We were taken into an enclosure bounded by a high wall, and containing three long, one-storied, detached brick buildings, which, I was informed, were for the female lepers, and that there were three similar buildings on the other side of the compound, separated by a wall, for the men. As I walked up a few steps which raised the building from the level of the road, and entered the first ward, I was conscious of a “faint” smell (which is peculiar to the disease) emanating from it. We entered a long room with a stone floor, and rows of beds ranged down each side. Lying or sitting on these beds—for there was not a vestige of any other kind of furniture—were several native women, all more or less bandaged. They looked up at me with a pitifully sad expression on their faces. One woman tore off her bandages and exposed a few diseased stumps remaining from what had once been fingers. The smell in the place was very bad; the sheets on the beds were discoloured and dirty; the bandages covering the sores of these poor wretches were filthy. I would fain have spoken a few words of comfort to them, for my heart was sad within me; but knowing very little of the language, I could do no more than make a few friendly gestures. Brother John told them we should come again, and we were just turning to depart when the superintendent said, “You haven’t seen Bridget.” On saying this, he lifted a filthy sheet that was tied on to a stick placed across an opening at the further end of the building, which contained a small room, or alcove, and disclosed a white woman sleeping! I was horrified to find a European woman in the Leper Asylum, and with nothing more than a dirty sheet dividing her from natives. The poor old thing, who had grey hair, was sleeping so peacefully that I begged the man not to disturb her. When we got outside I asked who she was, and found that she was an Irishwoman who had been an inmate of the asylum for many years.
The next ward we visited was constructed on exactly the same lines. In this there were, I think, seven women. The superintendent had a deal to say of a girl called Bella, who, he told us, had been studying medicine at the Umritzar Medical Mission when the disease broke out in her. Poor Bella lay on a dirty bed, and smiled feebly as we approached. Her fingers and toes were in a terrible state. The former had been dressed with something black that looked like tar. She wore no bandages on them, and there were great holes in her poor fingers, as though some wild animal had been biting pieces of flesh from them. Bella was a Eurasian, so spoke English. I could have cried aloud as I stood gazing helplessly on this young girl, cut down in the very flower of her youth, and doomed to spend the remainder of her days in this horrible abode of disease and death. “Oh, can nothing be done for her?” I asked. “Nothing,” replied the superintendent; “I will give her three years to live—three years at the outside.” I felt sorry that my question should have called forth such a reply; for poor Bella heard it in sad silence. I longed to comfort her, but I could think of nothing to say; it was all so horrible. I determined, however, that as no woman regularly visited the place, I would do so myself. I did not fear the disease; I only felt wretched on seeing its poor victims. I turned and spoke to another woman in European dress. She was a Polish Jewess, and was evidently afflicted with a different kind of leprosy, for her skin was the colour of indigo, and was much puffed and swollen, though no open sores were visible on her. She told me that she was married and the mother of a family. She could in no way account for her present state. When leprosy first showed itself on her, her husband cast her adrift, and refused to see or help her in any way. She had saved a little money and had been to doctors in Austria and Germany, and had tried all sorts of pretended cures, but without success. “Have you any money now?” I asked. “Yes,” she replied, “I have a hundred and fifty rupees [about ten guineas] in the bank; but I would sooner starve than touch it. I am a pauper in this place; but after death I will be again a lady. The money is for my funeral; I will be buried in my own coffin, as a Jewess.” I asked them if they would like some books to read, but they shook their heads sadly, and said that their sight was going fast, and reading hurt their eyes too much. They tried to speak cheerfully; but it was all terribly sad. Brother John could hardly trust himself to speak to poor Bella, while she herself seemed ready to cry. I looked at the miserable bareness of the place, and at the native women squatting about on the floor, and inquired if they had no chairs or washstands, or any more furniture than what I saw. They shook their heads. The Jewess pointed to a little oil-stove that was worn out and full of holes, and asked me if I would try to get her a new one, as she had no stove to boil water for her tea. I found that they washed themselves at a tap in the enclosure, but had neither bath-tubs or washstands. The sheets on their beds were supposed to be changed once a week: it was evident from their colour that they could not have been washed oftener. I wish to lay particular stress on the need there was of clean