John Ainslie Torrance

“ In the years 1870 and 1879 large accessions were made to the inmates of Dunedin gaol by the arrival of two batches of Maori prisoners from the North Island, the first being Waikato warriors taken in the field, the second the disturbers of the peace who knocked down the settlers' fences at Parihaka. The Waikato men were a fine, noble body. They conducted themselves with amazing good humour, and joined heartily, as if in competitive spirit with the white men, on the works in various places. ”

“ Even now, after the lapse of the years that have intervened since free immigration ceased, the number of men absolutely adrift in the colony is appalling, and in many instances they find their way into asylums, where they are cared for, or prematurely and as strangers end their lives in the hospitals or benevolent institutions, with none of their kith or kin present to cheer them in their last days and hours, and with no one save the Chaplain or other minister to follow their remains to the cemetery. ”

“ It is pleasant to see on Sundays groups of female patients, in their attire for the day, promenading the tastefully laid out plain in front of the main building, with the far-reaching landscape and seascape before them, or lolling enjoyably on the lawn, or, with book in hand, quietly seated on the rests. ”

“ As a matter of fact, the inmates of the Asylum live long. They are well housed, well fed, well clothed, are kept scrupulously clean, generally speaking they are free from care and worry, they are not subject to the risks connected with free life—the risks of accident or of disease by infection or exposure or excess, the work done by those of them who are capable of any service is of a healthful kind, and the careful nursing of the sick and really suffering is all that could be desired, and beyond what the outside world is aware of. ”

“ We can speak from absolute knowledge of much actual individual distress existing, which such an institution as a Benevolent Asylum would assist in alleviating. Persons suffering from chronic diseases, not admissible patients to an hospital, convalescents recovering from lengthened illnesses, unfortunates deprived for a time of work and subjected to temporary distress, women deserted by their husbands and children by their parents—these are the cases which do occur, and without the aid of a Benevolent Asylum they must remain unattended to. ”

“ This question of insanity has all along been a serious one to Otago, and indeed to the whole of New Zealand, not because this kind of malady has prevailed here more than in other places, but because of the shameful extent to which weak-minded and mentally impaired persons have been deported from the Home country by their relatives or others, and shunted on to the colony. Even now, notwithstanding the mortality that in the course of nature has taken place in the Asylum, there are friendless men and women who arrived long years ago, and who still bid fair to live for many years. ”

“ It is true that as time passed by, and the number of immigrants increased, the young settlement once or twice passed through a painful experience. The early settlers had no foe in the shape of a warlike savage to contend with, but they had their sorrows and difficulties and dangers nevertheless. On two or three occasions, owing to the non-arrival of vessels with supplies, the worst of all foes—starvation—cast its dark shadow over the place, some of the necessaries of life being absolutely unattainable. ”

“ Such sentences as the following have a painful sound:—"There are some very wealthy people in this Province, in town and country, who have vast quantities of land, who do not contribute towards the funds of the Institution to the same extent as people of far less means." "While many have subscribed, and do subscribe liberally, there is a large class of the community who contribute nothing towards the help of the destitute, the sick, the afflicted, and the widows and orphans." ”

“ From the centre of this lawn a high flagstaff rises. In the general work of the institution and in the clearing and cultivation of the land, a large number of the patients are daily employed, not by compulsion, but by kindly inducement. Apart from the parties of males engaged in the fields, and the women serving in the laundry, kitchen, &c., all directly under the eye of male and female officers respectively, there are men who, in various kinds of asylum labour, and without any surveillance beyond that of the general superintendency, work to good purpose. ”

“ As a medical school, Dunedin Hospital, with its operating theatre, is invaluable. Large numbers of students daily walk the wards, and receive from the honorary medical and surgical staff lectures based on the great variety of cases dealt with; and already several medical gentlemen trained in the University and in the Hospital are in practice in the colony, while a goodly number who elected to finish their course in the universities and hospitals in the Home Country were fitted by their well-grounded elementary training here to acquit themselves with marked success. ”

“ For several years also a few lunatics were located in the gaol, where for want of proper facilities they were a source of annoyance; but when the Lunatic Asylum was opened, they were removed to more suitable quarters. One amusing incident connected with lunatic life in gaol may not be deemed out of place in this sketch. One insane man, ordinarily a happy-souled being, but who, like many other insane persons, could show method in his madness, was peremptorily told by an officer to clean his (the officer's) long boots, and to "do them well." ”

“ This useful Institution is the only one of the kind in New Zealand, and it is for the whole Colony. It is situated in the Waikari District, some two miles in a south-westerly direction from the outskirts of Dunedin. It is a lovely spot, and there is nothing in the cheery-looking block of buildings and picturesque surroundings to suggest the idea of a home for the insane. That it is the residence of some retired gentleman in very comfortable circumstances, is more likely to be the conclusion of any onlooker ignorant of its purpose. ”

“ As might be expected, some of the new arrivals—individuals and families—were penniless, and at once required assistance to save them from starvation; others were physically and otherwise unfitted for colonial life, especially digger life, with all its risks and hardships and exposure, and numbers of these required help; others, again, leaving their wives and children in Dunedin, set out for the goldfields, and some of these families were left destitute by the desertion or death of the bread-winners, and they also had to be cared for. ”

