men completely independent of the government and medical faculty? The
complaints of the poor (if they were well founded) would thus have an
impartial organ, while at present this organ is absolutely wanting. Thus
the doors of the hospital of Dr. Griffon once shut on a patient, he
belonged body and soul to science. No friendly or disinterested ear can
hear his grief. He is told plainly that, being admitted out of charity, he
becomes henceforth a part of the experimental domain of the doctor, and
that patient and malady must serve as subjects of study and observation,
analysis, or instruction, to the young students who accompany assiduously
the visits of M. Griffon. In effect, the subject soon had to answer to
interrogations often the most painful, the most sorrowful; and that, not to
the doctor alone, who like the priest, fulfills a duty, and has the right
to know everything--no, he must reply in a loud voice before a curious and
greedy crowd of students. Yes, in this pandemonium of science, old or
young, maid or wife, were obliged to abjure every feeling or sentiment of
shame, and to make the most confidential communications, submit to the most
material investigations, before a numerous public; and almost always these
cruel formalities aggravated their disease. And this is neither humane nor
just; it is because the poor enter the hospital in the holy name of
charity, that they should be treated with compassion and with respect, for
misfortune has its dignity.

On reading the following lines, it will be perceived why we have caused
them to be preceded by these reflections. Nothing could be more sad than
the nocturnal aspect of the vast ward of the hospital, where we will
introduce our readers. Along the whole length of its gloomy walls were
ranged two parallel rows of beds, vaguely lighted by the sepulchral
glimmering of a lamp suspended from the ceiling; the narrow windows were
barred with iron, like a prison's. The atmosphere is so sickening, so
filled with disease, that the new patients did not often become acclimated