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Mental Health in Historical Perspective

The Cost of
Insanity in
Nineteenth-Century
Ireland
Public, Voluntary and
Private Asylum Care

Alice Mauger
Mental Health in Historical Perspective

Series Editors
Catharine Coleborne
School of Humanities and Social Science
University of Newcastle
Callaghan, NSW, Australia

Matthew Smith
History of Psychiatry
University of Strathclyde
Glasgow, UK
Covering all historical periods and geographical contexts, the series
explores how mental illness has been understood, experienced, diag-
nosed, treated and contested. It will publish works that engage actively
with contemporary debates related to mental health and, as such, will be
of interest not only to historians, but also mental health professionals,
patients and policy makers. With its focus on mental health, rather than
just psychiatry, the series will endeavour to provide more patient-centred
histories. Although this has long been an aim of health historians, it has
not been realised, and this series aims to change that.
The scope of the series is kept as broad as possible to attract good
quality proposals about all aspects of the history of mental health from
all periods. The series emphasises interdisciplinary approaches to the field
of study, and encourages short titles, longer works, collections, and titles
which stretch the boundaries of academic publishing in new ways.

More information about this series at

http://www.springer.com/series/14806
 Alice Mauger

The Cost of Insanity in

Nineteenth-Century
Ireland
Public, Voluntary and Private Asylum Care
Alice Mauger
Centre for the History of Medicine in
Ireland, School of History
University College Dublin
Dublin, Ireland

Mental Health in Historical Perspective

ISBN 978-3-319-65243-6 ISBN 978-3-319-65244-3 (eBook)
https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-65244-3

Library of Congress Control Number: 2017949204

© The Editor(s) (if applicable) and The Author(s) 2018. This book is an open access publication.
Open Access This book is licensed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution
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use, sharing, adaptation, distribution and reproduction in any medium or format, as long as
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Neither the publisher nor the authors or the editors give a warranty, express or implied,
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The registered company address is: Gewerbestrasse 11, 6330 Cham, Switzerland
In Memory of my Mother, Mary
 Acknowledgements

This book is the product of the immense levels of support and encour-
agement given to me over the last few years, not just in University
College Dublin, where I studied, but in archives, other universities and
at home. Dr. Catherine Cox was a constant source of guidance, provid-
ing me with the essential and thought-provoking feedback, comments
and criticism she is uniquely qualified to make. I would also particularly
like to thank Dr. Lindsey Earner-Byrne, for her kindness, thoroughness
and professional insights into all my academic pursuits and her continued
interest and support. In addition, I am indebted to my colleagues who
have worked at the School of History and Archives and the Centre for
the History of Medicine in Ireland at University College Dublin for their
stimulating academic conversations, helpful advice and friendship. These
include Drs. Anne Mac Lellan, David Durnin, Fiachra Byrne, Richard
McElligott, Sarah York, Niamh NicGhabhann, Sean Lucey, Philomena
Gorey, Clara Cullen, Claire Poinsot, Ian Miller and Keith Smith, and my
former colleagues at William Fry, including Maria Butler and Deirdre
McGuinness. I am also indebted to everyone who has provided feedback,
comments and questions at the various places I presented my work. I am
especially grateful to the Wellcome Trust, who kindly funded both my
master’s and doctoral studies and made it possible for me to spend peri-
ods of time in different parts of Ireland conducting research and to share
it with colleagues abroad. Thanks also to the editorial team at Palgrave
MacMillan, especially Molly Beck and the anonymous reviewer for their
generous and insightful feedback on drafts of this manuscript.

vii
viii Acknowledgements

The archival research, which forms the basis of this book, would not
have been possible without the confidence vested in me by those who
granted me access to the nineteenth-century records of nine Irish psy-
chiatric hospitals. I am extremely grateful to these individuals and col-
lectives, who include Emma Balmaine, Sile McManus, Stewarts’ Ethics
Committee and the HSE. I would especially like to thank Dr. Denis
Eustace, who not only took the time to meet with me and grant me
access to his treasure trove of historic records but also provided me
with his keen insight and unparalleled knowledge of Hampstead and
Highfield Houses. His tour of the demesne, encompassing its unspoiled
nineteenth-century pleasure grounds, really brought to life for me the
history I was writing.
Archival research would have proven rather isolating and daunting
were it not for the kindness, patience and immeasurable assistance of the
archivists, librarians and records keepers at the various places I worked.
They include Brian Donnelly and Gregory O’Connor at the National
Archives of Ireland, Gráinne Doran at the Wexford County Council
Archive Service, Irene Franklin at Clare County Council, Richard
Bennett at Grangegorman Museum, Glynn and Shirley Douglas and all
the gang at the Friend’s Historical Library in Rathfarnham, Joan Rappel
and Sean Priestly at Stewarts, Kate McCallion at St John of God Hospital
and Harriet Wheelock at the Royal College of Physicians of Ireland.
Their inspiring suggestions and interest in my research made archival
visits an enjoyable and productive pursuit and were a testament to their
dedication in furthering the study of Irish history. Many went beyond
their call of duty, providing me with transport to and from archives and
even lunch! I would also like to thank the staff at the National Archives
of Ireland, the National Archives (Kew), the National Library of Ireland
and the Public Records Office Northern Ireland.
I want to thank all my close friends and my family, especially Ralph
Mauger, Jack and Emma Carroll, and Catherine, Philip and Sophie
Mitchell. Their endurance and encouragement have been unwavering
and I am forever indebted to them. I would not be where I am today
without the guidance, love and support of my mother, Mary, who always
believed in me. Finally, thanks to Richard for his unceasing patience,
direction and moral support, and for being my best friend.
Alice Mauger
 Contents

1 Introduction 1

Part I Governing Insanity

2 The Non-Pauper Insane: Private, Voluntary

and State Concerns 27

3 An Institutional Marketplace 69

Part II Understanding Insanity

4 ‘A Considerable Degree Removed from Pauperism’?:

