximum and
minimum of alimentary necessities.
But like all the other branches of this inquiry, it is very diffi-
cult to obtain authentic information in relation to it. Very few
persons keep a record of their consumption, and of the few who do
so, still fewer will permit the public eye to gaze on these memorials
of their private expenditure.
In Porter's " Progress of the Nation," p. 104, the consumption
of a London family is stated as follows. The family consisted of
a gentleman, his wife, six children and ten servants, in all eighteen
persons.
Per diem. Per. annum.
6668 lbs. meat, or, for each person, 1.0149.16 lbs. 3V0j lbs.
5100 lbs. bread, " "" 0.776.255 " 283^ "
541 lbs. butter, " " 1.317.505 oz. 3O5V "
1887 quarts milk, " " 28.721'qts. 104| qts.
My own consumption, as nearly as I can ascertain it, is as fol-
lows, with a family consisting of three adults and three children :
Per diem. Per annum.
625 lbs. meat, or, for each person, 0.285 lbs. 104.725 lbs.
1600 " bread " " 0.730 " 266.450 "
1800 " potatoes " " 0.821 " 299.665 "
158 " sugar, " " 0.072 " 26.333 "
29
The English Poor Law Commissioners made very careful
inquiries into the consumption of food in the families of the labor-
ing poor, and it is indeed surprising to find on how little they
appear to subsist. Assistant Commissioner , Hale* says: "It
was almost impossible in many districts to prescribe a diet less
abundant, and of inferior quality to that of a majority of the
laboring classes, and at the same time sufficient to keep the
inmates of the work -house, belonging to the same classes, in. health
and strength." " It is a matter of notoriety, that meat is rarely?
if ever, tasted by the Irish peasant." According to the minute
personal inquiries of Assistant Commissioner Hawley^ it appears
that the food of the laboring poor, in thirteen Unions, consists of
2j% lbs. of potatoes, and 2,^ pints of milk per day. These
weights are of potatoes in their raw state; they lose in cooking
about two ounces to the pound. The amount of nitrogen contained
in this amount of potatoes and milk, for one week, is 5.62 ounces,
and the amount of carbon is 132.10 ounces, which shows that men
can subsist at hard labor, with a less amount of nitrogenous food
than is allowed to the idlest pauper in this country, and may prob-
ably be considered the minimum supply for a laborer.
In the first annual report of the American Prison Discipline
Society, p. 14, we are told that in 1822, the directors of the Mill-
bank Prison, containing eight hundred prisoners, in compliance with
a popular demand for severe punishments, reduced their diet to
eight ounces of bread per diem, and a soup made in the proportion
of one ox. head to every hundred male prisoners, and the same to
one hundred and twenty females. This amount of food, for one
week, gives 20.41 ounces of carbon and 3.34 of nitrogen.
" A general decay of health was apparent, but the scurvy did not
appear till January, 1848. The cases of disease increased rapidly,
and on the 28th of February, 118 were sick, and on the 1 0th of
April, more than 400."
I have no doubt, however, that they might have been kept in
tolerable health, even with this small supply of nitrogen, had the
supply of carboriaceous food been increased sufficiently to supply the
waste from respiration.
* Sixth Annual Report Poor Law Commissioners, p. 2S8.
80
Or Various Articles of Food, and the Influence of
Cooking on their Value as Aliments.
Bread has been called " the staiFof life," and the appellation
is as just as it is poetical. No single article of food is eo well
adapted to satisfy the cravings of appetite, and to repair the Tvaste
of the system. Yet, alone, it well not sustain life.
It seems to have uniformly sustained its popularity wherever it
has been introduced, Etnd those who have been instrumental in its
introduction, among nations to whom it was previously unknown,
have ever been regarded as public benefactors.
According to a tradition of the Jews, Eve was the first in-
veiitress ; the legend assures us that our prime mother was wont
to heat small flint-stones beneath the leafy bowers of Eden, which
she deposited in an earthen pitcher ; then she poured semi-fluid
dough into it, which percolated through the stones, and adhered to
their surfaces ; when the pitcher cooled, she' carried it to the side
of a clean rivulet, and seated herself by Adam's side ; the" bread
was then scraped from the sides of the stones, when they eat it
with the fruits plucked from the loaded boughs above them, and
clear water from the brook in place of tea and coffee. There is
certainly some beauty, if no truth, in the legend.
The earliest authentic intimation of the use of bread is found in
Genesis xiv, 18 : " And Melchisedec, king of Salem, brought forth
bread and wine." The chronology of this is fixed by Dr. Hales
at A. M. 2091.
The first notice of leaven and leavened bread is found in Exo-
dus xii. 5 : " Ye shall put away leavened bread out of your houses :
for whosoever eateth leavened bread from the first day until the
seventh day, that soul shall be cutoff from Israel." The date of
this prohibition was A. M. 2513, or 422 years after bread was first
mentioned. As nothing is said of leaven previous to the exodus,
it is probable that the Hebrews learned its use from the Egyptians.
According to a Chinese tradition, Ching Noung, the successor of
F'ohi, was the first who taught^men (Chinese) the art of husbandry
and the method of making bread from wheat, and wine from rice,
B. C, 1998.
There was an annual festival celebrated at Athens, and the va-
rious cities of Greece, in honor of the hero who first taught them
SI
the art of bjread-Hiaking, previous to which their food had been
roasted acorns. , , One of the facts most clearly ascertained with re-
spect to the economy of public institutions, is, that they should
always bake their own bread. It can always be done cheaper and
better than it can be purchased.
There is always a great temptation for the baker to adulterate
his bread. There are many modes known to the trade, by which its
weight may be increased without addition to its nutritive qualities.
FOr example, if thin flour paste is used instead of water for set-
ting the sponge, 104 loaves, of 4 lbs. each, can he, made out of the
same flour, which otherwise would only make 94 loaves, because
the boiled paste communicates a water-keeping faculty to the bread
in that proportion. Another common practice is to add sulphate
of copper to the dough ; a single grain added to three pounds of
bs^ead will increase its weight by a full sixteenth.
But bread may also be baked cheaper than it can be purchased ;
this is the uniform testimony of all the institutions I visited, ex-
cept one or two which took the stale and refuse bread of the bakers
at a reduced rate. At the work-house on Randall's Island, 1,490,^
562 lbs. of bread were baked ftom 1,135,428 lbs. of flour, and
soipe additional Indian meal ; the increase of the weight of the
bread over the flour and meal used in its composition was about 30
per cent. The bake-house has five ovens, each of which is heated
three times, a day, making 15 heatings per day, and 90 heatings
per w^eek ; these 90 heatings consume two cords of pine wood ;
each heating will therefore consume 2j| feet of wood. Two, pounds
of salt and four quarts of yeast are used for a barrel of flour.
The average cost of each loaf is 6 cents, ox, 2 cents per pound.
The average increase of the weight of bread over the flour, used
in its composition, is 83 per cent, in our best public institutions.
It ought to be known that there is a wide difference amongst the
different kinds of flour sold in the market, with respect to breads
producing qualities. This will be clearly indicated by the follow-
ing table, kindly furnished me by. Dr. Bell, of the McLean Luna-
tic Asylum at Boston, as the result of carefully conducted experi-
ments at that institution.
1 bbl. of Canal flour produced 290 lbs. of bread
" J. H. Beache's brand " from 300 to 329 lbs. "
" W. Whiting's " " " 300 " 310 ' "
32
1 bbl. E. S. Beach, Akron brand produced 310 to 315 lbs. of bread.
" Shawmut
a a
290 " 300
" C. J. Hill
a 11
2T6 " 285
" J. Field, Rochester
a u
300 " 305
" LockportMills, A.Spaulding",
310 " 315
" Akron Cascade
295 " 300
" Union steam mills
230 " 250
" Franklin, Ohio
232
" Richmond
233
" Eagle Harbor
295 to 300
" Common Genesee about
275
When we bear in mind that, with the flour purchased by the
greater number of institutions, only 261 lbs. of bread are obtained
from a barrel of flour, the importance of skill and knowledge in
the purchase of flour becomes strikingly apparent.
The difference between this amount, and the quantity of bread
yielded by a barrel of J. H. Beache's flour is 68 lbs., which, at 2
cents per lb., is$l 36^per bbl. Hence, on 5,793 barrels, (the number
purchased in a year by the ten governors,) there would, at an equal
price per barrel, be a saving of $7;878 48. It is undoubtedly
better in many cases to purchase supplies on a large scale by con-
tract, but flour can always be more economically procured in the
open market.
It is invariably true, that the excellence of bread will be in the
exact rates of the weight obtained from a given quantity of flour.
The excellence and the nutritive properties of flour depend very
much on the amount of gluten it contains ; and it is found, on an-
alysis, that different kinds of wheat vary greatly in the amount of
this substance contained in them. Thus, according to the analysis
of Vauquelin.
Flour from the hard wheat of Odessa contSiins 14.55 per cent, of
gluten.
Used in French hospitals, 9.02 per cent, of gluten.
Hence, a barrel of the Odessa flour will contain 10.85 lbs. more
of gluten than a barrel of French flour.
Since a knowledge of the amount of gluten in flour is so neces-
sary for those who purchase it, it is desirable for them to know
how to analyze it. For this purpose he should weigh accurately
1 lb. of flour, and place it on a piece of silken sieve stuff; it is
33
then to be washed with pure water on the sieve, until it ceases
to be milky ; the sticky mass which remains on the sieve is gluten.
After being carefully dried and weighed, it will show the amount
of gluten contained in a pound of flour. The comparative chemi-
cal and commercial values of different samples of flour can be as-
certained in this way, with sufficient accuracy for common pur-
poses.
The various processes of bread-making are, first,
Setting the Sponge.— A sufficient quantity of salt (about 2
lbs. to a bbl. of flour) is dissolved in lukewarm water ; yeast
(about 4 qts. to a bbl. of flour) is then added, and flour enough
to give it a semi-fluid consistency is carefully stirred into it. It
is then set aside to rise. In about an hour carbonic acid gas be-
gins to form, and very soon 'the sponge begins to swell ; if too little
flour has been added, or the sponge is too thin, the gas breaks
through and escapes ; if too much floar has been added, or the
sponge is too thick, the gas does not permeate the whole mass, and
it becomes unequal. Second,
The Kneading Process. — After a sufficient amount of carbon-
ic acid gas has been developed in the sponge, more flour is incor-
porated with it by a laborious and long-continued kneading, so that
every part, of the flour shall be thoroughly moistened, and the gas
generated in the sponge shall be brought into contact with every
portion of the added flour.
It is then set aside to rise again, when an additional development
of gas ensues at the expense of the sugar of the freshly added
flour. When it has risen enough it is again kneaded, and separ-
ated into lumps which are formed into loaves ; these are set aside
until they about double their bulk, when they are ready for. Third, '
The Baking Process. — The oven is heated to the proper de-
gree, which every baker learns to judge of by the color of the
oven, and the bread is then placed in it until the gluten and starch
of the flour are chemically incorporated, which is the case when
a straw thrust into the loaf can be withdrawn without the adhe-
rence of any glutinous matter. The bread is then withdrawn from
the oven and is ready for use.
5
34
Having thus described the various processes of bread-making,
let us inquire into the part 'which is performed by the various in-
gredients in the compounds, and the processes performed for its
production.
The presence of salt'm bread is for the following uses : first, if the
the flour is slightly damaged, it will correct it. Second, it makes
the bread far more agreeable to the taste. Third, by its affinity
for water, it prevents the bread from drying up, as it would do
without it. Fourth, its anti-sceptic properties prevent the bread
from moulding ; and fifth, its affinity for water is so great, that
much more of that liquid can be used in the bread.
The function of yeast is, by inducing fermentation, to produce
that spongy and vesicular texture which is essential to good bread.
In order to explain some of the principles of fermentation, we must
understand, that when animal and vegetable substances are di-
vorced from the vital principle which held them by a peculiar and
unknown force in a fixed condition, there is a tendency in them
-0 re-arrange their particles in such a manner as to be fitted to re-
enter a living animal or vegetable body , in other words, they be-
gin to decay. Those substances which contain much nitrogen in
their composition, and of which the gluten of wheat is an example,
are conspicuous for the looseness of their union with those sub-
stances with which they combined* in the living plant or animal.
Nitrogen, indeed, is remarkable for the feebleness of its affinity
with all the simple substances, and seems to require the vital force
superadded to that attraction, in order to remain in stable combi-
nation with them. In the progress of nitrogenized bodies towards
decay, several successive stages are clearly discernable, and these
succeed each other in a regular and unvarying order.
Fermentation i& one of these stages. Wheat contains gluten,
starch, and sugar ; the former being rich in nitrogen, is united to
the other bodies by a very feeble tie, but a separation is prevented
by the vital power resident in the vegetable. Grinding destroys
the vitality of the wheat, and hence the power which contains its
proximate elements in combination is very much enfeebled. In
general, chemical transformations cannot take place without the
presence of water ; hence we see the necessity of forming flour into
dough by means of water in order to in.ure the requisite ferment-
ation. In this condition the elements of flour are held together
35
by the feeblest possible affinity^ — they are in a state of unstable
equilibrium — like a pile of bricks, which, while perfectly still, may
stand safely, yet may be thrown down by the slightest touch.
This slight touch is in fact communicated by the yeast ; it ex-
ercises no chemical action on the dough, its mere presence accom-
plishes the work. Being itself in the act of transformation, it at
once gives the necessary force to set the elements of the dough at
liberty ; and that chain of causes is commenced, which eventu?illy
fits the material particles of the flour to re-enter the living ve-
getable.
The sugar of the. dough is first acted upon; and quitting the
form of sugar, is resolved into carbonic acid gas and alcohol.
