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(47) Native Hospital at Calcutta [[218-219]]
[[218]] The hospital now supported in Calcutta by voluntary
contribution,
for the reception of natives requiring surgical assistance, was founded
about 1793; those unfortunate persons who met with accidents having
before
no asylum wherein they could find either solace or remedy.
| Williamson 1810 vol. 1: ((479))
The establishment
is, as yet, rather limited; but, it is to be hoped, will in the course
of a few years rise superior to the disadvantages under which it
labors,
in consequence of the great expence incurred in lodging the patients,
many
of whom labor under complaints purely clinical; contrary to the first
intention,
and indeed, to the first proposal for such a charity. |
The first proposal for this charity appeared about 1791, in The
World
(a Calcutta weekly paper), and suggested the expediency of sending all
those deformed persons who infested the streets of Calcutta in quest of
eleemosynary aid, to some hospital, which should also accommodate
natives
injured by accidents within the city.
| Williamson 1810 vol. 1:
((480)) The proposal
was founded on the peremptory necessity for conducting all upon the
cheapest
plan; and contained a calculation of the expences incident to the
construction
of thatched ranges of huts, similar to barracks, to be erected on a
piece
of ground to be granted by government for that purpose. The whole
expence,
it appeared, would not have amounted to more than £1,500 or
£2,000
yearly, yet full accommodation, and subsistence, would have been
afforded
for three hundred patients.
The idea of permanence, which is usually supposed to
carry with it cheapness,
was, I understand, the plea for deviating from the proposed economical
estimate: the consequence has been, that the number of patients is
extremely
limitted. That original expence will, in most countries, be found far
cheaper
than a flimsy beginning attended with constant demands for repair,
cannot
be doubted; but, where there is no capital, [or] at least a very small
one, it is absurd to act upon the former scale; since it must, of
necessity,
counteract the whole intention.
Further, we should consider local circumstances: thus,
in Calcutta,
the same money that will cover in accommodations for a thousand
persons,
under a substantial thatch, laid over mud or mat walls, adequate to the
ordinary purposes of the inhabitants at large, and similar to at least
ninety-nine in the ((481)) hundred, of those habitations which shelter
the bulk of the population, would not suffice to provide fifty of the
same
description, with apartments formed of masonry, timber, &c.,
according
to the scale on which Europeans build houses for their own residence,
within
that city.
It is likewise a well-known fact, that what is called a
puckah-house,
that is, one built of bricks, lime, and timber, will, at the end of ten
years, cost as much in repairs, as the thatched edifices built for an
equal
number of inhabitants. This being the case, it will forcibly strike the
reader, that in departing from the original suggestion, the managers
likewise
departed from the best principle.
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Many natives have vaingloriously asserted that though the institution
in question was founded by Europeans, it has been principally upheld by
the liberality of opulent natives. This may in some measure be correct;
yet [[219]] allowing it to the fullest extent, what have the natives
done
more than an ordinary duty, in affording assistance to their own
countrymen,
and that too, after being urged or guided to the measure? On the other
hand, the European inhabitants may certainly claim the palm, both as
original
founders of the institution, and subsequent benefactors, in a case
where
their own countrymen were not to be benefited.
| Williamson 1810 vol. 1: ((482))
The present state
of the funds is not the most flourishing; and its utility is too great
to allow its falling from deficiency of means. Would it not be
advisable
to collect a very small assessment at every house inhabited by a native
within the Maharrattah Ditch (which limits the jurisdiction of the
police),
either according to extent, or to its rent? This assessment should be
paid
into the hands of the magistrates, to be by them disbursed, according
to
proper regulations, through the medium of native agents, to be elected
annually by all who should contribute either a certain gross sum, or by
regular yearly donation, towards the support of the institution.
This would produce a stabile, and adequate, revenue;
while it would
likewise induce many natives, some from pride, others from hope, and a
few from fear, to add their mites to such as should result from that
spontaneous
flow of genuine humanity, with which the Hindu code is replete; and of
which the Hindus at large make so great a boast. Possibly the day is
not
far off when in lieu of building immense houses, richly endowed, for
the
maintenance of an idle, haughty, ignorant, and insolent gang of
priests,
some rich natives, reflecting on the wants of their more industrious,
and
more meritorious, poor, may bequeath liberally towards the formation of
such establishments, as may rescue them from that ((483)) variety of
sufferings
to which they become subjected by the accumulation of years, the
visitations
of disease, and the pressure of misfortune!
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