The Social Profile of Fee-Paying Patients 115

5 ‘The Evil Effects of Mental Strain and Overwork’:

Employment, Gender and Insanity 149

6 ‘A Great Source of Amusement’: Work Therapy

and Recreation 189

ix
x Contents

7 Respect and Respectability: The Treatment and

Expectations of Fee-Paying Patients 207

Conclusion 253

Appendix: A Methodology and Sources for Chapter 4 259

Select Bibliography 261

Index 273
 Abbreviations

CCA Clare Country Archives

CSORP Chief Secretary’s Office Registered Papers
FHL Friend’s Historical Library, Rathfarnham, Dublin
GM Grangegorman Museum
NAI National Archives of Ireland
PRONI Public Records Office of Northern Ireland
SJOGH St. John of God Hospital
WCC Wexford County Council

xi
 List of Figures

Fig. 2.1 Patient numbers in voluntary and private asylums

in Ireland, 1830 to 1900 44
Fig. 2.2 Patient numbers in St Patrick’s, Bloomfield,
St Vincent’s and Stewarts, 1830–1900 45
Fig. 3.1 Advertisement for Hampstead House, Glasnevin,
Dublin, 1858 91
Fig. 7.1 Photograph of Michael C., male paying patient,
Richmond district asylum, 20 May 1900 217
Fig. 7.2 Photograph of Rebecca B., female paying patient,
Richmond district asylum, undated 239

xiii
 List of Tables

Table 2.1 Number of paying patients resident in district

asylums and the proportion of paying patients
to total patients resident in district asylums, 1857–1889 55
Table 2.2 Number of paying patients admitted to district asylums
and the proportion of paying patient admissions
to total admissions to district asylums, 1880–1890 55
Table 2.3 Proportion of paying patients and patients supposed
to have means but do not pay to total resident population
of district asylums in Ireland, 1865–1875 57
Table 3.1 Breakdown of amounts contributed to maintenance
of patients at Belfast, Ennis, Enniscorthy and Richmond
district asylums, 1868–1900 71
Table 3.2 Proportion of contributions towards patients’
maintenance at Belfast, Ennis, Enniscorthy and Richmond
district asylums, 1875–1895 81
Table 3.3 Documented maintenance fees, Stewarts and Bloomfield,
1858–1900 84
Table 3.4 Maintenance fees at Stewarts 85
Table 3.5 Known length of stay for patients admitted to the district,
voluntary and private asylums studied, 1868–1900 98
Table 3.6 Known outcome of stay for patients admitted to the district,
voluntary and private asylums studied, 1868–1900 99
Table 4.1 Gender of first admissions to the case studies, 1868–1900 117
Table 4.2 Known maintenance fees by gender of paying patients
admitted to Belfast, Ennis, Enniscorthy and Richmond
district asylums, 1868–1900 118

xv
xvi List of Tables

Table 4.3 Known maintenance fees by gender of first admissions

to Bloomfield and Stewart’s, 1868–1900 118
Table 4.4 Known maintenance fees by gender of first admissions
to Hampstead and Highfield, 1868–1900 119
Table 4.5 Known marital status by gender of first admissions
to the case studies, 1868–1900 and in the Irish census,
1871–1901 119
Table 4.6 Maintenance fees by gender by marital status of first
admissions to the case studies, 1868–1900 120
Table 4.7 Known religious persuasion of first admissions
to the case studies, 1868–1900 121
Table 4.8 Former occupation of male first admissions
to the case studies, 1868–1900 122
Table 4.9 Known maintenance fees for male farmer first admissions
to Belfast, Ennis, Enniscorthy and Richmond district
asylums, 1868–1900 123
Table 4.10 Relationship between land acreage and maintenance
fees charged for paying patients admitted to Enniscorthy
district asylum, 1868–1900 130
Table 4.11 Former occupations of female first admissions to the case
studies, 1868–1900 136
Table 4.12 Female first admissions to the case studies associated with
farming, 1868–1900 137
Table 5.1 Supposed cause of illness of first admissions
to the case studies, 1868–1900 152
Table 5.2 Physical and moral causes by gender most commonly
assigned to first admissions to the case studies, 1868–1900 153
Table 7.1 Proportion of patients described as ‘Dangerous to Others’
in case notes on Bloomfield, Stewarts, St John of God’s,
Hampstead and Highfield patients, c. 1890s 232
Table 7.2 Recorded diagnoses of first admissions to the case studies,
1868–1900 233
 CHAPTER 1

Introduction

Recent decades have witnessed growing fascination with the development

of Irish mental healthcare.1 Scholars have delved into nineteenth-century
records to uncover astonishingly colourful and detailed accounts of insti-
tutionalisation. Their studies have recaptured the very fabric of asylum
life: the sort of people committed, their behaviour, the treatments they
received and their experiences and views of incarceration. The emerging
pictures tend to be punctuated by staff violence, filth, overcrowding and a
mounting pessimism about medicine’s ability to cure ‘insanity’. In spite of
this undeniable progress in reclaiming the history of Ireland’s mentally ill
and their caregivers, scholarship has focused overwhelmingly on the poor.
This tendency arguably reflects a historical reality. Those admitted
to asylums, but not as paupers, were relatively few. Yet by shifting our
focus away from the poor and assessing the assortment of care options
for other social groups, we can gain vivid insights into how families
from a variety of social backgrounds coped with mental illness. A far
cry from Charlotte Brontë’s ‘madwoman in the attic’, more than one of
Ireland’s asylums was kept exclusively for respectable ladies. As this book
will reveal, the sense of class identity and social status shared by fami-
lies, along with their collective spending power, had overwhelming con-
sequences for patients’ care and treatment. The high importance rural
Irish families placed on property—especially land—lends to this study a
particularly interesting dimension. This book interrogates the popular
notion that relatives were routinely locked away to be deprived of land