Sugar, carbonic acid, and alcohol, are mutually convertable into
each other, being formed of the same elements united in different
proportions.
Sugar is composed of twelve equivalents of carbon, twelve o
hydrogen, and twelve of oxygen. Alcohol is composed of four
equivalents of carbon, six of hydrogen, and two^ of oxygen ; and
carbonic acid is composed of one equivalent of carbon and two of
oxygen. Yeast, then, by its presence, disposes the sugar to trans-
pose its elements and thus from these compounds is the carbonic
acid formed at the expense of the sugar, which forms those numer-
ous air cells on which the lightness of bread is dependent.
We may remark in passing, that the baker sometimes is unable
to make his dough rise well, even when the whole process is skill-
fully performed, this defect arises from the absence of sugar in the
flour ; and may easily be remedied by adding about three ounces
of sugar to fifteen or twenty pounds of flour.
Kneading. — 'The end to be accomplished by the repeated and
laborious kneadings to which the dough is subjected is, to bring
every particle of the fermenting mass into contact with every par-
ticle of sugar dispersed through the dough. This would be ob-
viously impossible, were the small quantity of yeast required for a
batch of bread, poured immediately into the large mass of flour.
A small quantity of flour only, would combine with the yeast,
and therefore only a small portion of the batch would be spongy,
the rest being tough and clammy. But by first incorporating the
yeast with the semi-fluid sponge, it is easily diffused through it ;
a portion of the gluten of the flour is during the process, endowed
36
with the property of yeast, that is, acquires the property of decom-
posing sugar.
When, therefore, the reserved flour is added to the sponge, it
encounters a prodigiously increased number of particles which are
endowed with the power of promoting fermentation.
The kneading the sponge with the flour should he effected' as
evenly as possible, so that every particle of flour should be brought
into contact with the sponge, when carbonic acid gas is developed
throughout the mass.
Baking. — We have already shown the tendency of nitrogenized
bodies to decay through a regular and unvarying series of grada-
tions ; and we have traced the process up to the point where the
sugar is converted into alcohol and carbonic acid gas. We have
now to remark, that as soon this transformation is effected, another
commences, which is called the acetous fermentation, by the opera-
tiori of which, the above named substances are converted into
vinegar. It is the object of the baker to check the fermentive
process as soon as the sugar of the flour is converted into carbonic
acid gas, and before the formation of vinegar is effected. This is
most effectually accomplished by baking, since fermentation is
arrested at a temperature over 120° F.
We have seen also that alcohol is engendered during the fermen-
tive process. As this poisonous substance was never intended by
the Creator for the sustenance of man, it is necessary, if we would
have wholesome bread, to get clear of it. Baking fulfills this indi-
cation. An oven sufiiciently hot for baking properly, will distil
off all the alchohol in the dough, and when a straw thrust into the
centre of a loaf comes out again without the adherence of the
dough, it is a sign that the last drop of alcohol has departed from
it, and that the bread is ready for the stomach.
Baking contributes in other ways to the perfection of bread.
Notwithstanding the original sugar of the flour is converted into
carbonic acid gas and alcohol, yet on analysing well made bread,
we find that there is more sugar in the baked loaf than there was
in the flour ; this anomalous fact was for a long time very puzzling
to chemists, but it is now clearly ascertained, that the starch of
the flour is converted into sugar by the action of the gluten upon
it during the process of baking. Lastly, baking causes the gas to
31
expand, and this increases the division of the particles of the
bread, making it far rnore palatable and -light than it otherwise
would be. . ■
From what has been said, it appears that the conditions on which
the making of good bread depends are as follows :
Ist. Flour .rich in gluten and sugar.
2d. Lively yeast.
3d. The temperature of the sponge should be kept from 68° to
77° F. Fermentation will not go on below 60°, and a temperature
higher than 120° F. arrests it.
4th, Thorough kneading ; care being taken not to break the
dough, since that permits the escape of the gas.
6th. _To cheek the fermentation by baking before the develop-
ments of acetic or lactic acids commences.
7th. If these acids are accidentally formed before baking, to
neutralize them with soda or some equivalent alkali.
It was with no little surprise that I found that white bread was
always used in the various institutions of our country. I consider
this is as a mistake. There is much nourishment contained in the
rejected portions of the wheat, and certain salts have their seat in
the inner coating of the envelope of the grain which contribute
very much to the healthfulness of the bod}'.
I would strongly recommend that what is oalled Graham bread
should be used in every prison and almshouse in place of white
bread. I believe the change is loudly called for by every economic
and hygenic consideration.
I do not know the price of Graham flour, but it is evident that
it must be much lower than superfine flour, because 6,000 lbs, of
wheat yield but 4312 lbs. of superfine flour, showing a loss of
1,688 lbs. of nutritive matter.
The time required for the chymification of Graham bread is 3
hours 30 minutes.
Corn Bread deserves more attention than it has yet received
from the managers of prisons and almshouses.
38
It is used at very few places that I have visited, and forms the
staple of no institution except the Washington almshouse, where
it is used. It is much approved, and seems a very agreeable and
nutritive diet. The mode of making it is as follows : 3 bushels of
meal are scalded in the morning, and left to soak until 3 o'clock,
P. M. ; a quart of fine salt is then added, and well stirred into
the mass, after which it is placed in pans about 1^ inches thick,
and baked, a little practice will show the proper heat of the oven,
and the time of baking.
The time required for the chymification of corn bread is 3 hours
15 minutes.
There is yet another kind of bread used at the Massachusetts
State Prison, and at several of the New England almshouses,
which is very cheap and nutritious, and which might be usefully
provided occasionally as a change. It is made as follows :
8 bushels of rye flour are mixed with 8 bushels of Indian meal,
by sifting alternate layers into a trough ; a portion of the mixture
is made into a sponge with 6 quarts of yeast. After the sponge
has risen sufficiently, the remainder of the mixture is incorporated
with it, and the dough, without waiting for any further raising, is
then put into sheet iron pans 1 foot in diameter, and 4 inches deep.
The loaves are baked for six or seven hours, at the end of which
time they are swelled to about six inches in thickness. The size
of the dishes is of some importance, as if they are smaller than
above described, the loaf is too much dried to be palatable, and if
larger, the middle of the loaf is not sufficiently done. When this
bread is given exclusively, as it is at the Massachusetts State
Prison, the daily ration is 2' lbs. In the heat of summer when
wheat bread is given to the prisoners they are allowed 1| lbs daily.
Mush and molasses is an important article of diet in very
many of the institutions which I have visited. There is however,
a great discrepancy in the accounts I received of its nourishing
properties and its healthfulness. It was complained of as produ-
cing diarrhoea at the Penitentiary on Blackwell's Island, the
Almshouse and State Prison at Philadelphia, while at other places
it was deemed a most valuable article of diet. I was much puzzled
with these contradictory accounts at first, but the difficulty wai
explained by C. Robbins, Master of the House of Correction at
Boston.
39
This gentleman has held the office since 1833, and he has been
a close observer of the effects of food on the health of his prisoners
during this long period. At first he found that mush disagreed
with his men, but close observation showed him that this result
did not arise from any inherent quality of the meal, but from im-
proper cooking. It will be found on close examination, that the
partic-les of Indian meal are hard and gritty, and that they do not
readily absorb water: If these unsaturated particles are received
into the stomach and bowels without being thoroughly saturated
with water, the vital and chemical processes of digestion cannot
act upon them, and they therefore irritate the mucous membrane
as foreign bodies, and produce diarrhoea and dysentery. To ob-
viate this, the meal should be soaked in cold water for 4 hours,
then boiled 3 hours, at the end of which time, enough molasses is
added to give ^ gill to every man to be supplied. The mixture is
then boiled another hour, when it is finished. Mush cooked in this
way will not injuriously afiect the bowels when in a healthy state.
Three ounces of meal per man is a sufficient ration.
The following analysis of Indian meal was made by J. H. Salis-
bury, chemist to the State Agricultural Society, q,nd is considered
by competent judges to be the most reliable statement of its com-
position on record :
Sugar and extract, 18.32 Oil,.. 4.60
Piber or Epidamus, . . . . 0.89 Matter separated from
Zeine or gluten,. 3.68 gluten by a weak solu-
Albumen, 4.29 tion of potash, 5.97
Dextrine, 3.26 Caseine, 0.08
Starch, 66.30 Water,. .■ 8.45
Rice. — I have never heard any complaint of rice as an article
of diet ; in many places boiled rice is alternated with mush with
great advantage. In point of cheapness, it does not compare with
Indian meal.
Indian meal, according to the above analysis, contains 85.15 per
cent, of carbon, and 1.27 per cent of nitrogen, while rice contains
34.10 per cent of carbon and 0.57 per cent, of nitrogen. Rice
costs $2 50 per 100 lbs., while Indian meal costs $1 50 per 100
lbs. Thus while rice costs 70 per cent, more than meal, it con-
tains less of carbon and considerably less than half the nitrogen.
40
Beans, as an aliment, are unequivocally condemned by the su-
perintendants of many institutions, and are as highly praised by
others ; as an evidence of the better reliance that can be placed
on the opinions of even intelligent oflScers -when unsupported by
reliable data, I may observe that the physician of the alms house
at Blackwells Island was very certain that the days on which beans
were eaten, were marked by extraordinary complaints of colic
pains and diarrhoea, while the superintendant never heard of such
complaints, and believes that beans were as wholesome an article
of diet as any other vegetable. At my request, he paid particular
attention to their effects subsequenc to my visit; and has since
been kind enough to inform me by letter that his opinion remains
unchanged with respects to their wholesomeness.
I, however, met with this complaint too often to doubt that
there is some foundation for it, but I have reason to believe
that it arises, like the complaint against mush, from insufiScient
cooking. The external envelope of the bean is very tough and
fibrous ; if this covering is not reduced by cooking, it will act on
the stomach and bowels as a foreign body, and an irritant. I have
been assured by old soldiers, that when dried beans are eaten on a
hurried ma,rch, when there is not time to soak them well before
boiling, the ill effects were almost immediately made manifest by
disorder of the bowels, but if they were soaked m water over
night, and well boiled the next day, no such mischief was ever
produced. This preliminary soaking should never be neglected in
an alms house or a prison.
Time of chymification of boiled beans, 3 hours.
Beans contain 38 per cent, of carbon and 3.47 per cent, of ni-
trogen. This great richness in nitrogen would seem to indicate a
high nutritive value, higher than practical experience has rated
them, although I am sorry to say I can produce no reliable data for
the foundation of such experience.
Potatoes are well known to be a valuable article of food, but
their scarcity and high price of late has very much diminished
their consumption in the prisons and alms houses of this and other
countries.
Potatoes vary exceedingly in theit nutritive qualities, some va-
rieties being twice as valuable as others. The test of their value
41
is the amount of starch which they contain. Their value is also
very much affected by cooking. In the Fifth Report of the In-
spectors of Prisons for Scotland, Northumberland and Durham, is
an experiment to ascertain the relative values of roasted nd
boiled potatoes. In the first case the dihner consisted of 3 lbs. of
boiled potatoes, and in the second, it consisted of 3 lbs. of roasted
potatoes, the diet was the same in all other respects in^both cases.
At the end of the experiment, after two months trial, it was found
that all the prisoners were in good health, and had gained on an
average 4 lbs. each. One prisoner only lost weight, amounting to
5 lbs. 2 oz. The greatest gain was 9 lbs. 4 oz. This was on
boiled potatoes. On the roasted potato diet the men were in good
health, but there had been an average loss of 1| lbs. weight. The
greatest loss was 10 lbs. by a man. The greatest gain was 65 lbs.
by a woman. From this it appears that potatoes are more nutri-
tive when boiled than when roasted ; but the experiment deserves
careful verification.
By the action of boiling water, the albumen is coagulated while
the starch absorbs water, and swelling up separate from each
other. When this process is well performed, the potato is said
to be mealy, if not well done they are said to be watery. Late in
the season, the water dries out of the potatoe, and a still larger
quantity is extracted when germination begins. In this state i
appears waxy and dark colored, when boiled. This condition is
much improved by soaking the potatoes in water an hour before
boiling. The lost water is regained, its dark color is diminished,
and the flavor is much improved. Salt is added to the water at
some alms houses, but this injures the color without being of any
advantage. J. S. Hollowaiy, the excellent warden of the Eastern
Penitentiary at Philadelphia, writes as follows with regard to sub-
stitutes for potatoes :
" The beans, rice and homminy, &c., are served alternately, and
have been resorted to as a substitute for potatoes during the
late and present high price of that article. When abundant, or
not over 50 cents per bushel, we serve them nearly every day at
dinner, varying by an occasional mess of beets, parsneps, turnips,
&c." " We do not use Indian meal in any other form than hom-
miny, and that once a week."
6
42
Soup is considered as the alimentary sheet anchor by most War-
dens, Superintendants and Physicians of public institutions, never-
theless, some are greatly opposed to it. Dr. R. A. Given, the
very intelligent physician of the Eastern Penitentiary of Philadel-
phia, is most decidedly of opinion, that it is exceedingly injurious.
It is not used at that penitentiary at all, its place being su,pplied
by a hash composed of chopped meat, potatoes and onions heated
together. I am however of opinion, from very careful enquiries,
that it well deserves its popularity. Officers of public institutions
are more divided with regard to the use of cabbage in soup, and I
should not feel myself justified in recommending its use, believing
that it is more indigestible when boiled in soup than in any other •
form of cookery. It is far more wholesome eaten raw.
The chemistry of soup-making is not well understood. We
know that by some unknown play of affinities Osmazome, a sul-
phui-etted compound, ammonia and two volatile acids similar
to acetic and butyric, are produced.
The fibrine of the meat is rendered harder by the boiling, and
yields nothing to the soup. Albumen is rendered soluble by the
boiling, and contributes to its nutritive qualities.
