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Now we would inquire, what medical knowledge does a Superintendent or medical physician need in an Insane Asylum?

Judging of his application of his knowledge to the patients he needs none at all!

Any one who can turn a bolt with the key of the State is capacitated for a medical Superintendent of our present Insane Asylum system, conducted as that was by Dr. Andrew McFarland at Jacksonville.

The Investigating Committee reported that they found just, and abundant occasion for complaint of criminal indifference on the part of the Superintendent towards the interests of his patients.

I have been told, neither do I doubt the fact, that patients have been known to have been dead and buried one year in the asylum burial grounds before the Superintendent had even informed their friends of their death!

Such cases have doubtless been the victims of foul usage, whose corpses would have testified against him, had they been suffered to be examined by their friends, in a reasonable time after their decease. And the heathenish usage of insane asylums generally, of burying their patients secretly, and regardless of any Christian obsequies or ceremonies, affords these murderers a rare opportunity for escaping detection of their crimes, which, under other circumstances, would convict a man of a capital criminal offense.

At Jacksonville Asylum the patients are buried in the dead of night by lamp-light -- without the least recognition of their humanity by any kind of burial service. But mournerless and palless the rough box containing the corpse is transported on an ox-cart to the unenclosed and unadorned burial ground of the asylum, near by, where the hirelings bury them as they would a beast! and leave no monument to designate the spot where they lie, except a humble wooden slab at the head of the grave.

I will close this chapter, with an extract from "Mrs. Oken's Prison Life," who has in her book given a graphic description of an asylum burial in these words, viz.:

"I wish here to mention that the deaths are kept as secret as possible. The body is carried away in the night, with no funeral, and either sent home or buried in the asylum cemetery.

"In one of my walks, I counted eighty-seven graves in that little enclosure, which, on inquiry, I found had been dug in less than four years -- though I have reason to believe that the great majority of those who die are not buried there, but conveyed to their former homes in their coffins.

"How many go there to find their "cure" in death is more, I imagine, than is for the interest of Dr. McFarland to make public.

"Then hurry on some cheap shroud -- hustle them into a cheap coffin -- don't stop for a funeral -- where are the mourners! -- take them from their cells to the dead-room -- step quickly, but carefully -- make no noise -- go out in twilight when no one sees -- throw up the turf with hasty spade -- and then by the trembling moon-beams aid, or "the lantern dimly burning, bury them darkly at dead of night!" No minister -- no weeping -- no matter -- they are insane!"

"Battle their bones over the stones,
They are lunatics! that no one but 'Jesus owns.'"

CHAPTER XXXVI.
The Death Penalty to be Annihilated.

Dr. McFarland says he does not believe in annihilating the death penalty for murder -- that he has not progressed so far as that -- for he says:

"Did not God command life to be taken for life? Did He not command Agag to be hewn in pieces as his punishment?"

I replied, "Yes, He did, but I do not therefore infer that we have a right so to do, for He himself was the law-maker and executive of the Jewish code. Of course every law was just and right, being wisely adapted to the infant state in which the race of men then existed."

"Do you think the race is in any better condition now than it was then?"

"I consider they are in a more developed state; good and evil are both stronger and more vigorous, because their capacities have increased. In consequence of this growth or development, a different kind of training is required to adapt itself to man's higher nature. For example, you would not feel justified in using the same kind of discipline over your developed son of twenty-one years, as with your son of three or five years. To attempt to compel him with penalties and restraints as you do your child, would be trifling with his manhood, insulting his manly feelings, and would justly bring you and your authority into derision. So God having himself controlled the race in its childhood, and as their father until they were of age, when they must require a different kind of training, He then abrogated the Jewish code, and instituted in its place, the Christian dispensation, of which Christ was the expounder. Now, instead of returning "an eye for an eye, and a tooth for a tooth," we must return good for evil, and leave judgment and vengeance for our wrongs, to Him who judgeth righteous judgment. For he says, "Vengeance is mine, I will repay."