© The Author(s) 2018 1

A. Mauger, The Cost of Insanity in Nineteenth-Century
Ireland, Mental Health in Historical Perspective,
https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-65244-3_1
2 A. Mauger

or inheritance and queries how often “land grabbing” Irish families really
abused the asylum system for personal economic gain.
Focusing on Britain, wide-ranging and sophisticated studies have
grappled with non-pauper patients’ institutionalisation, diagnosis, experi-
ence and treatment.2 But save for Elizabeth Malcolm’s study of Dublin’s
Swift’s Hospital, their Irish counterparts have been awarded little more
than a supporting role.3 This may be rooted in an expectation that the
Irish experience differed little from Britain’s. Ireland and Britain, after
all, had forceful political and cultural ties. As Mark Finnane noted in
his highly regarded exploration of Ireland’s public asylum system, ‘the
Irish government was, of course, the English government in Ireland’.4
Moreover, some historians have convincingly suggested that post-Fam-
ine Ireland was mid-Victorian, at least where the absorption of Victorian
attitudes towards living standards, devotional routine and the decline of
the Irish language were concerned.5 Nonetheless, to assume that Ireland
is unworthy of separate investigation would be to ignore key dispari-
ties between Ireland and Britain. These include Ireland’s overwhelm-
ingly rural character, greater poverty levels and prominent religious and
political divisions, which permeated the welfare landscape and resulted in
Catholic and Protestant controlled hospitals. This book builds on exist-
ing surveys of Ireland’s lunatic asylums by arguing that a myriad of polit-
ical, religious, economic and socio-cultural factors came to define public,
voluntary and private provision, creating a uniquely Irish institutional
framework. It also considers the type of people institutionalised, their
expectations of asylum life and the roles played by families, communities
and doctors in their care and treatment.

Case Studies
To address these questions, nine asylums were selected as case studies.
These were the three private asylums, Hampstead House, Highfield
House and St John of God’s; two voluntary asylums, Bloomfield Retreat
and Stewarts Institution; and the four district asylums at Belfast, Ennis,
Enniscorthy and Dublin (Richmond). Together these hospitals housed
patients from urban and rural settings in the north, south, east and west
of the country. Of the nine asylums, six were in Dublin, reflecting the
geographical concentration of private and voluntary care in Ireland’s
capital.
 1 INTRODUCTION 3

Nineteenth-century Ireland, subject to a quasi-colonial administration

in Dublin Castle (1801–1922), famine, massive land-agitation, emigra-
tion and, at the end of the century, an enduring economic depression (c.
1879–1895), lends a stimulating backdrop. From 1801 until the Great
Famine (c. 1845–1850), the rising middle classes began to gain a footing
in both urban and rural Ireland. When Irish peers and the richest gentry
steadily withdrew from Dublin after the union (1801), this vacuum was
filled by the rising professional classes, especially lawyers and physicians.6
From the eighteenth century, Dublin had become a key player in medi-
cal education and by the mid-nineteenth century had numerous teaching
hospitals and medical schools as well as being home to the Irish medical
colleges.7 In this era, the focus of power had shifted from the Protestant
ascendancy towards Catholics, who gradually came to control local poli-
tics and, to a lesser degree, Dublin’s businesses and professions.8 In rela-
tion to occupational profile, late nineteenth-century Dublin was much
closer to London than any other English or Irish provincial city.9 Several
industries also registered steady progress in Dublin, including flour mill-
ing, brewing and textiles.10 Of course, like other cities in the United
Kingdom, there also existed extreme poverty and Dublin’s poorest
inhabitants fell victim to contagious diseases, poor sanitation, tenement
accommodation and overcrowding.11
But Dublin remained both geographically and demographically iso-
lated from the rest of Ireland. While the north-east of Ireland and par-
ticularly Belfast continued to industrialise and areas such as Cork in
the south of Ireland urbanised, a staggering residual population inhab-
ited the ‘very backward’, ‘little urbanised or industrialised’ and ‘over-
populated’ landscape of rural Ireland.12 In rural communities, there
were immense inequalities in income and holding size prior to the
Famine.13 While the effects of the Famine on Ireland’s population are
well known, there is a lesser-told tale underlying the more common
chronicles of death, disease and economic downturn. Although some
landlords suffered from declining net incomes and land values, oth-
ers held fast to their position and even as late as the 1880s, almost half
of Ireland comprised estates of 5000 acres or more owned by only 700
landlords.14 While this was taking place, a middling class of farmer, not
poles apart from his British equivalent, began to strengthen his position
in rural Ireland.15 The smaller tenants and cottiers who suffered during
the Famine paved the way for a more successful commercial farmer. In
post-Famine Ireland, the growing non-renewal of long leases meant an
4 A. Mauger