The cellular tissues, the aponeurosis, the tendons and the bones
yield gelatine, a substance rich in nitrogen.
By the, usual methods of cooking, much gelatine remains undis-
solved in the bone, which might b'e extracted if boiled at a higher
temperature. This has often been done in Europe, but the high
price of fuel here forbids the economical use of the method.
Soup is best made as follows : 1 gall, of water, 4 lbs. of meat, 3
oz. of rice, | lb. of vegetables, ^V of pepper, jV tb of a gill of
salt boiled for four hours together with the crumbs of bread left
of the preceding day.
Kitchen and Cooking Utensils.
I have seen no kitchen which equals that at Ward's Island. The
only objection to it is the want of contiguity to the dining room.
It contains the following apparatus : Two ranges made by Wm.
Beebe & Co. ; 9 boilers of 80 gallons each, of Hoe's patent.
These are double and are surrounded by steam, the outer vessel is
encased in wood to prevent radiation , These are very superior to
those into which the steam is directly admitted. With th« latter
43
it is impossible to cook mush, or beans, or even soup as they should
be ; with the former much more gelatine is extracted from the
bones than with the latter ; and with a pressure of steam of 25 lbs.
to the square inch they can bake bread nearly as well as an oven,
the spent steam can be employed in heating the building, or warm-
ing water for washing.
2 tea or coffee boilers. These are made of copper, 2 feet 4
inches long, 1 ft. 7 in. wide, and 2 ft. 2 inches deep. Each of
these is surmounted by a copper globe 10 inches in diameter,
formed by the union of two semi-spheres ; a metallic diaphragm
finely perforated, is extended across one of these, on which the tea
or coffee is placed. Boiling water is now admitted into the globe
through a stop-cock from a vessel above ; after being left for some
time with the coffee, a stop-cock in the bottom is Opened and the
liquid passes into the cistern beneath. This process is repeated
until all the strength of the coffee or tea is exhausted.
For washing dishes a long trough runs along the side of the
room which is divided into convenient compartments, a steam pipe
runs along the bottom of the troughs and a cold water pipe runs
along the top, furnished with cocks opening into each compartment
of the trough. The steam may also be admitted or excluded at
pleasure into either, or all the compartments. There is a row of
shelves over the trough, separated from each other by the diameter
of a plate ; the space between the shelves is divided into spaces
about 2^ inches wide by means of wires perpendicular to the shelves;
after the dishes are washed in the trough, they are put edgewise on
the shelves between the wire racks to drain. The boiler in which
the steam is generated is 12 ft.' long and 3 ft. in diameter. It
consumes 600 lbs. of coal per day, and besides heating the 9
boilers and the water for washingthe dishes, it warms several apart-
ments of the building ; but the number of cubic feet heated I did
not ascertain. Such a kitchen and apparatus is sufficient to perform
the cooking for 8,000 persons. There is no oven specially con-
structed for roasting meat. Though roast meat should not ordina-
rily be given as an article of diet to paupers and prisoners in good
health, yet it is desirable that they should have it occasionally
sometimes as a reward for general good conduct, and on some of
the great festivals when all desire that the poor and even the guil-
ty should participate in the general rejoicing. I saw an oven well
44
fitted for this purpose at the Boyleston Reform School at Boston,
made by D. Sandford & Co. which seemed to me to be as good as
can be made, and I would recommend its adoption.
Dining Roojms, and Dining Room Fukniture.
The construction of dining rooms, and the adaptation of the fur-
niture to thewants of Prisons and Alms Houses has occupied much
of my attention. From my own observations and from consulta-
tion with experienced men, I have arrived at the following conclu-
sions :
For Almshouses on a large scale, there should be four dining
rooms, two for men and two for women. One room for each sex
should be devoted to those, who from accident or unavoidable mis-
fortune have been reduced from comfortable circumstances to
poverty ; every consideration of religion and humanity requires
that such as these should be made comfortable. It vsrould not be
desired or expected that they should be maintained in luxury, but
all that is included in the word comforts, should be theirs. I
noticed with pleasure, at the Philadelphia Almshouse, a table
spread for this class, with a clean white cloth, white earthen plates,
knives and forks, butter and good tea. It differed in no respect
from the table of a respectable and industrious laborer. The
aspect of things here contrasted pleasantly with some other places,
where I saw men who in other days had occupied the high places
of the earth, and women who had once been the observed of all
observers, brought into contact at the table with negroes and
white persons of the lowest character, whose filthy habits and dis-
gusting conversation, added to the bitterness of the cup which
was given to these fallen ones to drink of.
There is another class, which as you well know, would not ap-
preciate these things ; they have never been accustomed to them.
A long life of vagrancy has inured them to filthy habits and dis-
gusting conduct, which makes them insufferable to the former
class, and quite unworthy of privileges which ought to be freely
accorded to them. If, from want of room or funds it is impossi-
ble to provide four rooms, this classification might be effected by
causing them to take their meals at different times.
The best plan of placing tables is that adopted at the New
York Almshouse, with some slight modifications.
45
Two tables should be placed across the rooms, each table long
enough to hold eight persons : an alley way should extend through
the room between the tables at least four feet wide. Paupers
should only set on one side of the table. Each pauper should be
furnished with a stool. There should be at least 2j feet between
a table and the row of stools of the one before it.
The annexed diagram explains the construction.
46
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47
The table should be placed on cast iron supporters, screwed to
the floor.
A few institutions use white earthenware plates, and cups and
saucers, and a few use knives and forks, but in. the great majority
tin plates and cups are used, and no knives or forks are allowed.
Some of the officers contend, that earthen plates are cheaper
in the long run, as more care is taken of them ; but I am satisfied
that for all except, the best class of paupers, tin ware is cheapest
and knives and forks are an unnecessary expense.
There is a difference of usage with regard to the mode of feed-
ing prisoners ; some prisons feeding their men at tables, others in
their cells. The greater number very properly in my opinion,
feed at tables ; some men do not eat their full allowance, others
desire more ; an exchange is easy at table, but impossible in a
cell ; besides eating at table is more humanizing in its tendency,
and altogether preferable. I have never heard of any difficulty
arising from the practice, except at the Charlestown Prison, where
there was once a rebellion at table, which however was promptly
quelled. The only difference between the construction of a prison
dining room, and the one recommended for an almshouse, is the
construction of elevated chairs along the centre aisle for the
keepers on duty.
Dormitories.
The best plan for sleeping apartments that 1 have seen is the
following :
Each pauper to sleep on a separate iron bedstead. No room to
contain more than 50 beds. The beds should be arranged in two
rows, on each side of the room. There should be 2^ feet of space
between each bed, and a space four feet wide between the two rows
of beds. Each room should have a good water closet attached.
A sufficient number of hooks should be affixed to the wall, so that
every article of clothing can be hung up during the night. A
lantern should be suspended from the ceiling of each room. Two
of these rooms should be separated from each other by a smaller
room, where an officer should sleep ; doors of lattice work open
from the officer's room into each of the larger dormitories j he can
thus overlook one hundred beds without rising from his own. The
48
.-annexed diagram fully illustrates the plan. A stool should
" stand at the head of each bed, with a small drawer in it,
for keeping clothing, &c. The best substance for filling the beds
is rattan' shavings. Captain Robbins, of the Boston House 6f
Correction, assures me that such beds are very comfortable, and
that it is impossible for bugs to live in them. The swing cots in
use in the cells of prisons, prevent the proper airing of the bed
clothes ; it should be a universal rule in prisons for the convicts
to bring out their bed and bedding, and hang them across the gal-
lery railing opposite to their cells. At the Philadelphia Alms-
house, the- coverlets are nearly all white. The officers told us
they were cheaper, and they preferred them because they imposed
a greater necessity for cleafaliness.
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50
Heating and Ventilating.
I found schemes for heating and ventilating as numerous as the
places I visited. All the contrivances were more or less effectual
for the purpose of heating, but for ventilation the success was not
so decided. The most thorough ventilation that I saw, was that
at the Philadelphia alms house. It is unnecessary for me to de-
scribe the principle or its application, it is enough for the purpose
of this report to bear testimony to the superiority of the plan
adopted there, over any other that I saw. Buckenheim & Morton,
of No. 16 Arch street, Philadelphia, were the contractors, and
from this specimen of their skill, I should judge them to be mas-
ters of their business. 800,000 cubic feet of air are warmed by it,
and the air in all the rooms is renewed every 30 minutes, at the
expense of 1| tons of coal daily, which is a saving of 30 per cent,
on their former mode of heating.
Washing.
A washing machine constructed by Silas Cornell, and in use at
the Friends' School and some other public institutions at Provi-
dence, is the most complete thing that I have seen. With a mix-
ture of 14 quarts of soft soap, 1 pint of camphene and 1 pint of
spirits of turpentine, one man will wash 10 sheets in 16 minutes.
The machine is on the principle of a fulling mill, and costs one
hundred dollars. Were this machine substituted for the iron drum
wheels at Ward's Island, I should regard the apparatus for washing
and ironing as perfect as it could be, in the present state of the
arts, and more perfect than any other institution in the country.
Hygiene.
If the present day presents a striking contrast to the past, in
any particular, it is by the attention which is paid to the preser-
vation of health, and to the knowledge which has been acquired of
the' physiological laws, on obedience to which, life and health are
dependent. Hitherto, physicians have only been expected to cure
us of those diseases which were penalties of the breaches of the
laws of health ; now, no one can lay claim to the character of a
respectable physician who is not as capable of advising us how to
avoid disease, as he is of curinP', us when prostrated by sickness.
51
It is not my intention in this report^ to go into a detailed state-
ment of all ' the laws of life and health ; such a work, were I
qualified to write it, could not be.eibhraced within the limits I have
prescribed for myself. I shall only, therefore, state a few of the'
more general and well established principles, and some of the facts
which have fallen under my notice during the visits I have made
under your direction.
1st. The breathing of pure air is one of the first and most in-
dispensable conditions of health and vigor.
Breathing is the last act of digestion. Without being brought
into contact with the air, the elements of food cannot be converted
into blood. All the blood of the body is brought into contact with
the atmosphere every half hour, and the health of the body de-
pends upon the purity of the blood; it is obvious, then, that if the
air is impure, those impurities must be communicated to the blood
and' disease will be engendered.
You will find in Dr. Griscom's admirable little work on the
" Uses and Abuses of Air," a full account of the diseases which
ensue from the inhalation of impure air ; I learned an important
fact at Baltimore relative to its agency in the production of Chol-
era. While the city of Baltimore was entirely exempt from this
disease, it broke Out with the utmost virulence at the alms house
building, which is situated in the country, on elevated ground and
apparently uniting in itself all the elements of the m6st perfect
healthfulness. The physicians made the most careful examination of
the house and^rounds without discovering any thing that could pos-
sibly be suspected of causing the disease. On extending their sur-
vey beyond the walls, they found a large; cess-pool, where the filth
and ordure of the establishment was emptied ; this had usually been
emptied in the spring, and used on the farm as a manure ; but the
farmer happened to be sick at the time that this was usually done,
and it was afterwards neglected. The smell of the place was ex-
ceedingly noxious, and they ordered it to be cleansed immediately;
the men employed to cleanse it all died of cholera within twenty-
four hours', and after it was cleansed, the cholera ceased as sud-
denly as it began. JVo patient died of cholera whose rooms did
not open towards the pool, and no one was attacked whose rooms
did not open towards it. These facts were stated to me first by
Dr. Weime, and afterwards by the physicians of the alms house.
52
Air ijiay be vitiated in various ways. 1st. By bad smells, the
proximity of privies, the retention of urine in vessels in chambers,
the decomposition of vegetables in cellars, and want of cleanliness
generally, are the main causes of this source of impurity. They
may all be easily prevented by the most obvious methods, except
from the privies. Water closets may be constructed -within the
building so as to be perfectly free from odor, but they are too ex-
pensive and too liable to be injured to be generally brought into
use in alms houses and prisons. The cheapest, the mOdt simple,
and the most useful contrivance that I' have seen, is that in use at
Ward's Island. It consists simply of a long trough, with a bottom
sloping from one end to the other. A circular orifice, six inches
in diameter, is made in the lowest end, which is filled with a cor-
responding plug. The trough is provided with a broad rounded
board on the front edge for the thighs to rest during the defaecation.
This trough is kept filled with water about 1 foot in depth, aad is
emptied by drawing the plug twice a day. The large body of
water carries with it all fsecal impurities, and the trough is con-
stantly kept sweet and clean. A lining of lead or zinc, will, of
course, be an advantage, as wood absorbs odors while metals do
not ; if there is an underground drain with a small descent, it
may require an additional supply of water to carry the ordure
thoroughly away.
The scrubbing of floors with water, is sometimes a cause of dis-
ease. Odorous matters absorbed by the floor, are dissolved in the
water, and when this evaporates, they are difiused through the
air of the room ; for this reason, dry rubbing should always be
preferred to scouring in public institutions. The plan was first
successfully adopted by Dr. Woodward of the Worcester Lunatic
Asylum, and wherever it has been since introduced, its superiority
over the old method, has been fully admitted.
When rooms are ventilated from below, upwards, the current
carries with it the odors and the fine dust from the floor, which
very much increases the impurity of the air ; this is avoided by
making the ventilation from above downward, as is the case in
most modern erections. Air is also vitiated
2d. By some of the modes used for heating. Dr. Ure made some
experiments on this form of vitiation* at the London custom house.
* Dictionary of Arts. Art stove.
53
The heating of this room was effected by the passage of air over
red hot plates.