“ But now, when men are mostly strangers to their nearest neighbours—when each one endeavours to jostle the others in the race after fortune's favours—the game of life has lost its unexciting "live and let live" character; it is played with absorbing interest—the wrapped earnestness of those who stake their all on the hazard of the die. ”

“ At the outer end of one of the rows of bunks were two closed-in solitary cells, or strong-rooms, if the word strong can in this connection be applied to ordinary planks of wood and to a wooden door. Seeing that, in many instances the world over, massive stone walls and iron doors have failed to prevent the escape of men of the Jack Shepherd class, it goes without saying that the matchboard cells of the old Dunedin Gaol were altogether inadequate to frustrate the efforts of even less desperate men bent on regaining their liberty. ”

“ OTAGO BENEVOLENT INSTITUTION.
HE old familiar averment, "The poor ye have always with you," has formed the basis of many appeals on behalf of the poor and needy, and the stern fact of which it takes cognizance—a fact that has asserted itself in every community throughout the civilized world—has led to the formation of those charitable institutions whose name is legion. In the very early days of the Province of Otago poverty in the strict acceptation of the term was unknown. The first immigrants were by no means in affluent circumstances ”

“ Salt could be, and was, extracted from the waters of the bay by the homely and slow process of boiling in an ordinary pot over an ordinary fire, but flour and oatmeal could not be so easily manufactured. One colonial, writing to a friend in the Home Country, made the doleful statement, "There is but one barrel of meal in the place, and it is sold to people in trouble or for children at fourpence per pound." We would expect to find that man breaking out into loud and harsh grumbling, or expressing himself in tones of abject despair. ”

“ If during the operation of the immigration scheme something like a proper system of selection had been adopted, many of the unsuitable persons brought to the colony would have been allowed to remain at Home, to their own and the colony's advantage. Still further, it has to be borne in mind that many of our asylum inmates, such as epileptics and silly, useless, but harmless creatures, would not in the Home country be ranked as lunatics or be placed in asylums. ”

“ The work accomplished by the patients while in the Asylum in the city was considerable. Under the direction of competent warders they levelled the very broken ground, for the most part erected from time to time the additional buildings required, and formed the large cricket and football park, now partly used by the High School boys and partly by the public. The formation of that flat necessitated the removal of a hill fourteen feet high and the filling up of deep gullies. They also formed a 2-acre garden and a large bowling-green, the first ever made in Otago. ”

“ Times of depression are always marked by dearth of employment, when there is a necessity for charitable assistance, more or less, to those in enforced idleness. But the extraordinary increase in the number of recipients of aid from the Institution indicated in the foregoing statement was, no doubt, in the first instance chiefly due to the importation from the Home Country of many unsuitable and undesirable immigrants during the operation of the Public Works and Immigration Scheme. Drunkenness and the desertion of wives and children were also prolific causes of family distress ”

“ It of course goes without saying that some of those who pass through the school fall into evil ways, and when such an instance occurs, there are always people thoughtless enough to see in it evidence of the futility of the institution as a reforming power. ”

“ Unfortunately, wherever civilised communities are formed, there in due course the "progressive" gaol becomes a necessity. In the first days of the Otago settlement there seems to have been no urgent call for a prison, but as the years went by and the population slowly increased, breakers of the law forced the question of the establishment of a place of penal confinement on the attention of the authorities. ”

“ What four-footed animal is so dangerous to the community as that animal which unites the uncultivated intellect of a man to the uncontrollable passions of a beast?" As there was no law of compulsion that could reach such parents, the Legislature passed a law which deprived them of the dangerous power they possessed; and hence the establishment of the Industrial School.
The first step towards meeting the necessities of the children of the very poor in Dunedin, was the passing of a vote by the Provincial Council in 1863, for the maintenance of Free Schools ”

“ A large proportion of the estate is under cultivation, the produce being consumed in the establishment. The pleasure grounds, with upper and lower garden and orchard, are extensive and tastefully planted with ornamental trees and shrubs; the paths and avenues are well gravelled and lined with flower-plots; comfortable seats are stationed in all directions; and the lawn-tennis court, bowling-green, and skittle alley (now in course of formation) are at the free use of the inmates. ”

“ In the course of the weeks and months the articles are stored up, and periodically a bazaar is held, at which they are displayed for inspection and sale, and a remarkably good and enchanting display they make. Not only do the lads and girls receive the money realised by their own labour, but prizes are also given to those who excel in the different branches of industry; and in connection with all the work engaged in, the minds of the young people are persistently, and in all interesting ways, imbued with religious and temperance principles. ”

“ But there seems to be an impression, at least among some of the public, that the number of the insane in the colony, as compared with the same unfortunate class in the Home Country, is unduly large. As a matter of fact, in proportion to the population, and as gauged by the number of inmates of our asylums, insanity in New Zealand is less prevalent than in the Home Country. ”

“ While the institution at Seacliff is understood to be the asylum for the insane within the Otago and Southland districts, among its 500 inmates are patients from northern asylums, parties having on two or three occasions been sent south to relieve the over-crowded condition of these lesser asylums. In respect of their insane, Otago and Southland are no doubt on a par with other parts of New Zealand. ”