increasing consolidation of farmland, which in turn engendered a rural

landscape not dissimilar in appearance to Britain.16 In the words of R.V.
Comerford, ‘the newly progressing—if not universally prosperous—mul-
titudes of rural society were ready for a lifestyle more obviously “respect-
able” than that of their parents’.17
Post-Famine rural Ireland saw greater social diversity than previ-
ous eras, with the increased visibility of a growing middle class. The
extension of railways and introduction of bank branches to rural towns
attracted people with reasonably paid jobs, while growing numbers of
specialised retail shops ‘gave an air of progress, even modest affluence,
to the streets’. Those who prospered included managers, shopkeepers,
bankers, professional men, administrators and the upper levels of skilled
artisans.18 Landless labourers, unskilled or semi-skilled industrial workers
and the unemployed, however, were more precariously positioned and
for many, emigration offered the most hopeful future.19 Thus, after the
Famine, the landscape inhabited by Irish asylums had undergone dra-
matic changes. This trend continued following the Land Wars of the late
nineteenth century, which brought about a decline in landlords’ incomes
and a gradual emergence of land ownership among peasants.20 From
1879, Ireland experienced an agricultural depression that affected most
areas of the economy.21 These shifts, along with the cultural and politi-
cal upheaval of the nineteenth century, had complex ramifications for the
institutions and actors at the centre of this story.
Within this setting, Irish asylum care flourished. In 1817, the state
authorised the creation of public asylums intended exclusively for the
‘lunatic poor’ and these institutions, which became known as district asy-
lums, quickly expanded beyond all expectations.22 By 1830, four district
asylums housed some 300 patients; by 1900, twenty-two accommodated
almost 16,000.23 Importantly, these asylums preceded their English and
Welsh equivalents, predating the Poor Law and falling instead under
the direct control of central government. This fashioned the criteria for
those eligible for relief. While the substantial accommodation in work-
house lunatic wards from the 1840s was restricted to the destitute, the
only requirement for entering a district asylum was a certificate of pov-
erty, which stated that neither the patient nor their family or ‘friends’
could afford accommodation in a private asylum. As a result, most of
the patients committed to district asylums were considered poor but not
destitute.24
 1 INTRODUCTION 5

By the 1840s, national and local lunacy administrators came under

increasing pressure due to overcrowding and high admissions rates
to district asylums. The continuing expansion of this system on a scale
seemingly far higher than elsewhere in the United Kingdom provoked
debates and anxieties about Irish susceptibility to mental illness.25
Against this backdrop, care options for the non-pauper insane began to
increase. In 1870, new rules allowing paying patients into district asy-
lums were introduced. Private asylums catered for a much smaller pool
of potential patients. In 1830, seven private asylums housed 117 patients
and by 1900, only 306 patients resided in thirteen such institutions.26
While parishes in England and Wales often boarded-out paupers in pri-
vate asylums,27 the Irish Poor Law was never allowed to adopt this prac-
tice, partly because the public system had been established earlier there.
This, combined with the expense of private asylum care, was the princi-
pal reason why Irish private asylums remained comparatively small, cater-
ing instead for primarily wealthier clients.28
Meanwhile, four separate charitable asylums were founded from the
bequests and donations of various philanthropic groups interested in
lunacy. These voluntary institutions, often termed ‘mixed’ because they
admitted both charity and private patients, were considered distinct
from private asylums because their managing bodies did not profit from
patient fees. Instead, any surplus funds were diverted towards the care of
less wealthy patients or improvements to the accommodation provided.
Although these voluntary hospitals eventually housed more patients than
the private asylums, they remained small compared with the district sys-
tem. In 1830, two voluntary asylums accommodated 154 patients; by
1900, there were four catering for 403 patients.29
Together, the records of the nine selected institutions are the foun-
dations for this book’s exploration of public, voluntary and private asy-
lum care. The three private asylums, Hampstead House, its sister asylum,
Highfield House, and the Hospital of St John of God, were in Dublin
City’s suburbs. Hampstead was founded in 1825, when Drs. John
Eustace, Isaac Ryall and Richard Grattan formed a partnership to man-
age it. Ryall purchased the property on the north side of Dublin, which
included Hampstead House, and co-leased the house and an acre of land
to Grattan and Eustace.30 Ryall left the partnership the following year
and a new contract was drawn up between Eustace and Grattan for the
joint ownership of Hampstead. A further twenty-three acres were leased
in 1836, and in 1862, all of Hampstead’s female patients were removed
6 A. Mauger

to the nearby Highfield House, which occupied the same demesne. Both
Hampstead and Highfield remained small. Within five years of opening,
Hampstead had only thirteen patients; by 1900, Hampstead had twelve
male patients and Highfield had eighteen female patients.31 Based in the
south Dublin suburb of Stillorgan, St John of God’s had its origins in
the arrival of members of the Hospitaller Order of St John of God from
France in 1877. Members of this order, which had a tradition of caring
for the mentally ill, established and gave their name to the private asy-
lum in 1885.32 St John of God’s was run by these religious brothers and
admitted only men. In contrast to Hampstead and Highfield, it quickly
became one of the largest private asylums in Ireland. Within five years of
opening, twenty-nine patients resided at St John of God’s and by 1900,
there were seventy-six.33
The two voluntary asylums selected for study are the Bloomfield
Retreat and Stewarts Institution, also located in Dublin’s suburbs.
Members of the Society of Friends founded the Bloomfield Retreat in
Donnybrook in 1812. Society members supported this asylum through
donations and subscriptions and were also allowed to nominate charity
patients, while a committee composed of Society members managed the
asylum.34 This managing committee modelled Bloomfield on the prin-
ciples developed at the York Retreat in England, where the Tuke family
had famously advocated moral therapy (see Chaps. 5, 6 and 7).35 Like
the York Retreat, Bloomfield was small by national standards. Within five
years of opening, Bloomfield had only eleven patients and by 1900, there
were thirty-three.36
The other voluntary asylum chosen was originally called the Lucan
Spa but was renamed Stewarts Institution in the 1870s after its propri-
etor, Dr. Henry Hutchinson Stewart, a medical doctor and philanthro-
pist with an especial interest in the welfare of the insane.37 Following
the introduction of the Poor Law in 1838, he became a governor of
the Hardwicke Hospital, which housed chronic pauper lunatics. This
hospital had formed part of the House of Industry in North Brunswick
Street, Dublin, which was remodelled as the North Union Workhouse.
No further patients were admitted to the Hardwicke and by 1856, its
remaining chronic patients had been transferred to a former military bar-
racks at Islandbridge, Dublin.38 The following year, Stewart purchased
the former Spa Hotel in Lucan and transferred the 102 Islandbridge
patients under his charge to these premises.39 Vacancies arose as these
mainly elderly patients died and Stewart began to admit paying patients
 1 INTRODUCTION 7