The gentlemen employed in these rooms were subject to " a sense
of fullness in the head, with occasional flushings of the counte-
nance, throbbings of the temples, and vertigo, followed, not unfre-
quently, with a confusion of ideas, very disagreeable to oificers oc-
cupied with important, and sometimes intricate calculations. A
few are affected with unpleasant perspiration on their sides. The
whole of them complain of a remarkable coldness and langour in
their extremities, more especially in their legs and feet."
This disorder was occasioned, 1st, By the dryness of the air,
caused by the mode of hea-ting. The air in- the room indicated 70
per cent, of dryness, according to Daniel's Hygrometer, while the
external atmosphere was nearly saturated with moisture.
2d. ,The air was probably impregnated with the sulphur, carbon,
or arsenic, which exist in cast iron.
3d. By the combustion of minute particles of animal and vege-
table matter with which the air is loaded, and which may, at any
time, be made visible by the admission of a ray of light into a
darkened room.
4th. By the high electrical tension which is communicated to air
by passing over a hot plate. Dr. Ure thus accounts for the ill ef-
fects of very dry air, " When plunged in a very dry air, the in-
sensible perspiration will be increased ; and as it is a true evapo-
ration, it will generate cold proportionably to its amount. Those
parts of the body which are most insulated in the air, and furthest
from the heart, such as the extremities, will feel the refrigeratory
influence most powerfully. Hence, the coldness of the hands and
feet, so generally felt by the inmates of the apartment, though its
temperature be at or above 60"^. The brain being screened by the
scull from this evaporating influence, will remain relatively hot,
and will get surcharged besides, with the fluids which are repelled
from the extremities, by the condensation or contraction of the
blood vessels, caused by cold. Hence, the affections of the head,
such as tension, and its' dangerous consequences. If sensible per-
spiration happen from debility to break forth from a system
previously relaxed, and plunged into dry air, so attractive of va-
por, it will be of the kind called a cold clammy sweat on the side
and back. Air may be vitiated."
64
3d. By a privation of oxygen through breathing, and by the in-
sensible perspiration emanating from bodies.
Six hundred cubic feet of air are breathed by an adult every
hour. A cell in a prison like Blackwell's Island contains less than
300 cubic feet, there is, therefore, less than half an hour's supply
of air for one person ; to be pure, it should be renewed at least 20
times in the course of the night. If this is not done, the prisoner
will have to breathe the pulmonary aUd cutaneous secretions of
his own body, which must necessarily injure his health. The ef-
fect of this poisonous atmosphere is liot only injurious to the body,
but has a powerful efifect on the mind ; it irritates the brain, and
induces an irascible disposition, to the existence of which a great
proportion of the rebellions and outbreaks, and misconduct in our
prisons and alms houses is owing.
This effect of impure air in producing an irascible disposition,
is nowhere more strikingly manifest than in our legislative halls ;
the disgraceful altercations which so often disgrace them, will be
found invariably to occur in the latter part of the sitting, when the
air has become impure, in consequence of being repeatedly breath-
ed ; nor can we be surprised at this result, when we consider that
oxygen is inhaled but is not exhaled, being replaced by carbonic
acid gas, a deadly poison, which, when pure, will extinguish life
in two minutes, and that one-fifth of the blood of the body is con-
veyed to the brain, though its weight is only one-fortieth of the
whole body. The air is also vitiated
4th. By terrene exhalations. At the last meeting of the Super-
intendents of Lunatic Asylums, it was agreed to embody in the
form of propositions all the opinions in which that learned body
unanimously agreed ; among these is the following, which forms
their ninth proposition : "No apartments should ever be
provided for the confinement of patients, or as their lodging rooms,
that are not entirely above ground." Common household expe-
rience shows conclusively enough, that cellars and basements are
unhealthy ; if a basement room is closed for a short time, the exhala-
tions from the earth may easily be detected by the sense of smell.
The only substance cognizable by chemistry is simply agueous
vapor ; but there is more than this, and though so subtle as to
elude the grasp of the recent chemical analysis it yet exists in suflSci-
ent force to undermine the stoutest constitution, and lay the founda-
66
tion for innumerable diseases of which scrofula is the genuine ex-
pression. That these exhalations interfere with the digestion, or
assimilation of food seems tq be proved by the experience of the
Maryland Penitentiary.
All the men were fillowed the same diet, both with respect to
quantity and quality.
Of 11 blacksmiths employed in making railroad spikes, all
gained in weight. The average gain of each person, was 6. 25'
lbs.
Of 6 prisoners employed in the dormitories, in, sweeping and
whitewashing, all gained. The average gain of each person being
5.2 lbs. _
Of 9 shoemakers all gained. The average gain being 6.5 lbs.
Of 29 weavers, 21 lost weight. Average loss, 6 lbs. Eight
•gained weight. Average gain, 5.3 lbs.
Of 9 broom-makers, 6 lost weight. Average weight lost, 13.5
lbs. Three gained. Average gain, 2.3 lbs. One of the men
employed in the broom-shop, aged 33, lost 39.5 lbs.
The difference between this shop and the others, will be seen
at a glance ; all gained in weight except the broom-makers and
weavers, and between these, the former suffered most severely.
I was informed by Dr. Frick, that the men in the broom-shop were
constantly troubled with catarrhs and rheumatisms, and that when
their flesh was in any way wounded, it healed with great difficulty.
On carefully comparing this shop with the others, I found it to
differ from the rest in two respects. 1st. It had a brick floor,
resting directly on the earth ; and 2nd, the odor of paint was con-
stantly diffused through its air.
Both of these circumstances probably contributed to produce the
result, but taken in connexion with observations, made at other
places, I have no doubt that the exhalations from the earth was the
main cause of the difficulty.
II. Cleanliness of the person is of the utmost importance for the
preservation of health.
When we consider that there are, on an average, 2,800 pores on
every square inch of the human body, and that the ordinary num-
ber of square inches on the surface of a man, is 2,500, we find that
the whole number of pores is 7,000,000 ; we cannot doubt these
56
orifices are invested witli some most important function. Our
convictions are strengthened, when we consider further, that each
of these pores is the outlet of a perspiratory tube a quarter of an
inch in length ; hence, the total length of Ihis system of drainage,
is TWENY-EiGHT MILES in every full grown man. At the bottom of
each of these tubes is a sponge-like body, which sucks up the im-
purities of the blood contained in the capillaries around, and ejects
the excrementitious matters through the pores, in the form of
insensible perspiration. It is evident that the Creator, who makes
nothing in vain, intended that this immense and complicated sys-
tem of drainage should perform a very important part in the
animal economy. In fact, by its agency, there are nearly three
pounds of matter which would be poisonous, if retained in the sys-
tem, ejected every twenty- four hours. If a ra'bbit is covered
with an impermeable coating of varnish, so as to close the pores'
completely, his blood becomes a poison, owing to the presence of
these excrementitious matters, and he dies of asphyxia in about an
hour and a half. Anything which obstructs the free action of the
perspiratory apparatus even in a slight degree, is therefore injurious
to health. To maintain this action of the skin in its integrity,
thorough bathing is necessary, at least three times a week in summer,
Once a week in the spring and autumn, and once a month in the
winter season. This is especially necessary for the restrained and
artificial mode of life that prisoners are compelled to submit to,
and ought always to be enforced, unless contra indicated by
disease.
Every prison and alms house is incomplete, if unprovided with
a swimming-bath, 25 feet square and 6 feet deep, or bathing tubs
of the ordinary kind, and a shower bath of at least 4 feet fall.
It is well known, that public institutions, especially those
designed for children, are very liable to the prevalence of sore eyes,
and when one person is attacked, it is very likely to spread to a
great number ; the purulent matter which exudes from the eyes,
adheres to the basin in which they are washed, and if the next
washed brings the slightest particle of it into contact with his own
eye, he is sure to contract opthalmia. This spreading of the
disease is prevented by a Very simple contrivance in use at Ran-
dall's and Ward's Islands, and invented, I believe, by Dr.
Whittlesey. It consists of a tube about seven feet in diameter and
5T
two feet dfeep, arcjund the upper circumference of this tub, a lead
pipe one inch in'diamater is placed, which is provided with small
orifices about one foot apart. When water is admitted into the
pipe, a jet is thrown up from each orifice, with a force, and to an
elevation proportioned to the head of water on the pipe._ Each
child cara bathe his face over these j'ets, without rubbing his eyes,
and it is obviously impossible that pijrflient matter can be carried
m &\s way to a well eye.
III. Exposure of the surface to the direct rays of the sua, is
^another of the conditions on which health is preserved. We are
unable to explam the rationale of the sun's action, but we know
that the rays of the sun are capable of inducing intense chemical
action, and it is probable their presence is able to determine some
of the wonderful processes of vital chemistry on the action of which
the integrity of the system depends.
Although we cannot precisely explain the action of the sun's
rays on the body, the fact of the necessity- of their presence is be-
yond controversy ; the blanched and etiolated appearance of those
who are secluded from them, is obvious to the most superficial
observer, and the evil influence on the health of such privation, is
well known to every physician who has ever been connected with a
^TJson.
The health of the pupils of the school for the blind, under the
care of Dr. S. G. Howe, has been most remarkable, and much of
their exemption from disease is attributed by the ofiicers to th'e
enforcement of the rule that no pupil shall remain within doors
more than three quarters of an hour at one time, or, in other
words, each pupil is compelled to spend fifteen minutes out of every
hour, in the open air. It is very desirable that every prise ^gj.
should exercise in the open air, at least one hour out of thetw ojitY-
four. ,
IV. Care should be taken, that the food ir a ^-^^
wholesome. "*
In prisons and alms houses supplied by cor r ^^ is
sometimes furnished of a very deleterious qr -'^^^^ ,' f„;„\^tful
diseases and loss of life has been the rep ^alityj an ^^
Auburn prison, a severe disease was eng^ .nit- ^^ , .. „f nn,
8 ^^deiedbyalototun
58
sound fish that was furnished by the contractor ; but this thing has
been of too frequent occurrence, and the danger is too well known
to the officers of prisons and alms houses, to make it necessary to
enlarge upon it in this report.
Labor.
It is of the utmost importance to provide labor for the prisoners
and paupers. It is important to provide it when it can be pro-
fitable to relieve the honest and industrious classes from the ex-
pense of supporting the idle and dissolute. It is also important to
provide it for the welfare Of the prisoners and paupers themselves,
even if no pecuniary gain resulted from the provision. Very
much of the crime and pauperism extant results from the want of
early training, and instruction in the regular pursuits of industry.
When children are taught in early youth, the value of time, the
importance of economy, and the habit of persevering industry, it
is very rare that they lapse into crime ; when the early neglect has
ripened into its legitimate fruit, it is surely the duty of the State
and its ministers to strive to eradicate the germ of their misfor-
tunes by repairing the errors of their early education.
The poor law commissioners of Great Britain year after year
bear testimony to the necessity of providing a test of work for all
who seek the bounty of the public, and their views are amply borne
out by the unerring dictates of experience. The following is an
extract from the sixth annual report : " Sir John Walsingham was,
on the 4th of April, in the present year, informed that a petition
from the weavers of Carlisle had been brought up, most properly
worded, and respectfully presented to the Board of Guardians of
the Carlisle Union by a body of working men, on Thursday the 2d
of April ; that the Guardians having admitted and conferred with
a deputation from this body, had directed the relieving officers to
take down the applications of all who affirmed themselves to be in
need of relief, in order that they (the guardians) might be in a
position to deal with them on the following day (Friday) to which
the meeting was then adjourned ; and that on Friday, the guar-
dians being still unprepared to settle definitely the future plan of
proceeding, had been under the necessity of giving relief in aid of
wages for one week to 3 or 4 hundred weavears, (being heads of
families,) after the average rate probably of Is. 6d. to each, in
money or j»psey's worth.
59
On Wednesday, the 8th of April, a meeting of the Chairman,
Vice-Chairman and Principal Guardians of the Union, T^as held,
at -which Sir John Walsingham was present ; and in conformity
with his suggestions, it was agreed that a resolution should be pro-
posed and promulgated on the following day (Thursday 9th April)
to the effect, that from and after Thursday the 16th of April, the
Guardians ^hould give no relief whatever, unless the person
relieved was wholly put of employment, and would regularly work
in breaking stones, or in such other labor as the Union authorities
might provide.
It was a.lso agreed that for the first week (i. e. from the 16th to
the 23d of April,) the weavers who should go to work on account
of the parish might be paid by the day until they should become
accustomed to the use of the hammer, but that for the second and
subsequent weeks (i. e., from the 23d of April,) they should be paid
by the piece, receiving the wages of independent laborers pn the
highways, viz., 10s. 6d. per yard for stone breaking." The result
of these measures is thus stated by Sir J. Walsingham.
" The guardians sat for 12, consecutive hours, notwithstanding
that they had divided themselves, for the more speedy transaction
of business, into three sections ; and they had to relieve on this
day (9th April,) between 400 and 500 heads of families. In re-
lieving, them, however, each applicant was made duly aware of the
board's resolutions, and that no more relief in aid of wages would
be allowed ; and they were also informed that, if they could not
maintain themselves and families by the loom, the guardians would
pay to them wages for stone breaking, &c., at which they might,
if they chose to exert themselves, obtain a subsistance ; but that at
all events, they would no longer be permitted to be partly paupers
and partly independent workmen,
The applicants relieved in aid of wages on Thursday, the 2d of
April, (the first day of the crisis,) numbered between 300 and 400,
and between 400 and 500 on Thursday, the 9th of April, the
second week of the crisis.
On Thursday the 16th of April, (the third week of the crisis,)
when it was tolerably notorious that work, and not alms, would be
given, there presented themselves but 50 applicants, to try how far
the guardians were in earnest. The stone yard, and in some few
cases the workhouse, was offered to these fifty individuals ; and I
60
found on examination of the labor book, tbat out of the 50, six
only had availed themselves of this relief.