bed-linen and underclothing, both from the offensive nature of the disease and from the tropical heat of the climate. In the alcove attached to this ward we found another girl, called Daisy, whom the superintendent informed me was of Scotch parentage, but who had been suckled as an infant by a Madrassi nurse, who had afterwards turned out to be a leper. Her features were terribly distorted by the disease. Her fingers and toes were in much the same state as those of poor Bella, and she wore a green shade over her eyes. There were a couple of wicker chairs in her little room, also an accordion, with which the superintendent told me she used to accompany herself to songs; that she had a sweet voice, and often sang to the other lepers. “To whom do these women apply for their wants?” I asked. “To me,” said Mr. McGuire. “I come here once a week.” “But is there no woman to look after such things?” “No,” he said; “women don’t care to come to such places as these.” I passed sorrowfully out, telling Daisy and the others that I would soon return with fruit, flowers, etc., which they said they would like. They smiled sadly, as though doubting my word, having had, as I afterwards discovered, many other promises of the kind which had not been kept. Poor Bella was tortured by flies, which surrounded her open sores in swarms. The smell, too, of the disease was so great that I was perforce obliged to walk with my handkerchief to my face the whole time. It was a very hot day, and I felt bitterly sorry for these poor sufferers, without fans, lavender water, or any little comforts whatever. I would fain have fled from this pestilent abode, and yet I lingered, wishing in my helplessness that I had the power of God behind me to enable me to say to these poor women, “I will, be thou clean.” As it was, I could only stand gazing sadly on them, wondering why God had so afflicted His creatures. I walked as one bewildered through another ward, wherein were nine miserable native women, all more or less terrible to behold. “Is there no English doctor to attend to the European women here?” I asked. “No,” replied the superintendent. “There is a native doctor, at a salary of twenty rupees a month.” “How many lepers are there?” “Seventy-six.” “But you have not half of the lepers in Calcutta in the asylum?” “Half! Why we only touch the fringe of leprosy.” “Has Government done nothing in the matter?” “So far, no, though an inquiry is to be made some day with a view to providing accommodation for lepers.” “Are they allowed to go in and out of the asylum when they like?” “There is no law to prevent them,” he replied. “A leper falls fainting by the way-side, he is seized by the police, and conveyed in a third-class hackney carriage to the asylum. As soon as he has had his wounds dressed, has gained a little strength, and finds himself able to do so, he walks out into the streets again to beg. The Europeans do not go out.”
He then asked us if we would like to see the men, and, on our replying that we would, conducted us to the opposite side of the grounds, through a door labelled “Male Ward,” and into three buildings exactly similar to those we had just quitted. We walked down the first ward, filled with poor diseased specimens of humanity, in silence. The heat and smell of the place, and the filthy sheets and flies surrounding these poor lepers, were a sight that I shall never, never forget. One poor, half-naked creature was sitting in a corner trying to adjust a bandage round his legs, which, with only one or two stumps in the place of fingers, was to him no easy task. My first impulse was to fix the dirty rag for him; but I suddenly remembered that contact with this terrible disease might possibly be fatal to me, so passed on. In the next ward, which was even in a dirtier state than any that I had previously visited, the native lepers were crowded together as thickly as possible. A horrible smell pervaded the place. Bits of dirty stained bandages hung here and there. On the floor, curled up on a piece of Indian matting, lay the form of a man in the last stage of leprosy. His back was turned to me, and, although I spoke a word to him, he made no sign, no movement. I stood and looked at him in his misery. His poor bones were almost protruding through his skin, which was drawn over his body like parchment. He groaned aloud, as if in agony, every now and then moistening his parched lips with his tongue. There was no friend or attendant near to give him a drop of water. All his fellow-sufferers in the wards seemed to be watching for the end. I asked if water could be given him, but was told that he had better be left to die in peace. He was a native, and men of his caste will not, I believe, accept a drink of water from a European’s hands, or from a European water vessel: I know not whether the agonies he was enduring would have induced him to break his caste. Poor wretch, he carried our heartfelt sympathy with him on his journey into the unknown country, as well as our will to have helped him if we could have done so in any way. He died, I was told, a few hours after we left the asylum. About sixpence in coppers had been found on him, which sum was duly handed over to the authorities, who buried him according to the custom of his race.
