Fearing that they meant to kill him by dosing him, he shut himself into his room, put his bed against the door, and barred it the best he could. The attendants found the next morning his door barred, and all fast, they of course burst it open, and such an outcry was never heard! He thought then of course he was a gone case. He roared and blubbered—but there was no use, he had to take the medicine.
He was now removed into the dormitory with other patients, in the same room. He finally concluded to take the matter into his own hands—he let me into the secret. It was to take the medicine in his mouth and walk carelessly away to his room or to the washroom and spit it out; he was very successful in this. I suppose for three months he did not swallow a table spoonful; yet it was given him three times a day. In the spring his son came and took him away: he went cursing the institution.
The asylum was now very full; some enlargements were made for patients. Some time in the fore part of this winter, as near as I can now judge, I saw a poor skeleton of a man come into the hall leaning on the arm of a man on one side, and on the other on the arm of a lady; he looked haggard, and I thought he was in the last stages of consumption.
They led him to one of the dormitories and placed him on a bed. I thought it strange that they would leave such a man on the first hall, as the sick and feeble were generally assigned to other apartments; I soon learned the cause of this. He was a merchant from West Port, Essex county, and a man of some means; his disease was dyspepsia. He was advised to go to Utica asylum for a cure, as the doctors there were so very skillful. He thought it like any other hospital, that he could stay as long as he pleased, and if things did not work favorably he could leave when he pleased; and as his friends brought him there, and he paid his own bills, they wanted him left on the first floor.
His friends left, and he was left there weak and feeble as a child; I think I never saw before a man's limbs so very small. I pitied him; I knew he and his folks were sold, but I dared not tell him so. His appetite was very poor, and what he did eat distressed him, and he was in the habit of vomiting it up. He had a habit, when his food hurt him, of placing his head down lower than his body, which he thought helped him to vomit.
The doctor forbade his using any means to assist him to vomit. He was sly, and would vomit out of the window to prevent detection. He was soon after removed to another hall; and on passing through that hall a few days afterwards, I found him bound down to his seat with straps, to prevent his getting his head down. He looked wishfully at me. I pitied him, but dared not say anything to him; here he stayed for a long time.
At length he was brought back upon the first floor. His wife came to see him, but the doctor did not permit them to meet. He wrote to his family and read the letter to the doctor, representing things all right, but had a slip of paper prepared, counteracting what was in the letter; in this slip he begged them to come and take him away; this slip he put into the envelope with the letter.
His wife came, and demanded to see him; she did see him; she resolved to take him home, but the doctor remonstrated and she left him. This afflicted the man. He finally got some better, and walked out with me; for at this time I had my liberty to go out alone, when I pleased and where I pleased. He could not walk far at a time, but was anxious to walk out every day. At length he would stay out after I went in, sometimes for half an hour—he began now to lay his plans to run away, as the doctor would not give his consent to let him go. He one day stole the keys, and came very near effecting his escape, when he was detected. He did not deny the fact, but told them that he did it to get away; that he had done nothing to forfeit his liberty; that he was under no obligations to them; that he paid his own way.
His mind was now intent on leaving; he had written home for money, and it had been intercepted by the doctor; he resolved to go without money. He walked out with me as usual; he prepared himself by putting on all the clothes he could. I knew nothing of his plan; he lingered; I went in; he did not come in, and has never been in since. He went down to the depot by a back street, went to Troy, found friends there to help him on, and got home safe. I doubt whether he will ever go to Utica again to be cured of dyspepsia.
And though this man has a perfect dread of the asylum, there are men, however, who like the institution, and think it the best place in the world. It has been urged that those who so dislike the institution are those whose minds are not right; they are a little insane still, that if they were perfectly sane they would like it—that those who like it are sane men.