On Thursday, the 23d of April, (from which day piece-work was
to begin,) I attended the Board of Guardians, and I don't think 10
applications from weavers came before us, and of the 10, four were
from the six stone breakers of the precedingweek ; three of whom,
as being known of old for idle, ill- conducted men, received orders
of admittance into the workhouse; whilst the fourth, as being' in-
firm of body and industrious in disposition, received a month's
out relief.
The Guardians of the Carlisle Union thus terminated a crisis,
of which the first appearance was sufficiently formidable, by de-
monstrating, in the most rapid 'and decisive manner, not only the
eflfectiveness of the principle on which the workhouse system is
based, but the overwhelming mischiefs and difficulties into which
any attempts to make up wages out of the poor rates, must even
plunge the administrators of relief.
I have thus at the hazard of wearying you by prolixity, spread
out the full report of the Assistant Commissioner, which demon-
strates the necessity for providing a test of labor for all those who
seek a maintenance at the public expense. Were it necessary, this
testimony might be corroborated from almost every one of the
Reports of the Poor Law Commissioners of England, but that you
will scarcely deem it necessary ; your own experience will have
amply proved to you, that very many throw themselves on the pub'
lie for support who would never think of doing so, were they com-
pelled to labor in return for their support.
There are men who make it a regular business to travel from
one poor house to another, and it is not unfrequent to hear knots
of these gentry grouped together, conversing on the merits and
demerits of the different alms houses of the country, just as
fashionable travellers discuss the comparative merits of our first
rate hotels.
Justice to tax payers and to the paupers, seems to require that
labor of some sort should be provided at every institution designed
for their reception. Nothing can be conceived more demoralizing
in its tendency than the habit of dependence which public support
without labor in return, entails upon those who give themselves up
to it ; they themselves are useless to the community, while their
61
cTiildren almost invariably become its scourge, and end their days
either in a prison or on the scaffold.
Although the necessity for the provision of labor is apparent,
the kinds of labor to be introduced, and the mode of conducting
the work is unfortunately a very difficult problem.
By an inspection of the table marked I, you will perceive that the
average amount of labor obtained from the paupers of all these
institutions, which embrace, among others, all the poor houses in
New York and Massachusetts, is only $3 91 per capita per annum.
While table J, although showing an increased amount of earnings,
is yet far from being a flattering exhibition of the power of mak-
ing the earnings of convicts adequate to their support. The earn-
ings of the Massachusetts State Prison have been sufficient to
support it without the aid from the State Treasury since 1831.
And the same has been done at Auburn for many years, but with
these exceptions, and that of Weatherfield, I do not know of a
single institution for either paupers or criminals, which for any
considerable time has been self supporting.
The expenses of Maine State Prison over and above the earn-
ings of the convicts for 1850, was $5,000. Number of convicts
67.
Excess of expenses above earnings in New Hampshire State
Prison for 1850, |6,634. Number of prisoners 82.
Excess of expenses over earnings in Vermont State Prison,
$4,261. Number of prisoners 62.
Excess of expenses above earnings in Rhode Island State Prison
for 1850, $5,087. Number of prisoners 84.
Excess of expenditures above earnings Sing Sing Prisouj
128,181. Number of prisopers 672.
Excess of expenses above earnings, Female Prison, Sing Sing,
$8,038. Number of prisoners 78. .
Excess of expenses over earnings at the Eastern Penitentiary,
Pennsylvania, was $4,864, not including salaries of officers. Num-
ber of prisoners 299.
Excess of expenses over earnings at Baltimore Penitentiary,
not including salaries of officers, $16,123. Number of prisoners
229.
Excess of expense over earnings in Michigan State Prison,
$12,687. Number of prisoners 110.
62
There are many reasons why the labor of paupers and criminals
should be unproductive. The cause of their becoming such, in a
great majority of instances, is a certain imbecility or obliquity of
mind, which renders them incapable of obtaining a livelihood in a
regular way. Even where there is the physical ability to labor,
there is a deficiency of judgment which prevents them from sell-
ing their labor in the most profitable market, or from taking care
of their earnings after they have received them. It is very rare
to find either a criminal or a pauper who is qualified to make a
living by honest industry ; in nine eases out of ten, some bodily or
mental infirmity is the cause of their falling into pauperism or
crime, and this infirmity which renders them unable to support
themselves in the world, makes them unprofitable laborers in the
alms house or prison.
This peculiar heedlessness of the pauper or prisoner, causes
them to spoil so much of the materials and tools entrusted to their
charge, that their labour would be unprofitable from this cause, if
from no other. The asylum at Blockley, near Philadelphia, is
fitted up with a steam engine, and much expensive machinery, but
it is rarely used, as the waste and destruction of machinery is
greater than the profits of the paupers' labor.
Another thing which very much diminishes the value of pauper
labor, is the absence of that hope of reward, which all experience
teaches is the most powerful stimulus to industry. If the crimi-
nal or the pauper drags through the day with just sufficient motion
to preserve him from punishment, his object is attained; he will
not make any willing effort to increase his production, to make
the most of his materials, or to improve his workmanship.
The most serious obstacle, however, to the profitable employ-
ments of prison and pauper labor, is the difficulty of procuring
competent managers. The ability to organize labor, to discover
the capacities of men, to elicit their utmost powers, and to direct
those powers into the most profitable channels, is a gift possessed
by very few ; and those who are competent to conduct the large
and complicated business relations of a large prison, with complete
success, can secure far greater pecuniary rewards in business, than
they could receive as a salary from any institution in the country.
Still, since prisons and almshouses have in some cases been made
self-supporting, we are not to despair of doing so inr others with
equal good management.
63
As the result of my most careful inquiries, I am of opinion that
no species of labor is so well adapted to paupers as agricultural
and horticultural labor. So far as I was able to learn, four-fifths
of the paupers in the northern states have never learned any trade ;
their stay in the almshouse being voluntary, they do not stay long
enough to acquire a trade thoroughly ; and as I have before re-
marked, they labor under the disadvantage of a certain mental
imbecility, which disenables them from learning any trade to
advantage. This difficulty does not exist in agriculture or horti-
culture ; any one can pull weeds, spread manure, or perform any
horticultural process under the direction of a skilful gardener.
Those institttjtions which are best provided with the means of
employing paupers in the cultivation of land show a better pecuni-
ary return for labor than any others, as South Boston, Providence
and Newport, while those that have expended capital largely
in providing machinery, have in most instances failed in making it
remunerative. I therefore strongly recommend, that the main
reliance of pauper establishments for profitable labor of their
inmates, should be on the cultivation of land. I shall only suggest
such other branches of labor as may be easily learned, and which
require better taste and genius for their acquisition. For child-
ren, knitting socks, and mittens for the younger, and the making
of children's shoes for the elder children, are employments well
adapted to their capacities, and are as profitable as any that I
have found. The boys at the Reform School, Boston, learn to
make these shoes readily in a fortnight, and will turn off ten pairs
of shoes in a day. The making of razor strops is well adapted
for children ; at first view this seems a trifling business, but the
number made annually is enormous.
One manufacturer offered to employ all the boys in the Phila-
delphia House of Refuge at this business, and allow a shilling a
day of six each hours' work of each boy. Book-binding, ia also
well adapted for childrens' labor ; they learn ^n a week to bind
school books, and in the vicinity of large publishing houses, this is
a kind of work which can easily be obtained at fair prices for the
labor.
Seating cane chairs, making umbrella stretchers, covering trunks,
and other similar occupations, are well adapted to this class of
children.
64
For adult paupers, mat-making, from the huska of Indian corn,
straw-hat making, shoe-making, spinning, knitting, stone-break-
ing, for McAdamized roads, and pounding bones for manure, are
valuable as auxiliaries for the employment of paupers. Some pau-
pers discover an astonishing aptitude for cutting and carving, these
might be profitably employed in making from bone, islet prickers,
tooth picks, and similar articles, while others might cut childreii's
toys out of wood, make pill boxes, match boxes, horse and fish nets,
and other occupations of like character.
Practical Recommendations.
I recommend for Ward's Island Refuge, the following bill of
fare :
Breakfast. — Half pound Graham bread, one herring and rye
cofiee.
Supper.— Four times a week, mush and molasses, (five ounces
of Indian meal and half gill of molasses ;) three times a
week, rice and molasses, (four ounces of rice and half gill of
molasses.)
Dinner. — Sunday, rice hash, (three ounces of meat and four
ounces of rice to each person.) See bill of fare, Mass.
State Prison. Twelve ounces corn bread. See bill of
fare, Washington Asylum.
Monday, baked pork and beams, five ounces pork, and five
ounces beans to each person.
Tuesday, six ounces corned beef, eight ounces potatoes,,
twelve ounces corn bread.
Wednesday, six ounces fresh beef, made into soup, twelve
ounces corn bread, and eight ounces '^beets, carrots,,
or tufeps. '
TAwr^daj', same as Wednesday.
Friday, four Ounces salt fish, twelve ounces potatoes, and
twelve ounces corn bread.
SatWday, same as Wednesday.
As fast as it can be done with a due regard to economy, I re-
, commend, on the score of health and economy of fuel, the fetroduc-
65
tion of the plan of heating and ventilating in use at the Bleckley
Alms House, Philadelphia.
I advise that the shingle roofs at Ward's Island be painted with
the Ohio Stone Paint ; roofs painted thus are incombustible, very-
much more durable, and less likely to leak ; most of the roofs at
Ward's Island, are very liable to take fire from the chimneys, and
the security which the Ohio Paint confers against fire is sufficient
to repay its cost, independently, of the other- advantages derived
from its use.
I advise that a law be procured ftom the Legislature requiring
the County Clerks in this State, to keep registers in which the
names of persons desiring to employ servants should be register-
ed together, with the kind of work required to be performed, and
the wages they are willing to give ; a copy of such register to be
transmitted weekly to the Commissioners of Emigration. It ap-
pears to me, that this would be a cheap and efficient means of re-
lieving the Commissioners of their burden, and confer a great
favOr on the people of this State who require the services of male
and female servants.
An immense saving may be made at Ward's Island, by the thor-
ough cultivation of the land. For this purpose, I recommend that
the washings of the privies be collected in cess pools to be used as
manure, a great proportion of it can used in the recent semi-fluid
state, and all odours can be absorbed by the daily sprinkling of
gypsum and powdered charcoal. Immense quantities of asparagas
and rhubarb, by the, use of this liquid manure, could be raised on
the Island for sale. Strawberries, raspberries, grapes and melons,
would be also easily produced and command remunerative prices,
I would also advise, that a part of the people at the Refuge
should be employed in making corn husk mats, and braiding straw
hats. Husks and straw can be procured in the auntum in any
quantities.
Any one can learn to make mats . in an hour, and straw hats in
a very little time. Among so many emigrants, some must be tai-
lors, and shoe-makers, these of course would be employed at their
own trade, and in general it would be well to provide conveniences
for the exercise of those trades, which experience shows are most
frequently professed by emigrants. But whatever kinds of em-
ployment are selected, I would' maintain it as a cardinal principle
9
66
that every able bodied person, whether child or adult, should be
kept in regular and active employment,
I recommend the enactment of a code of regulations for each in-
stitution, to be printed and placed in the hands of each person em-
ployed, in which the duties and responsibilities of each oiEcer
should be distinctly laid down, and specific directions given for
their conduct in various emergencies ; this is particularly neces-
sary in case of fire, the jofficers ought to known before hand what
is to be done, and the precise order in which they should be done,
let the fire break out when and where it will. I beg to refer you
to the fourteenth annual report of the Poor Law Commissioners of
England. To the code of rules for Massachusetts State Prison,
where the duties of officers in relation to the breaking out of a fire,
are laid down with singular clearness and good sense. To the
rules of the Baltimore and Philadelphia Aims-Houses, and those for
the government of the House of Correction at Boston. On the
basis of these codes, modified by your own experience, and the peculi-
arities of the Institutions committed to your charge, you will be able
to construct a system of regulation that will very materially alleviate
the burden of your own duties, make the duties of your officers easier
and more grateful, and remove many of those causes of irritation
and disquietude on the part of the inmates which invariably spring
up when the rule of their conduct is merely the will of the officer in
charge.
The system of accounts, and the contrivances for checking fraud
and speculation, adopted by the Commissioners, are greatly supe-
rior to most of the institutions in the country. They are superior
to all others in this. The number and character of the arti-
cles in each room can be at once ascertained from the books of the
Refuge ; thus, if it was desired to know how many tin cups there
were in the dining room, the number would be ascertained in a
moment at the office, and the correspondence can at once be as-
certained by counting, and the person in charge of the room held
responsible for any deficiency.
The aggregate value of the minor articles in a large institution
ia not small, apd on that account is worthy of attention, but the
moral offset of a rigid system of accountability is even more de-
sirable than the pecuniary saving which is .effected by it. As I
have seen nothing better in the accounts of other institutions, I
have no alteration or improvement to recommend.
67
I also adyise, that a book should be kept at each institution, in
which the following facts should be registered in parallel columns.
1st, name of pauper or prisoner; 2nd, age; 3rd, height; 4th,
weight on admission ; 5th, occupation before entrance ; 6th, occu-
pation after entrance; 7th, capacity of the chest. This may be
measured with great accuracy by means of a very simple and
inexpensive apparatus. It consists of a tall glass jar, of small
diameter, graduated to one-sixteenth of an inch on the sides. This
jar is to be filled with water, and inverted ovet a pneumatic
cistern. The pauper is then directed to fill his chest with air, and
to expire it into the graduated jar through a bent tube ; the
space occupied by the air in the jar will then be an exact measure
of the capacity of the chest. 8th, weight on the first day of every
succeeding month.