There were three English-speaking Eurasian lepers in this ward. One man enlisted my sympathies on his behalf about some property which was confiscated to the State on the death of his mother, but which he asserts virtually belonged to him. He had made a struggle to retain possession of it, and had addressed a long petition to Lord Dufferin, who was then Viceroy of India; but, having failed to prove his legitimacy, was informed that nothing could possibly be done for him. I found him a refined, well-educated man, very fond of reading George Eliot’s works, and any well written novels.
The others are two Eurasian lads who are cousins. One about 22, the other 10 years of age. I felt much sympathy for the poor child, cut off from everyone, and doomed to spend what should be his brightest days in this awful place. He is a nice-looking boy, with a bright face, and a sweet, kindly disposition; and is devoted to drawing and painting, which he can do remarkably well. He has often since drawn dogs, cows, and different animals, and laid them out on his bed for me to see and admire. Indeed, so well were some of these executed that I should have liked to have shown them to friends of mine, had it been safe to have handled them. Leprosy was only just asserting itself on him; no sores were visible, but his fingers were doubled up, and a few ominous spots were on his body. His cousin is a leper in a more advanced stage, so one would be led to infer from this that the disease has been transmitted by heredity. I do not know how he managed to do his drawing and painting so well as he did, for there was neither a chair or table in the ward, so he must have used the bed as a table, and worked in a kneeling position.
Brother John and I drove home from the leper asylum in silence, as our hearts were too full for words. It seemed terrible that men and women should be living in the very midst of this crowded city as in a living tomb. Women, too, of my own caste and country, left alone to die without a friend in the world. One lady, Mrs. Grant, the matron of an institution known as the Military Orphan School, at Kidderpore, had visited them occasionally; but when I first went there four months had elapsed without their seeing her. This, I am certain, was no fault of hers; as she has many other duties to perform, and the Indian climate seldom allows one to continue well for any lengthened period. The men, poor things! had had no visitor to practically help them. Mr. Hall, the clergyman of the district, was in the habit of reading prayers in the little church attached to the Leper Asylum on certain Sundays; but the lepers did not appreciate mere words. His wife, Mrs. Hall, took to visiting the native leper women after I had published articles in our paper, and after I had raised a substantial fund for the cause I had at heart; but, though she would distribute flowers to the natives, she always refrained from giving any to the European and Eurasian women, who would have greatly appreciated such presents.
CHAPTER III.
THE ACCOUNT I WROTE—BRIDGET—AN OFFICIAL VISIT TO THE LEPERS.
When I arrived home from the asylum, I went at once to find my husband, to tell him all that I had seen, and ask him to help me in doing something for the lepers. He was out, unfortunately, and, no one else being in the house, I tried to interest my little boy in the fate of the poor leper child whom I had just seen. His baby brain could not grasp the full extent of my meaning; but he understood enough to offer his scrap-book and promise me his musical-box and other things, all of which were duly handed over to the poor little leper next day.