of an ‘intermediate class’ at a ‘moderate rate’ of payment. By 1867,

there were thirty-seven paying patients along with the sixty-two remain-
ing Islandbridge patients.40 Despite his best efforts, demand for accom-
modation persistently outstripped supply and in the same year, Stewart
wrote that he had ‘constantly been obliged to refuse patients for want of
room’.41
Around this time, Stewart became interested in the plight of ‘idiot’
children and this had lasting consequences for his asylum. In 1865, Dr.
George Kidd, the editor of the Dublin Quarterly Journal of Medical
Science (1863–1868) published an appeal in that journal for the estab-
lishment of an institution for ‘idiotic’ children.42 Kidd, who would later
become an obstetric surgeon (1868–1875), assistant master (1875–
1876) and finally master (1876–1883) at the Coombe Lying-In Hospital
in Dublin, was sensitive to the needs of ‘idiot’ children and visited asy-
lums in Scotland and England in 1865.43 The following year, Kidd and
Stewart formed part of a committee to establish a special institution for
the education of ‘idiot’ children and the two men co-founded a chil-
dren’s institution.44 A property adjacent to the Lucan Spa asylum was
acquired and admitted the first twelve children in 1869. The commit-
tee took charge of both the asylum and the children’s institution and
Stewart agreed to divert the asylum’s profits to the latter.45 While the
children’s branch catered for both charity and private patients, the asy-
lum reserved its accommodation for paying patients.46 In the early
1870s, the committee purchased a new site in nearby Palmerstown and
building work commenced. Once completed, patients from both the
children’s institution and the Lucan Spa asylum were transferred to this
new facility, which was, at this point, named the Stewarts Institution.47
Stewarts was principally devoted to caring for ‘idiot’ children but in the
late 1890s, the accommodation for private patients was greatly enlarged.
By 1900, there were sixty-two private patients and ninety-six ‘imbecile’
patients.48 With the exception of St John of God’s, both the private and
voluntary asylums in this study had a Protestant ethos and, accordingly,
accommodated mainly patients who were Church of Ireland (see Chaps.
2 and 4).
The last Dublin-based asylum was the Richmond district asylum (est.
1815), known in more recent years as Grangegorman. While Richmond
served the bordering counties of Wicklow and Louth, its primary catch-
ment area was Dublin City and County and most of the paying patients
admitted came from Dublin. The other three district asylums selected
8 A. Mauger

were in Belfast (est. 1829), Ennis (est. 1868) and Enniscorthy (est.
1868). Belfast, an industrial city located in the north of Ireland, had, by
the end of the nineteenth century, overtaken Dublin to become Ireland’s
largest city and had the country’s largest port. Internationally renowned
for its strong shipbuilding industry, including Harland and Wolff, Belfast
was also host to expanding textiles industries in the later part of the cen-
tury and had a higher proportion of skilled workers, higher female par-
ticipation rates and higher incomes than Dublin.49 The religious profile
of Belfast’s population was at odds with other cities in Ireland, with a
comparatively high proportion of members of the Church of Ireland and
Presbyterians, and this is mirrored among the asylum’s paying patients.50
Ennis, a small town in the rural west of Ireland, experienced a short-lived
retail boom in the immediate aftermath of the Famine. Although the
railway was extended to Ennis from the neighbouring city of Limerick
in 1859, both the town and its surrounding parishes settled into a slow
decline from the 1860s, with little opportunity for any significant com-
mercial or industrial development or the expansion of local trades.51
Enniscorthy, a town in the more prosperous County Wexford in the
rural south-east of Ireland, had strong trade compared with towns like
Ennis. Wexford was also traditionally one of the wealthier farming areas
in Ireland and boasted many large estates as well as smaller holdings.52
These four district asylums differed in size. Richmond and Belfast were
mammoth institutions, accommodating some 2200 (forty-nine paying)
patients and 1300 (six paying) patients respectively in 1900. By com-
parison, Enniscorthy and Ennis were moderately sized, housing approxi-
mately 450 (twenty-four paying) patients and 380 (twelve paying)
patients in the same year.53
While the proportion of paying patients in the four district asylums
was small, their numbers equalled those in many of the smaller private
and voluntary asylums in this era, revealing that district asylums had
become an important form of care for non-paupers. Meanwhile, accom-
modation for paying patients had greatly increased within the private
and voluntary sectors from 270 patients in 1830 to 700 in 1900.54 This
expansion is particularly significant given that the general Irish popu-
lation had halved between 1845 and 1900. While the immediate con-
sequences of the Famine brought about a dramatic population decline
in Ireland through both death and emigration, further depopulation
occurred after 1850 when famine conditions had all but disappeared.55
 1 INTRODUCTION 9