Four or five classes of ten each, should be selected for experi-
ment on the efiect of various diets and modes of cookery. I
recommend that the object of the first set of experiments should be,
to ascertain how far the tables of dietetic equivalents founded on
the relative amounts of nitrogen and carbon in each article of food,
as determined by chemical analysis, can be relied on as a guide in
practice. '
For the Alms House at Blackwell's Island, I recommend for non-
working paupers, the same bill of fare as already laid down for
Ward's Island. For working men, an addition of 33 per cent, on
all articles except bread for dinner.
For the Penitentiary at Blackwell's Island, I advise the same
bill of fare for the female prisoners as already advised for the
Alms House.
For Male Prisoners.
Breakfast. — Same as now used, except that the bread should
be Graham bread, and one herring to each prisoner.
Supper. — Same as now ; Graham bread.
Dinner. — Sunday, baked pork and beans, 8 oz. pork, 1 gill
beans, 12 oz. corn bread.
Monday, 12 oz. fresh beef made into soup, 12 oz. corn
bread, 8 oz. beets, carrots, turnips or parsnips.
68
Tuesday, rice-hash, 6 oz. meat, 6 oz. rice ; 12 oz. corn
bread, 4 oz. potatoes ; the meat to be 3 oz. pork, and
3 oz. beef.
Wednesday, baked pork and beans, same as Sunday.
Thursday, same as Monday.
Friday, 6 oz. cod fish, 12 oz. potatoes hashed, 12 oz. corn
bread.
Saturday, 12 oz. corned beef, 10 oz. potatoes, 8 oz. beet, or
some other vegetable.
Randall's Island bill of fare, I advise should be constituted as
follows :
Breakfast. — Sunday and Wednesday, mush, (4 oz. Indian
meal,) and half a gill of molasses.
Monday and Thursday, 6 oz. Graham bread, 2 oz. cheese,
1 pint cocoa, (three quarter oz. cocoa, half oz. sugar,
1 gill milk.)
Tuesday and Friday, 1 pint milk porridge, 6 oz. Graham
bread.
Saturday, boiled rice, (4 oz.) with milk or molasses.
DiNNEB. — Monday and Wednesday, 5 oz. roast meat, 6 oz. corn
bread, 5 oz. potatoes.
Monday and Thursday, 5 oz. meat made into soup, with 6
oz. beets, carrots or turnips, 6 oz. corn bread.
Tuesday, 4 oz. fresh fish boiled, 6 oz. corn bread.
Friday, 4l oz. salt fish, 6 ounces potatoes hashed.
Saturday, 5 oz. corned beef, 4 oz. rice pudding.
Supper. — Sunday and Wednesday, 6 oz. Graham bread, three
quarter oz. butter.
Monday and Thursday, 6 oz. Graham bread, half pint
milk.
Tuesday and Friday, 6 oz. Graham bread, one and a half
oz. cheese.
Saturday, boiled rice, with molasses.
69
Conclusion.
I cannot bring this report to a close, witliout bearing a willing
and honest testimony to the excellence of the management exhi-
bited in the institutions committed to your care. This is shown
in the economy, cleanliness, comfort and good order which are
visible on every hand.
When you requested me to undertake a mission to the public
institutions in our large cities, you expressed so strong a sense of
the deficiencies of your establishments, and so strong a desire that
prompt and efficacious remedies should be ascertained and applied,
that I fuUy expected to be able to furnish you with most extensive
plans of improvement. Now, when my mission is accomplished,
I return with the most meagre list of improvements, because I have
really found very little that is superior to yours, and very few that
are at all equal.
When I look at the herculean task undertaken by the Commis-
sioners of Emigration, the difficulties they have encountered, with
inadequate funds, buildings and appliances, I cannot withhold a
tribute of grateful praise to the energy, the skill and the self-
denying labor, which in so short a time has brought order out of
confusion, and established a comfortable home and an ample pro-
vision for the wants of the shoals of destitute and unfortunate
emigrants, which the circumstances of European nations are con-
tinually forcing upon our shores.
The noble bakery at Blackwell's Island is well worthy the study
of those interested in the administration of charitable institutions,
and the bake-house recently erected by the Commissioners of
Emigration at Ward's Island, of ample size and replete with every
convenience and every contrivance for economy, will soon exercise
a marked and decided influence in reducing the expenditure for
provisions.
I should be untrue to my feelings, were I to omit an acknow-
ledgment of the unvarying kindness and attention that I received
from the officers and managers of every institution that I have
visited. All the details of management have been thrown open to my
inspection, without the slightest hesitation or reserve, and copies
have been kindly made of such documents as I desired to carry
home.
70
My thanks are especially due to Dr. Given, of the Eastern Peni-
tentiary, and to Dr. Isaac Parish, of Philadelphia ; to Dr. Frick,
of the Maryland Penitentiary, and to Dr, Waine, of Baltimorcj for
most valuable itiformation, and for much kind personal attention.
I trust that my inission, however meagre its present results
may be, will be found useful, by turning the attention of the man-
agers of public institutions to the importance of collecting safe and
reliable data from which we may eventually be enabled to deter-
mine, with reasonable certainty, the cheapest and the best mode of
employing the able-bodied, and supporting the sick and infirm
pauper.
Pauperism is increasing amongst us in a fearfully increasing
ratio. I am unable to state the rate of increase for the whole
country, but from the inquiries I have made, I am satisfied it is
increasing quite as fast as in the State of New York.
In the State of Now York, the total number of persons relieved
and supported, was 15,564, and the whole cost of their relief and
support, was $245,433 21, in A. D. 1832.
In the year 1850, the whole number relieved and supported, was
99,433, at an expense to the tax payors of f 816,858 90, being an
increase of tax for the support of pauperism, in 18 years, of 233
per cent, from 1832 to 1850. In 1832, 1 person was relieved at
the public expense, to every 156 inhabitants ; it was 1 to every 31
inhabitants in 1850.
In 1832, the cost of relieving and supporting the poor, was
thirteen cents and one mill to every man, woman and child in the
State.
In 1850, it was twenty-six cents and four mills. From these
statements, it appears that the tax for the relief and support of
the poor, has rather more than doubled in eighteen years.
We cannot flatter onrselves that the increase of pauperism, and
the consequent increase of taxation, will not continue ; the example
of other nations, forbids us to lay this " flattering unction to our
souls." In England, in 1850, one person was relieved or sup-
ported to every twenty inhabitants, while the cost of their support
was equivalent to the payment of $1 60 by every man, woman and
child in the country. In Ireland, every fifth man is a pauper, with
little prospect of improvement.
Facts like these, are eloquent ; they commend themselves alike
71
to the patriot, the Christian, the philanthropist, the statesman and
the tax-payer, and call loudly upon every one interested in the
administration of the poor-laws, to collect all the facts and experi-
ments which will enable us to mitigate the pressure of this great
evil, with all the economy compatible with humanity.
That much might be done by skill and good management, to
diminish the taxation arising from pauperism, is demonstrated by
the following statement.' I have no reason to believe, that the poor
in the counties of Cataraugus and Lewis, are in any degree better
treated than they are in the counties of Putnam and Orange ; yet
the average weekly cost of the support of the poor in Putnam
county, was, for six years, thirty-five cents, and the cost in Orange
county was thirty-nine cents, while in the County House of Catar-
raugus it was seventy- two cents, and in Lewis county it was seventy
cents.
I might multiply similar examples of the disparity of cost in the
maintenance of paupers in the different counties of the State to any
extent ; but the above are sufficient for my purpose ; it will be
noticed, that the counties of Orange and Putnam are in the vicinity
of New York, where the cost of living is much greater, than in
the remote counties of Cataraugus and Lewis, and the differefice
can therefore only be attributed to superior management.
With thanks for the kindness with which you have promoted the
objects of my mission, I respectfully submit my report for your
consideration. •
JOHN STANTON GOULD.
72
BILLS OF FARE AT VARIOUS INSTITUTIONS.
1. Ward's Island Bill of Fare — Ref0ge Department.
Sunday.— The breakfast consists of 8 oz. bread, half oz. coffee
to each person. On Thursday the breakfast consists of mush
and molasses.
The supper invariably consists of bread and tea, 8 oz. of the
former and one-eighth oz. of the latter.
The dinners are as follows :
Sunday. — 1:^ lbs. boiled rice and molasses, 8 oz. bread.
Monday. — 8 oz. corned beef or pork, 8 oz. bread.
Tuesday. — 8 oz. fresh beef, -with soup made from it, and 8 oz.
bread.
Wednesday. — 8 oz. beef or pork, and 8 oz. bread.
Thursday. — 8 oz. fresh beef and soup, 8 oz. bread.
Friday .--8 oz. salt fish, with potatoes, and 8 oz. bread.
Saturday. — 8 oz. fresh beef and soup, 8 oz. bread.
The soup is made by boiling, for 3 hours, in 200 gall?, of water
650 lbs. of beef, 40 lbs. riccjli lbs. of pepper, together with
leeks and carrots. The soup meat consists of shins, neck pieces,
shoulder clods, and sockets^ The crumbs of bread left on the ta-
bles are collected and put into the soup. Boiled by steam, but it is
not admitted into the boiler. By weekly returns, ending March
22d, it appears that 9 ^z. of potatoes are consumed by each per-
son per week ; 2 oz. beans per week ; i gill, molasses ; 1^ oz.
rice. It will be seen that the weekly requisitions do not corres-
pond with the above, which gives li lbs. per week. I cannot ac-
count for this discrepancy. 1 quart of milk is allowed to each
nursing woman per day.
IB
Bill of tare— Randall's Island.
Breakfast. — Every day in the week is milk and water, and mo-
lasses and bread.
Supper. — Every day, except Sundays and Fridays, consists of
rice and molasses, or mush and molasses, sometimes milk is sub-
stituted for molasses. On Saturdays and Fridays, milk and water,
and molasses and bread are given.
Dinner. — Monday, salt beef and potatoes.
Tuesday, fresh beef made into soup.
Wednesday, pork and potatoes and parsnips.
Thursday, roast ,beef and gravy.
Friday, salt fish and potatoes.
Saturday, fresh meat and soup.
Sunday, mush and mik.
Soup is made by boiling 710 lbs. meat in 160 galls, water ; to
this is added 4 bushels turnips, 1 bush, parsnips, one-half bush,
onions, one-half bush., carrots. The soup is boiled by steam,
which is not admitted into the boiler.
There is no regular allowance of food by weight to the inmates;
but a calculation founded on an examination of the return made
for the week ending March 31st, it appears that the average con-
sumption of bread per day, for each inmate, was 1 lb. ; of meat,
6| oz., for 6 days ; of salt fish, 4 oz., for 1 day ; of molasses, 21
gills per week ; of Indian meal, 3 oz. per week ; of rice, 6 oz. per
week. I cannot ascertain the quantity of potatoes consumed here.
10
u
BILL OF FARfi— NEW YOEK ALMS HOUSE.
Dinner Table, for Working Men.
M'
■s
^
M
03
■g »
^
&^
s
(U
di
o
s3
o
o
■V
«
pq
i pound.
1
■^ pound.
1 pound.
3 -J pints,
including
3 1 pints.
1 "
1
a
ii
about one
gill of
"
beans and
f pound.
1 "
"
peas each
II
1
"
ration.
(C
Monday
Tuesday
"Wednesday . .
Thursday. . . .
Friday
Saturday .
Sunday
I lb.
Supper,
i lb. of bread, \ of an ounce of tea.
BfiEAKFAST,
i lb. of bread, | of an ounce of coiFee.
Dinner Table, for Males and Females unable to work.
f
.
-^1
■s
pH e*-;
•tI
a
aa
c^l »
«
S
Days.
o
1
;ef Sou
Eice a
getable
6
o
1
J3
^
•^
m
-2
S
W
Monday.. . .
i poun
ilb.
ilb.
Tuesday.. . .
4 ounces.
iRill-
Wednesday
1 pound
ilb.
3 "i pints.
Thursday...
i ounces.
iKill-
Friday. . . .
4- lb.
fib.
1 lb.
Saturday. .
1 pound.
ilb.
3 -J pints.
~
Sunday
igill.
5 oz.
Soup made as follows : 600 lbs. meat, 18 lbs. rice, 50 heads of
Cabbage, and 1 quart salt, boiled in 186 galls, water ; boiled by
steam ; steam not admitted into the boiler.
75
4. — Bill of Fare of Penitentiary, Blackwell's Island.
Breakfast. — 3 lb. bread, i oz. coffee.
Supper. — Mush and molasses, and rice and molasses alternately
Dinner. — Sunday, i lb. pork, 1 lb. beef, f gill beans.
Monday, 1 lb. fresb beef made into soup, | lb. bread.
Tuesday, same as Monday.
Wednesday, same.
Thursday, 1 lb. pork, | gill beans, and 3 potatoes.
Friday, same as Monday.
Saturday, same as Monday.
For the supper of mush, 2i- oz. Indian meal are allowed to each.
For the supper of rice, 2i oz. are allowed to each. ,
k gill of molasses is allowed to each prisoner for supper.
The daily consumption of bread per man, is lilbs.
The soup contains, in addition to the meat for the day, iturnips,
carrots, and is usually thickened with Indian meal.
It is boiled by steam, which is admitted directly into the boiler.
The coffee is made by mixing 40 lbs. coffee with 2 bushels of
peas, and roasting them together.
5. — Bill of Fare at the Philadelphia Almshouse.
Breakfai^. — Bread and coffee.
Supper. — Bread and tea.
Dinner. — Sunday, beef and mutton soup.
Monday, cold corned beef and bread.
Tuesday, mush and molasses.
Wednesday, beef and mutton soup.
Thursday, cold corned beef and bread.
Friday, Cod-fish and potatoes.
Saturday, roast beef or mutton.
. The old women are allowed butter with their bread.