I could do nothing all day but brood over what I had seen. In the evening, with the incidents fresh on my mind, I sat down and wrote an account of them for our paper. This raised for me the anger of the officials in charge of the place, who had accepted the responsibility of caring for the lepers. I described exactly what I saw and smelt. If I had not written the truth, Brother John, who was with me, would have corrected my statements when appealed to in the matter, instead of publicly corroborating them, as he afterwards did. My husband thoroughly entered into, and appreciated, my wish to relieve the sufferers, and we presented ourselves next day at the asylum with offerings of fruit, flowers, fans, scent, biscuits, jam, clean linen for bandages, sheets, underclothing, and as many other things as I could think of. These things were tearfully received by the poor women, including Bridget, whom I now had an opportunity of seeing for the first time. Mr. McGuire was not pleased with me. He said they had all they required, and informed me, when I told the women I should try and get sufficient money to allow them a rupee a week each for extra washing, etc., that the Jewess had money in the bank, and that my money was not required. I happened to know about this money, and the use for what it was being kept, so allowed his remarks to pass in silence. Bridget was a strange and weird sight when I first saw her. She wore a short black petticoat, reaching a little below her knees, and a soiled cotton jacket that had once been white. She had evidently gone without a bath for a long time, for her face and neck were dirty. Her bare feet were swollen, but there were no leprous sores on her, nor any distortion of her fingers or toes. As she stood towering above me, a tall, gaunt, starved-looking woman, I noticed a wild, restless look in her eyes which appeared to me to be a sort of challenge. On a table near her were some old loaves of bread from which all the crumb had been eaten, leaving nothing but the outside crust, that, from want of teeth, she had been unable to eat. There was also a little sour milk in a bowl. I inquired and found that her diet was bread, milk and a little coarse sugar, and that she begged scraps of curry, or dall (lentil) and rice from the inmates. It appears that at the Calcutta Leper Asylum there is a milk diet, on which Bridget was placed, and which consisted of twenty-two ounces of bread and a quart of milk daily, and a little sugar, and a meat diet; the latter being sufficient for an adult, but the former was not. Bridget had her choice of the two diets, and, as she was loth to sacrifice her milk, which she would have to do if she chose the meat diet, elected to take the milk diet. The rules of the place were not sufficiently elastic to admit of a milk diet varied with meat. Bridget, therefore, in order to keep body and soul together, was obliged to beg food from the other inmates. She replied, when I asked her why she had not taken a bath, that there was no place in which she could bathe. Outside, there was a brick building that had evidently been constructed for the use of native women, and without reference to the requirements of Europeans. This building was divided into three small compartments, in each of which there was a tap for water and a drain for its outlet. There were no doors of any kind. I must here explain that the tap, rather than the more convenient bathing-tub, was selected in the interests of sanitation. The floor was of stone or concrete, and the wall in front, which shut off the bathing compartments from view, was open at both ends. My lady readers will understand how repugnant it is to the feelings of white women to bathe in a place in which they are not entirely secure from observation, even from that of their own sex; a condition which is not obtainable at the Calcutta Leper Asylum. Bridget, having been brought up in Ireland with some ideas of decency, would not take a bath under these conditions; so went without.
After making this discovery, I could not rest until I had written a letter to Mr. Lambert, the Commissioner of Police, asking for an interview. He granted my request, and appointed a time for me to call at his office. I found him a typical official, the performance of whose routine duties allowed him but little scope for the exercise of personal sympathy. I told him of the state of the Leper Asylum exactly as I had found it. He gave me little satisfaction, but ended by remarking that he and Mr. Justice Prinsep, who was President of the District Charitable Society, were going down to the Leper Asylum on the following morning, and that he would be glad if I would then shew them the dirty sheets described in my article which had appeared in our paper. I was too much awed by Mr. Lambert’s official manner to point out to him the futility of such a quest; for the most rigid believer in the artlessness of human nature would have known that the sheets destined to meet the forthcoming scrutiny, after all that had been written and read about their previous state, would be characterised, as far as possible, by scrupulous purity. However, being in a position to be thankful for the smallest mercy, I accepted Mr. Lambert’s offer, and drove down to the asylum, with my husband, on the following morning. Mr. Prinsep, who, I believe, had never been to the place before, appeared to be amused on seeing me, and was little inclined to treat the inquiry seriously. Owing to my article, no doubt, the asylum had undergone a thorough cleaning; the sheets were clean, and the place tidied up. Mr. Lambert, without a smile on his face, turned to us and said that he failed to see any cause for complaint, and that the place was clean. At that moment I saw a dying leper lying on a filthy bed, the sheets of which were covered with spots of blood and matter. I pointed this out to Mr. Lambert, who asked the man how often his sheets were changed. “We have a clean sheet every eight or nine days,” replied the man in English. I had given the time as once a week in our paper, so it was even longer than I had stated. When we got outside, Mr. Prinsep joined us, and we went to Bridget’s room. I asked Mr. Prinsep if he considered 22 ounces of bread, a quart of thin milk, and 4 ounces of coarse sugar a day sufficient for her? He turned to me and said he certainly thought it plenty. I could not help looking at his portly and well-nourished form, and comparing it with that of the thin, starved-looking old Irishwoman, standing at the door and offering a bowl of well-watered milk for his inspection.