Context
In contrast to the plethora of research on the history of Irish psychiatry,
sparse scholarly attention has been devoted to paying patients. Finnane’s
survey fails to acknowledge the existence of paying patients in the dis-
trict system. Catherine Cox has briefly outlined the legalisation of paying
patients’ admission into district asylums and contended that the result-
ing revenue generated was negligible, yet her discussion of patients in
the Enniscorthy and Carlow asylums does not distinguish between pay-
ing and pauper patients.56 Although several scholars have examined the
social profile of district asylum patients,57 few have focused on patients in
other asylums.58 Malcolm’s commissioned history of St Patrick’s (Swift’s)
Hospital is the only academic study of a non-public asylum in Ireland.
While much of Malcolm’s work concerns administrative and financial
aspects of the hospital’s history, she also examines patients’ social pro-
file in the 1870s and 1880s. This analysis, however, falls short of dis-
tinguishing between paying and charitable patients.59 Oonagh Walsh has
completed an article-length investigation of the implications of patients’
gender on their admission, treatment and discharge in both district
and private asylums in nineteenth-century Ireland. Yet her study relies
solely on the reports of the lunacy inspectors for her analysis of private
patients.60 My own previous research on the social role of Irish private
asylums also focuses primarily on these reports.61
This book expands on current scholarship to provide a more rounded
and focused study of paying patients in nineteenth-century Ireland. It
considers the role of public, voluntary and private asylums and assesses
the social profile of paying patients in these sectors. Given the existence
of substantial surveys of the pauper insane, much of the research under-
pinning this book focuses on non-paupers, while comparisons are drawn
with existing findings on pauper patient groups. It therefore adds com-
plexity to our understanding of the impact of factors such as class, social
status, spending power, religion and gender on patterns of committal,
care and treatment in Ireland.
Throughout, comparisons are drawn between Ireland and Britain.
Scholarship on British asylums and paying patients has focused mainly
on urban and industrial settings.62 One notable exception is the work
of Joseph Melling and Bill Forsythe, which explores public and private
mental healthcare in Devon in the largely rural south-west of England.63
The emphasis on the urban and industrial has its origins in Andrew
10 A. Mauger

Scull’s revisionist argument that the institutionalisation of the insane

was evidence of bourgeois elites’ concerns to regulate insanity within the
labouring masses. For Scull, the expansion of the English county asy-
lum system was a consequence of the ‘commercialisation of existence’, as
those who were unable to function in a capitalist market economy were
no longer tolerated and essentially ‘dumped’ in these institutions.64
Subsequent counter- and post-revisionist scholarship has revised
Scull’s model, re-assessing the role of the family in the committal and
discharge process and recognising the existence of family bonds.65
Scholars, including David Wright and, in the Irish context, Finnane, have
stressed the importance of the role of the family in identifying mental ill-
ness and in committing relatives to asylums.66 However, Cox has shown
that there were limits to the degree of autonomy families enjoyed and
that they were ‘obliged to negotiate with other actors, including police,
magistrates and dispensary doctors, and to operate within specific legal
frameworks’.67 Various studies have also highlighted how predominantly
rural Ireland offers a context in which industrially focused models can
be challenged.68 As Scull has acknowledged, his model cannot so readily
be applied to rural contexts, arguing, for example, that Wales’ ‘economic
backwardness’ meant more traditional modes of care persisted because
rural families were less likely to ‘dump’ inconvenient relatives into asy-
lums.69 This book engages with these debates, in demonstrating that the
families of paying patients negotiated fees with asylum authorities and
often had the luxury of selection between the three sectors of asylum
care. In doing so, it reveals that families did not simply pay to ‘dump’
relatives in institutions but, rather, their decision to commit a relative
was complicated by property and business interests and the welfare of the
entire family unit.

Records
This study investigates a range of sources from government records to
medical literature and asylum records. Government sources are indispen-
sable for situating Irish lunacy provision within the wider context of state
affairs. At national level, the Irish prison inspectors and, from 1845, the
lunacy inspectors were central figures in lunacy administration. These
inspectors, based in Dublin Castle, were required to visit all ‘receptacles
for the insane’ and reported annually on their observations. During the
nineteenth century, the government also initiated several commissions
 1 INTRODUCTION 11

of inquiry into lunacy provision, the reports of which contain evidence

from protagonists including the lunacy inspectors, asylum managing
bodies and resident physicians.70 During these inquiries, interest groups
debated, contested and explored the various methods of providing for
Ireland’s non-pauper insane.
Drawing on admissions registers, casebooks, minute books and annual
reports for the nine selected asylums, two databases of paying patients’
social profile were compiled for the periods 1826–1867 and 1868–1900.
Analysis of this material establishes the sectors of Irish society found in
different types of asylums (see Chap. 4). As outlined in Appendix A, for
the district asylums, paying patients were identified using admissions reg-
isters, minute books and financial accounts and then, through nominal
linkage, in the casebooks. By using all available records to identify pay-
ing patients, those who were admitted as paupers but were later charged
maintenance are captured in the study. Where patients were admitted as
paying patients but later maintained at the expense of the asylum, this
is noted in discussions of their case histories. The decision was made to
include all patients who were charged at one point or another during
their stay to highlight the fluidity between paying and pauper patients in
the district asylum system.
Chapters 5, 6 and 7 draw heavily on asylum doctors’ case notes on
patients. Analysis of this source is still a relatively new practice in the
history of psychiatry and scholars have adopted differing stances on its
credibility.71 Aside from its time-consuming nature, problems with cen-
sorship are rife. While case notes often contain direct statements from
patients, friends and relatives, historians including Jonathan Andrews
have cautioned that these sources are mediated through the reporting
physician, therefore reflecting medical preoccupations and biases.72 Yet,
as Andrews has acknowledged, case notes ‘may provide the surest basis
we have’ for understanding the changing nature of the experience of the
insane in asylums since 1800.73 Certainly, as Hilary Marland has sug-
gested, lay commentary in case notes should not be ignored.74 In the
Irish context, Cox has found that patients, relatives and friends often
provided medical and social histories of patients which, while lacking
contextual information, can be useful, particularly where they appear in
quotations in case notes.75
In addition, many scholars have begun to seek out the patient’s view
in such diverse materials as their letters, accounts by their family and
friends, their art and poetry, their diaries and memoirs and even fictional
12 A. Mauger

literature on patient experiences.76 This has largely been in response to

Roy Porter’s call to arms, in 1985, for a ‘patient-orientated history’.
Despite the enthusiasm of the 1980s, however, much work remains to be
done. Some thirty years after Porter’s call, Flurin Condrau observed that
the history of the patient’s experience was still undeveloped.77 Patients’
letters provide unrivalled insight into their experiences of asylum life.
However, where letters have survived, they are often those withheld by
the asylum authorities, which might be expected to contain complaints
about the asylum, casting it in a disproportionately negative light. Yet, as
Allan Beveridge has shown, frequent similarities in patients’ responses to
the Morningside Asylum in Scotland demand that their ‘claims are con-
sidered seriously’.78 In the course of researching this book, several hun-
dred letters were found, mostly appended to case notes.