There is no regular allowance with respect to the quantity of
food allowed, each one being permitted to eat until he issatisfied.
76
On examining the accounts of tlie institution, and comparing the
number of pounds purchased, with the weekly average number of
inmates, it appears that 8 oz. of meat per day, were allowed for 5
days in the week ; 3 oz. fish, and 1 lb. potatoes, 2 ddys in the
week ; 8i lbs. bread for each person per day.
Soup is made from 300 lbs. meat, I bush. 2 pecks and 2 quarts
of beans ; 2 pecks of onions, and the bread left at table the preced-
ing day, being boiled in 100 gallons of water for 4 hours.
The tea is made at the rate of 11 oz. to the 100 persons.
Coffee at the rate of 40 oz. to the 100 persons.
6. — Bill of Fare, Moyamensing Prison.
Breakfast. — 1^ lbs. of bread are given to each prisoner in the
morning which is to last him the whole day. Coffee once a week.
The convicts have mutton made into soup. Two days in the week
they have corned beef, and four days fresh beef. Prisoners sen-
tenced by the court, are allowed wheat bread. Vagrants have rye
bread.
7. — Eastern Penitentiary, Philadelphia, Bii.,l of Fare.
Breakfast. — li lbs. bread are given to each prisoner, which
lasts him the whole day. 6 mornings in the week, the
prisoners have tea at the rate of ^ oz. per man. 2 morn-
ings in the week, they are furnished with coffee, at the rate
of "5 of an oz. per man ; the coffee is pure, and the tea is a
good quality of hyson.
Supper. — Tea, the same as for breakfast.
Dinner. — Sunday, f lb. meat, free from bone, hashed with
onions.
Monday, smoked bacon and shoulders, 12 oz. per man.
Tuesday, mutton soup, 13 oz. meat.
Wednesday, same as Sunday.
11
Thursday, f lb. pork with bean soup in winter, and soup
the same as Tuesday in summer.
Friday, same as Sunday.
Saturday, same as Tuesday.
8 lbs. of sugar is allowed to 310 prisoners for sweetening their
tea in the morning, and the same quantity in the evening. 2^
gallons of molasses are used to sweeten the coffee for the same
number, being 0.41 ounces of sugar to the tea of each prisoner,
and 0.26 gills of molasses to the coffee of each prisoner.
Half a gallon of molasses, and as much salt and vinegar is al-
lowed to each prisoner monthly, as he desires. It is kept in the
cell, and used at discretion. In the winter season, bean soup is
allowed with pork. And hominy and molasses is sometimes given
for breakfast by way of change.
Bill of Fare, Philadelphia House of Refuge.
Breakfast. — Bread, as much as is wanted, and coffee.
Supper. — Mush and molasses, except on Saturdays and Sun-
days. On Saturdays they have soup, and on Sundays
the meat from which the soup from Saturday's supper
was made.
Dinner. — Every day except Sundays, they have fresh beef
made into soup ; 5 oz. of meat without bone are allowed
to each boy. On Sundays the dinner consists of bread
and molasses.
The coffee is the best Laguira unmixed ; 2i lbs. are used for
200 boys, and six quarts of milk and 5 quarts of molasses are
put into the whole quantity. The aggregate yearly consumption
of meat for the number of inmates would, at the rate of 5 oz.
per head, amount to 26,462 lbs. The amount actually consumed
during the year 1850, was 31,540 lbs ; showing that in their soup*
meat, 5 oz. of meat without bone was equivalent to 6 ^„ oz. with
bone. The soup is made by boiling 6 oz. meat for each person,
thickened for 250 persons, with 5 quarts of rice, 1 bushel of
turnips, and 10 heads of cabbage. Potatoes and beans are some-
times used in the soup. Rye bread is exclusively used for healthy
boys and girls. 100 weight of Indian meal is mixed with 2
78
barrels of rye flour. The average number of inmates in 1850,
was 232, and for these 468 barrels of rye flour and lYl cwt. of
Indian meal were used ; which if they gained 30 per cent, during
their conversion into bread, would give 27 oz. to each inmate per
day.
Bill of Fare, Maryland Penitentiary.
Breakfast. — 1 herring, i lb. bread, i oz. coffee, 1 oz. sugar.
Supper. — Bread and coffee, same as breakfast.
Dinner. — Sunday, 9 oz. bacon, ^ lb. bread, 12 oz. potatoes.
Sometimes beans are substituted for potatoes.
Monday, 12 oz. beef, made into soup, i lb. bread.
Tuesday, same as Sunday.
Wed7iesday, same as Mondiiy.
Thursday, same as Sunday.
Friday, same as Monday.
Saturday, same as Monday.
Fish is given every Catholic fast day. Occasionally Cod-fish
is given at other times, in which case, 10 oz. are allowed to each
prisoner. If more bread is asked for by a prisoner than the
regular allowance, it is always given. Sour crout is generally
allowed on Sundays and Tuesdays. The bacon is composed of
smoked hog's jaws.
Bill of Fare, Baltimore Jail.
The fare of this institution may be concisely stated : it consists of
1 lb. of bread, and 1 lb. of beef per day, with an allowance of
vegetables, 3 times a week. The prisoners do their own cooking,
and eat their allowance when and how they please.
79
Bill of Fare, Baltimore, Alms House.
Breakfast. — 8 oz. bread and coffee.
Supper. — 8 oz. bread and tea.
Dinner. — Sunday, 5 oz. pork or bacon.
Monday, mush and molasses in winter, and rice and molas-
ses in summer.
Tuesday, 8 oz. mutton made into soup, and 4 oz. bread.
Wednesday, 8 oz. beef soup, 4 oz. bread.
Thursday, 8 oz. mutton soup.
Friday, mush and molasses, or hominy.
Saturday, 8 oz. beef soup, 4 oz. bread.
The above is for ordinary purposes ; but working men are
allowed 12 oz. fresh meat, or 9 oz. bacon. Each pauper has f oz.
coffee, and \ oz, tea, (Young Hyson.)
Washington Jail, Bill of Fare.
Breakfast. — ^ a mackerel, or 1 herring, 1 oz. coffee, 11 oz.
bread.
No supper.
Dinner.- — Tuesdays, Thursdays and Saturdays, 1 lb. fresh beef
made into soup, 11 oz. bread. ' Other days, 1 lb. salt beef,
and 11 oz. bread. No vegetables given.
Bill of Fare of Penitentiary of District of Columbia.
Breakfast. — Rye coffee, ^ lb. bread.
Supper. — Tea, ^ lb. bread.
Dinner. — Sunday, 1 lb. of bacon or corned beef, with potatoes
or cabbage.
Fridays, 2 herrings a piece, with potatoes, I lb. bread.
Other days, 16 oz. beef made into soup, or 12 oz. pork
and i lb. bread. The coffee is made wholly of rye. Twice
a week Indian bread is served instead of wheat bread ; for
the remainder of the time, wheat bread is used.
80
Bill of Fare, Washington Asylum for the Poor.
Breakfast. — 1 herring to each pauper every day, except
Sunday ; as much bread as they wish.
Supper. — Tea and bread.
Dinner. — Sunday and Thursday, ^ lb. bacon and vegetables.
Monday, Wednesday, and Saturday, -^ lb. fresh beef with-
out bone, made into soup.
Tuesday, i lb. pork or | lb. salt beef.
Friday, a herring for each pauper.
The soup is made in the proportion of 16 galls, water to 35 lbs.
of meat, and thickened with flour and rice.
For able bodied paupers, corn bread is used, and wheat bread
for the old, infirm, and sickly.
4-J bushels of meal per week, and 180 lbs. wheat bread are suffi-
cient for 80 paupers 1 week.
Corn bread is made by scalding 3 bushels of Indian meal in the
morning ; it is then left till evening, when 1 quart of salt is
stirred in, and baked in cakes about 1 inch thick.
Each pauper is allowed as much salt, pepper, and vinegar as he
desires.
, The coffee is made by adding together i coffee and f rye. 12
lbs. of this mixture is given to 80 persons weekly. 1^ lbs. tea are
allowed to 80 persons weekly.
Bill of Fare, Boston Lunatic Asylum.
Breakfast. — Coffee and chocolate, with bread at pleasure.
Supper. — Tea and bread.
Dinner. — Sunday, boiled rice.
Monday, pork and beans, and rice pudding.
Tuesday, fresh fish and vegetables.
Wednesday, roast meat and vegetables.
Thursday, beef soup and pudding.
Friday, salt fish.
Saturday, roast meat and vegetables.
81
Cheese for supper twice a week ; gingerbread twice a week.
I had no means of ascertaining the amount of food consumed per
day by the patients in this asylum, nor the daily cost of their
provision.
Boston House of Coruection.
Breakfast.— Bread and coifee ; i oz. coffee to each prisoner.
Supper. — Bread and coffee ; 5 oz. coffee to each.
DiNSER.-r-Monday, Wednesday, and Friday, 1 lb. boiled beef,
and 1-J- lbs. potatoes.
Tuesday, Thursday and Saturday, 1 lb. meat made into
soup.
Sunday, baked beef.
i lb. beef is allowed to women. In addition to the above allow-
ance, men who work hard, are allowed an extra ration of bread of
i lb. All have 1 lb. of bread per day. Each man is allowed ^
pint of vinegar, and 2 oz. black pepper. On the days for boiled
beef, the liquor in which it is boiled, after skimming off the fat, is
thickened with Indian meal, and given to the men with their beef.
The soup is boiled 2^ hours, and then rice and cabbage are put
in and boiled for 2|- hours longer. If any of the prisoners leave
any food the preceding day, it is hashed up for them for breakfast.
Massachusetts State Prison.
Breakfast. — Sunday, Tuesday, Wednesday and Friday, rice
hash.
Monday, cold corned beef and warm potatoes.
Thursday, salt meat, hashed with potatoes.
Saturday, cod-fish, hashed with potatoes.
Dinner. — Sunday, cold corned beef, hot potatoes, and mush
and molasses.
Mondays and Fridays, baked pork and beans.
Tuesdays, Thursdays and Saturdays, soup.
Wednesdays, boiled corned beef.
Supper. — Bread and coffee twice a week, raush and molasses,
11
82
The coffee is made of rye, 9 quarts of which serve for 480 men.
Rice Hash is made by boiling the rice until it is nearly done ;
minced meat is then added, and boiled for ^ an hour.
Wheat bread is given to any prisoner with whom the rye and
Indian bread or the corn bread disagrees.
Convicts are allowed 1 lb. of beef, or 12 oz. of pork, and as
much bread as can be made from 10 oz. rye meal and 10 oz. of
Indian meal.
For every hundred rations they are allowed 2i bushels of
potatoes, 2 quarts of vinegar, and 4 quarts of salt. In the warm
season they are allowed an extra ration of 1 gall, of molasses,
and 12 oz. of hops to each 100 rations, which is made into hop
beer.
The Warden may at his discretion allow an equal market value
of peas, beans or rice in place of potatoes.
House of Industry, Boston.
Breakfast. — I lb. bread and cocoa.
Supper. — |- lb. bread, j oz. tea.
Dinner. — Sunday, rice and molasses.
Monday, beans and pork.
Tuesday, beef soup.
Wednesday, baked beef.
Thursday, same as Tuesday.
Friday, salt fish.
Saturday, same as Tuesday.
On Mondays, 100 lbs. pork and 2 bushels of beans are allowed
for 600 inmates. On Wednesdays the beef is composed of
shoulder clods, which are baked 2^ hours ; and 5 bushels of
potatoes are allowed to 600 persons. On Fridays 140 lbs. salt
fish and 5 bushels of potatoes are allowed to 600 persons. The
soup is made by boiling 36T lbs. neck pieces and shins of beef in
a sufficient quantity of water for 4 hours. Rice is always used as
a thickening, and any vegetables which they may have on hand are
9,lso put into the soup.
83
Suffolk Co. Jail.
Breakfast. — Rye coflfee, sweetened with molasses.
Supper. — ^The same. _
Dinner. — 1 lb. beef, and 2 or 3 potatoes.
4 lbs. of rye coflFee are allowed to 100 prisoners, and is
sweetened with 2 quarts of molasses.
1 lb. of bread is allowed per day.
The liquor in which the*beef is boiled, iS thickened with Indian
meal, and served with the meat.
As much salt and pepper is allowed to the men as they want, but
no vinegar.
Rhode Island State Prison.
Breakfast. — i lb. bread and coffee.
Supper. — Mush and molasses.
Dinner. — Sunday, 6 oz. cold corned beef, 5 oz. of rice.
Monday, 1 lb. of pork or beef.
Tuesday, i lb. beef made into soup.
Wednesday, i lb. salt fish.
Thursday, 1 lb. pork or beef.
Friday, i lb. beef made into soup.
Saturday, pork and beans. 27 lbs. pork, and 26 quarts
of beans for 100 men.
The bread is made three parts wheat, and 1 part Indian meal.
On cod-fish days, li bushels potatoes are allowed to 100 men ;
and 8 quarts of milk and 3 lbs. of butter are given as a sauce for
the cod-fish.
1:^ lbs. of coffee are allowed to 100 prisoners.
The mush is made at the rate of 20 quarts of meal to 100 men,
and each man is allowed i a gill of molasses.
Providence Alms House.
Breakfast. — Monday, meat, milk porridge and bread.
All other days, meat, coiFee, and bread and butter.
Dinner. — Sundays, mush of -wheat flour, rice, or Indian meal.
Mondays, boiled beef and pork.
Tuesdays and Thursdays, soup.
Wednesdays, roast meat.
Fridays, pork and beans.
Saturdays, salt fish and potatoes.
Supper. — Tea and bread and butter.
Each pauper is allowed as much as he wishes to eat ; but from
the number of lbs. of meat purchased, divided among the average
number of paupers, it appears that each pauper consumed daily
16 oz. of meat ; i. e. on each day when meat is allowed ; 5 oz. of
cod-fish.
