There has also been established within the last year a model infant school, founded by private subscriptions, for the children of labourers and journeymen artisans. At present, however, it is so little known, that it is of very little importance.
Impotent through Age.
Bourdeaux is the only town of the department which possesses any establishments of this kind, viz., the Hospital of Incurables (Hospice des Incurables), and that of the old people (Hospice des Vieillards).
These two establishments support 300 old people. This number falls very short of that which the population requires. The requisite qualifications for admission are, to have passed the age of 60, and to prove that the candidate has no means of subsistence.
It may be added, that at Bourdeaux the number of old people who are candidates for admittance to these hospitals amounts to 300, and that on an average a vacancy occurs for each at the end of four years at the Hospital des Incurables, and two years at Hospice des Vieillards, and that all these claimants find either in their families, the Secours à Domicile, or private charity, means of subsistence.
Sick.
The department possesses, for the reception of the sick, a small hospital at Bazas; one at St. Macaire, and one at La Réole; a more extensive one at Blaye and Libourne, and the great hospital at Bourdeaux.
The great hospital of Bourdeaux contains always from 600 to 650 sick. The daily admittances average 30; the discharges, 28, and the deaths two.
No distinction is made as to country, &c. either in admittance, treatment, or discharge.
The inmates of this hospital are generally composed of inhabitants of the town, who are too poor to be treated at home, or who prefer the care that is taken of them there to that which they would experience at home; of workmen, &c. from the neighbouring departments employed in the town, and who have nowhere else to go; of peasants, even in easy circumstances, who, from illness or accidents, have not the same resources at home.