Social Class in Ireland

Defining class boundaries in nineteenth-century Ireland is a difficult,
even impenetrable, task, and poses challenges for most historians. The
label ‘middle classes’—rather than ‘middle class’—is often adopted when
discussing any individual or group who could not be described as work-
ing class or aristocratic.79 Such appellations are unhelpful in an Irish con-
text and Irish historians have favoured a Weberian understanding of class,
which more heavily relies on notions of social status.80 This book does
not purport to resolve these challenges. Instead, by analysing various
social groups, it meditates on the influence of social class and status on
responses to mental illness. In this regard, it engages simultaneously with
the hitherto unrelated discourses of social class and psychiatry in nine-
teenth-century Ireland.
Ireland’s class boundaries were not rigidly defined. Ireland’s lack of
urbanisation and industrialisation did not allow for clear-cut economic
stratification. Instead, the rural Irish placed a high importance on land,
which was inextricably bound up in both social status and class-specific
gender constructions.81 Among the rural Irish, inheritance was a deter-
mining factor for living standards. After the Famine, families abandoned
the practice of subdividing their land between all heirs and this adoption
of impartible inheritance fostered succession disputes, family tensions
and class and gender conflicts.82 Despite the immense importance the
rural Irish placed on land, Maura Cronin has suggested that appropriate
or ‘respectable’ behaviour, rather than economic position, defined class
 1 INTRODUCTION 13

boundaries in Ireland.83 In consequence, there is little sense of the emer-

gence of a working-class identity in rural Irish contexts. Instead, divisions
were often in terms of the amount of land owned, if it was owned at all.
Designations such as ‘small farmer’, broadly speaking those with at least
five acres of land, ‘grazier’, those occupying at least one holding of 150–
200 acres, and ‘large farmer’ are thus commonly found.84
This book draws on these existing approaches in its definition of
class boundaries. Within the realm of asylum provision, it distinguishes
between the ‘pauper’ insane, or those considered unable to contribute
towards their maintenance, and the ‘non-pauper’ insane, those who were
considered capable of contributing. It is important to note that the labels
of pauper and non-pauper do not accurately reflect patients’ social or
economic condition, nor does the term pauper in this context imply des-
titution.85 Rather, they best represent contemporary characterisations of
asylum populations.
More nuanced class boundaries are identified among diverse groups
of asylum patients—those committed to district, voluntary and private
asylums as paying patients. While it is difficult to accurately assess the
social origins of asylum patients solely based on their occupational pro-
file, a more complete picture begins to emerge when a comprehensive
survey of patients’ occupational status, maintenance fees and, where pos-
sible, landholdings is undertaken (see Chap. 4). The importance placed
on social class in nineteenth-century Ireland is further measured against
the perceptions, expectations and experiences of the patients themselves
(see Chaps. 5 and 6). In addition, the responses of families, communities
and doctors to non-pauper insanity reveal the forms of behaviour and
lifestyle deemed appropriate for distinct social groups.

Outline of Chapters
This book comprises seven chapters, each focusing on the complex
interplay between various actors involved in providing for the non-pau-
per insane. Chapter 2 outlines the political development of non-pauper
lunacy provision in nineteenth-century Ireland. Focusing on Ireland’s
lunacy inspectors, the national press and the emerging psychiatric com-
munity, it is concerned with the debates aired at national level on how
best to accommodate different social groups. It concludes that in the
absence of a single effective model, the result was a patchwork of pub-
lic, voluntary and private accommodation, each the outcome of a set of
14 A. Mauger

shared convictions as to how, why and by whom the non-pauper insane

should be treated.
Chapter 3 considers the realities of providing care at local level.
Concentrating on the managing bodies and resident physicians of the
nine selected asylums, it traces their experiences of administrating non-
pauper lunacy. It also considers the interactions between families, com-
munities and these administrative figures when negotiating patients’
maintenance fees. Revisiting the conclusion of Chap. 2, this chapter con-
tends that the piecemeal and fragmented approach to non-pauper lunacy
provision resulted in an institutional marketplace. As will be argued,
patients and their relatives often had the luxury of selection, which cre-
ated competition between the voluntary and private sectors. Families
choosing between these sectors based their decisions not only on price
and location, but on the religious ethos of institutions and the standard
of accommodation provided. An analysis of the duration of stay and out-
come for patients committed to these asylums suggests that more expen-
sive asylums offered a greater chance of cure, or at least relief from the
symptoms of insanity, than did the district asylums.
Centring on patients in the nine case studies, Chap. 4 delineates the
socio-economic background of paying patients committed to public, vol-
untary and private asylums in the periods 1826–1867 and 1868–1900.
It reveals that many paying patients in district asylums occupied a pre-
carious social position just above the rank of pauper. Charitable and
especially private asylum patients, meanwhile, were usually drawn from
comparably comfortable circumstances. Exploration of patients’ social
profile is supplemented by analysis of their maintenance fees and prop-
erty holdings, shedding further light on the spending power of discrete
social groups. The existence of an institutional marketplace is further
depicted through evidence of the socio-economic overlap of patients in
the three types of asylums.
Focusing primarily on the period from 1868 to 1900, Chap. 5 consid-
ers the extent to which the social class, gender and occupational profile
of paying patients influenced medical and lay identification of the causes
of their insanity. It argues that asylum doctors in Ireland often con-
structed gender- as well as class-specific aetiologies for their non-pauper
patients: primarily work for men and domesticity for women. Contrary
to Britain, ‘alcohol’ was often attributed as a cause of illness, particularly
among private asylum patients, reflecting cultural disparities in attitudes
towards alcohol consumption on the two islands.
 1 INTRODUCTION 15