On Saturdays, 17 oz. bread, •§ oz. butter, | oz. tea, j oz. coffee,
2 oz. sugar.
Pentonville Prison, England, Bill of Fare.
I have not been able to learn the daily fare of the prisoners at
this institution, but the following is taken from one of the annual
reports for 1847, of the Inspectors of Great Britain, viz :
28 oz. meat, 140 oz. bread. Si pts. soup, 7 lbs. potatoes, 7 pts.
gruel, 5i pts. cocoa, 14 oz. milk, 1^ gills molasses.
The soup is made of the liquor of meat of that day,
strengthened by three ox heads, barley, carrots, pepper and some
onions.
Gruel is made by boiling at the rate 1^ oz. oat meal in 1 pint
of water, and 6 drams of molasses.
Cocoa is made by boiling f oz. fealsed cocoa in f pint of water,
2 oz. milk, and 6 drams of molasses.
85
^
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86
RATIO FOR U. S. ARMY.
I lb. pork or bacon, or 1^ lbs. of fresh or salt beef ; 18 oz. of
bread or flour, or 12 oz. of hard bread, or ly lbs. corn meal ; and
at the rate eight quarts of peas or beans, or, in lieu thereof, ten
pounds of rice ; 6 lbs. of coffee ; 12 lbs. of sugar ; 4 quarts of
vinegar.
87
■5[99Ai.
jad pooj piiog
O.^ r-ii-H r-li-H WOi-1 i-Hi-l
CO T-H O 00
£- to la CO
•uol^n:^
enosjsd JO 'o^
T-(-^00 OCOcDO-^OsincQOOOsOOOOQOCO
'<:O003J::-C^ iO^3 §
0< Penitentiary, Blackwell's Island. . .
Philadelphia Alms House
Moyamensinp; Prison, Philada
Eastern Penitentiary, Philada
Philadelphia House of Refuge
Maryland Penitentiary.
Baltimore Jail
Baltimore Alms House
"Washington Jail
Washington Penitentiary
Washington Alms House
Boston House of Correction
Massachusetts State Prison
Boston Alms House
Boston Jail
Rhode Island State Prison
Providence Alms House
Pentonville Prison, England
U.S. Navy
U. S.Army ."
W'^ N. Y. City Prison
Average of 1 2 Lunatic Asylums. . .
FU
CQ
cts.
76
36.9
41
62.
50
66
48
56
43
2 OT
62
47
83
40
90
28
$ cts.
28
12.1
06.7
41.6
18.7
77
36
1 23
2 11
25^
71i
22
53
93
13*
75
3
cts.
06
03.1
03
05.1
09
11.2
t 16
10
6*
+ 19*
10*
24
cts.
38:f
74
70.2
08.6
04
84
1 28
2 73
53
81*
61
85
08
25
1 24
2 51
cts.
20
19
13.7
9
16
10
19
13
10*
11*
23*
13
*
9
9
12f
* Unkno-wn.
f Including lights,
1^ Including hospital and buLldiDg expenses.
89
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90
Table I>.
Shewing the number of jails in Massachusetts, the weekly average
cost of hoard for each prisoner, the average weekly total cost
of each prisoner, the average number of prisoners, the average
weekly cost of fuel, fyc.
1
O
1
e
1
u
>
o
u
Average weekly cost
of fuel for each
Prisoner.
o
!i
It
1
.3
o
12;
Suffolk
1
3
3
^ 2
$1 66f
1 484
1 40
2 25
1 15
1 15
1 16
1 56
1 16
1 60
2 00
1 60
1 76
111
36
40
9
3
8
14
7
28
17
1
10
cts.
64
38
164
*
16
144
84
104
10 3-5
13 3-5
*
U 85
2 81
2 25
3 15
2 47
2 04
2 47
fl 46
2 35
*
3 35
«
*
75
Essex
41
Middlesex
50
44
Pranklin
8
Hamp'^liire
3
*
*
JS'orfolk
9
Bristol
26
Plymouth
7
6
Kan tucket .*
4
Dukes
3
SI 68
284
2 37
The number of prisoners who died in 1860, for which year this table is compiled,
was only 5, or 1 76-100 per cent, of the average number for the year, or 8-100 per
cent, for the whole number committed. No labor performed in any of the jails.
* Unknown.
f Evidently erroneous, but exactly according to the aecount given by the institu*
tioD,
91
Tatole E.
Shewing the results of the following Houses of Correction in rela-
tion to the weekly average cost of board for each prisoner, , the
annual average number of prisoners, the weekly average cost
of salaries for each prisoner, ^c.
%
1
^£
S3
>-
<4-l
O
Weekly average cost
of board, salaries,
per capita.
. Total average Tveekly
cost per capita.
Average weekly cost
of fuel per capita.
Suffolk :
$2 07
1 80
1 26
' 1 40
1 75
1 75
2 00
1 75
1 75
1 75
1 60
2 00
60
1 75
381
-76
103
40
3
5
42
18
26
72
2
3
2
$0 36
63
44
*
*
*
*
*
26
»
*
*
$2 06
*
3 20
3 17
2 57
3 43
2 03
1 93
1 63
2 43
*
*
*
«
10 12
*
Middlesex
11
Worcester
24f
IBf
23i
«
H
8
Hampshire
Hampden
Berkshire
Norfolk
Bristol
Plymouth
#
Barnstable
13i
*
Nantucket. ....
1 65
719
42
2 49
13 1-10
19 prisoners died during the year, being an average of 2 74-100 per cent, of the
average number, and 6-100 of 1 per cent, on the total number.
* Unknown.
92
Table F.
Shewing the amount of carbon and nitrogen in various articles of
food, from Liebig, Prout and Pereira.
S'S>
Wheat starch.
Gum Arabic
Anhydrous cane sugar
Sugar of milk
Citric acid
Butter
Mutton fat
Hog's lard
Albumen
Tibrine
Gluten
Wheat — dried in vacuo at 230° Fahr. . .
Oats — dried in vacuo at 230° Fahr.
Rye
Potatoes
Peas
Beans
Fresh bread
Ox blood
Fresh meat, without fat
Ditto, with l-7th fat, and cellular tissue
Dry muscular beef
Boasted deer
Roast beef
Roast yeal
Indian corn
37. 5
36.3
47.5
40.0
43.63
65.06
78.996
79.098
55.
55.
55.22
46.1
50.7
46.2
12.26
35.74
38.24
30.15
10.39
13.6
21.75
51.89
62.60
62.69
52.52
41.00
15.920
15.817
15.98
2.3
2.2
1.7
37
4.2
4.4
15.08
16.05
15.23
16.21
14.70
2.00
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lit^ la mt~
^ tj- to o t^
« —
g
CO
•^ -J
■JiJOJ
ra Ol oi o> a
e^
Dt 1 t—
nS IS
JQ
CO
■*
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3
>%
•pooj miM. pajid
llll
Ss
if
a
^
-dns ndui jo -0^^
1
«
P4
s
a>
ja
•-S
oS
■9|
d
■2 2
IB
S
y E*
bo.3
ed
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j
s^ZZ
a;'3
«
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la S
^13
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s
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5
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H
H
94
Table H.
Shewing the amount of the elements contained in various bills of
fare. The table refers to the amounts taken weekly, through^
out.
Institutions.
Carboa
Pentonville Prison, England
State Prison, Mass
House of Correction, Boston . . .
Emigrant Refuge, New York. . .
Alms House, Boston
Alms House, Providence
Alms House, Baltimore
Alms House, New Y ork
Alms House, Philadelphia
Alms House, Washington
State Prison, Rhode Island
State Prison, Maryland ,
State Prison, Washington.
State Prison, Philadelphia
Penitentiary, Blackwell's Island
oz.
8.20
22.40
17.67
10.80
9.2.3
14.67
11.01
18.61
12.07
10.24
13.74
17.84
19.46
17.81
22.26
oz.
102.96
124.46
100.72
67.47
64.72
76.56
79.44
92.98
78.71
68.68
87.28
93.67
92.28
91.72
112.69
95
Table I.
Shewing the value of pauper labor in alms houses, the average
number in each alms house, and the annual amount per capita.
t, tljD
II
g 3 53
S S S
BlocWey Alms House, Philadelphia.
House of Industry, Boston
Alms Houses in County of Suffolk,
" " Essex,
" Middlesex, '
" " Worcester, '
" " Hampshu-e, '
" " Hampden, '
" " Franklin, '
" " Berkshire,
Norfolk, ■
Bristol,
Plymouth
" Baltimore .
" Providence
Aggregate of all Alms Houses in New York.
Total
Average earnings per annum per head .
1.81S
•733
1.101
752
761
545
82
584
54
34
425
445
242
555
141
9.000
16.871
$8,539
3.471
1.600
3.262
2.822
3.372
262
545
427
30
2.165
1.935
1.080
5.646
2.348
28.353
65.857
71
73
45
33
70
20
20
90
90
5 09
4 36
4 46
10 18
16 37
3 15
3 91
m
Table J.
Shewing the aggregate value of convict labor, the annual value per
capita.
5 0) .^
O t3
a s
Moyamensing Prison, Phil
Eastern Penitentiary, Phil
House of Eefuge, Phil
Penitentiary, Washington ■.
All the Houses of Correction in Massachusetts. ,
Maryland Penitentiary
Rhode Island State Prison
Massachusetts State Prison
Pentonville Prison, England
Maine State Prison
Ifew Hampshire State Prison
Vermont State Prison
Connecticut State Prison
Aubnrn
Sing Sing
Clinton
New Jersey
Philadelphia
Virginia
Ohio
do
do
do
do
do
do
do
N. Y.
N.Y.
N. T.
Cherry Hill.,
$21,895
12.184
6.420
1.515
22.312
15. na
2.348
43.890
3.462
4.735
6.713
14.148
64.762
81.850
9.210
16.798
11.9
11.442
37.883
196
300
244
70
719
229
40
480
67
82
62
175
645
672
124
185
299
199
336
$111 71
40 61
28 66
21 64
31 03
66 27
68 70
91 43
24 26
45
59
64
86
97
103
62
90
40
57
97
o
O 00
^
a o
U O
e -5
1^
s r
•2 <»^
^^
*^ ^
O T3
.S js
a *-
a
H
'uajpuqo
■aiSoig
'paujEpj
■Spa9TJJ JO
uotijasap pue niBad
si9JjBnl5 oi^sauioa
•Xjt^BJonicai
'XiHougui
•i^jXPaqait
9 rt « -< (6 ^ ^ « -I <* M -- « Oi-^-ii !->-*-
«l> O)'^t-
»l^i-i«-«*Ttcoom^.«QU3pHm(OTj'clwt^com'*OD oeo
« CT M -^ O ■«1« r-
'NMM- V V V (B 0)
2 P, p. (S. p. p, P4
ja M CD (O Ol to
Eh Ks o ^ -ci" lo t^
K H
f- H
o o
98
Table L.
Showing the cost of maintaining the poor in fifteen Asylums in
Rhode Island, A. D. 1850.
j-
in
1-,
s.
o
? .
li
a
a
it
li
o a
S. s
o
o •
■a-?
Whole cost of sup-
porting poor, in-
cluding interest
on cost of asy-
lums.
bo .
11
It
$300
400
185
200
200
300
225
200
200
200
325
600
200
200
$1.1' 00
600
400
335
851
545
150
700
1,000
660
1,000
500
35
22
15
10
11
25
14
8
16
15
14
80
205
16
15
$13,000
8.500
3,600
4,000
4.962
6,200
3.800
1,00
6.000
8.000
4,00
16.000
40,000
6,000
60
$780
510
210
240
297
312
228
60
360
480
240
900
2,400
360
300
$2,780
1,610
■ 1,000
66S
680
1.612
840
460
860
830
740
3,650
9,246
646
830
$79 43
68 63
67 33
65 80
61 81
60 48
60
67 50
67 33
6.') 33
62 87
46 62
45 20
40 67
22 00
Smithfield
Cranston
Warwick
Middlfttown
Bristol
Newport
Providence
$7,631
600
$127,962
$7,677
$26,732
\ '
Note 1. — Average cost of supporting paupers in asylums, $51 50 per annum.
Note 2.— Average cost of supporting all the paupers of all kinds, $60 nO per annum.
Note 3.— Average cost of supporting all the paupers in R. I., $33,500 per annum.
Note 4.— Population of Rhode Island, 148,000.
Note 5. — The ratio of paupers to population is 1 in 2205.
Note 6.— The cost of supporting the poor in Rhode Island is 22.6 cts. per capita, per annum.
99
Table M.
Shewing the cost of supporting the poor in 16 towns that have not
asylums in Rhode Island, A. D. 1850.
Towns.
1
is
-a
I
ii
g
a
1
"ffl
6
Mode of keeping Poor.
Hopkinton
15
15
6
10
11
1
1
8
12
11
15
8
5
18 '
29
1
$1,000
900
350
550
600
50
350
375
594
600
600
300
169
500
860
at Hospi
$66 66
60
68 33
65
54 54
'50
50
46 87
49 50
45 45
40
37 50
33 80
33 33
29 65
tal.
Lowest bidder.
Gloucester
Lowest bidder.
Jamestown
Boarded by contract.
Lowest bidder.
Burrillville
N. Kingston
Barrington
Charlestown
"W. Greenwich
Coventry
Boarded by contract.
Do.
Do.
Lowest bidder.
Do.
Torster
Westerly
Do.
Boarded by contract.
Lowest bidder.
Do.
Boarded by contract.
Do.
Exeter
New Shoreham
S. Kingston
Johnstown
Richmond
111
$^'798
Note 1. — Average cost for each individual per annum, $45 60.