As Chap. 6 examines, the emphasis on work went beyond the medical

identification of causes and symptoms of non-pauper insanity to encom-
pass therapy. A significant tenet of moral therapy, which remained the
dominant form of treatment in nineteenth-century Irish asylums, was
work therapy. However, patients’ social origins impacted on this com-
ponent of their treatment as, not unlike the British context, those caring
for patients from more privileged backgrounds struggled to offer what
was considered class-appropriate employment.86 Instead, doctors at the
voluntary and private asylums prescribed more varied and extensive pro-
grammes of recreation consistent with patients’ accustomed pastimes
outside the asylum.
Chapter 7 centres specifically on the experiences and impressions of
paying patients in the selected asylums, exploring their care and treat-
ment primarily in the 1890s. It suggests that social status and class iden-
tity heavily influenced expectations of care. In district asylums, paying
patients were particularly anxious to affirm their social standing to dis-
tance themselves from the pauper patients with whom they were forced
to share lodgings. This led to the kind of class, religious and political
tensions between patients largely absent in the voluntary and private
asylums. Asylum doctors’ expectations of paying patients were equally
informed by class and status. Yet, staff’s attempts to maintain a sense of
social decorum in even the most expensive asylums were often frustrated
by patients’ violence and ‘inappropriate’ behaviour.
Overall, this book argues that the failure of the nineteenth-century
Irish state to provide accommodation for the non-pauper insane when
setting up the district asylum system gained public, state and medical rec-
ognition, both at national and local level. Fresh and revised legislation
and increased centralisation sought to address the challenges of accom-
modating this social cohort, while the lunacy inspectors, the medical
community and the press raised the question of who should be legally,
financially and morally accountable. No single solution was reached;
instead, the state, philanthropists and private asylum proprietors came to
share responsibility. This enabled many families to select between rival
sectors of asylum provision. Meanwhile, the emerging psychiatric pro-
fession, sometimes sharing a sense of social equality with their paying
patients, constructed class- and gender-based readings of their disorders,
fashioning treatments and accommodation accordingly. The patients,
acutely conscious of their own status and the threat incarceration posed
to their social standing, entertained certain expectations of what their
Another random document with
no related content on Scribd:
(1) Rattray’s Hausa version is identical with the Jamaican. The
Surinam story lacks the Dry-head ending. In the Madagascar and
Congo stories, the trick turns upon pretending that a spirit warns the
wife against poison if she partakes of her husband’s food. In Theal,
Kenkebe visits his father-in-law in time of famine, is feasted on an ox
and given bags of corn, which he conceals. Compare numbers 21c,
23, 24, 25, and 29.

(2) A Masai story (Hollis, 15) tells of two brothers who are given a
bullock to slaughter. They carry it to “a place where there was no
man or animal, or bird, or insect, or anything living,” and a devil puts
them to much inconvenience. The pursuit of Anansi by the shadow
of Death, in the Wona version of 27, has already been referred to in
the Dry-head episode. In Barker, 81–84, the stolen flour-producing
stone which Anansi is carrying off, sticks to his head and grinds him
to pieces, as referred to in the note to number 22.

In Theal, Kenkebe’s wife and son hide themselves behind the rock
which conceals his secret store, and push over a stone which
pursues him as far as his own house. [253]

In Barker, 66, the king gives to the greedy man a box so enchanted
that it can never be put down.

In Sac and Fox Indian tales, JAFL 15: 177, the monster-killing twins
bring home a rock which sticks upon their backs until they carry it to
its place again.

In the Ojibway Nanabushu cycle, Jones, Pub. Eth. Soc. 1: 117–127,

Nanabushu is cooking a deer. The branches of the tree creak and he
gets up to grease them and is caught and hung there. Meanwhile,
the wolves come and eat up the deer. He finally escapes, discovers
that the brains of the deer are still left in the deer-skull, transforms
himself into a snake and crawls into the head. Turning too quickly
back into human shape, he gets caught with the skull fast to his head
and has to carry it about with him until he manages to break it
against a rock.

(3) The regular Jamaica conclusion of the Dry-head episode seems

to be the Aesopic one in which a bird carries him in air and drops
him, not against a rock but, in Jekyll, “in the deepest part of the
woods;” in version (c), “in a sea-ball.” In another version not printed
here, Anansi takes in an old man because he has some food with
him; but when the food gives out, the man “become a Dry-head on
him,” and Anansi puts him off on Tacoomah, who leaves him by the
sea so that a wave comes up and drowns him. In version (a) Anansi
burns him up. Version (b) is a witticism in the same class as “Dry-
head and the Barber” in this collection.

In Pamela Smith’s version, Anansi shoots the bird who is doing him
the favor of carrying off Dry-head. See note to number 70 and
compare P. Smith, 59–64, in which Tiger, pursued by the “Nyams,”
begs one animal after another to hide him, but always lets his
presence be known. Finally, when Goat kills the “Nyams,” he eats
Goat with the “Nyams.”

In Dorsey, The Pawnee, 126, and Traditions of the Arikara, 146–148,

Coyote, pursued by a Rolling Stone, takes refuge with the Bull-bats
and is defended by them. In the Pawnee version, he later insults his
rescuers.

[Contents]

31. The Yam-hills. [Story]

The yam-hill story is very common in Jamaica. Parkes learned it in
Kingston. Pamela Smith tells it, page 59 and JAFL 9: 278.
Sometimes a song accompanies the story. The number of Yam-hills
varies.

Compare Cronise and Ward, 167–171; Parsons, Andros Island, 109.

[254]

The story depends upon the idea that it is unlucky to reveal to others
a marvel one has seen oneself, or to repeat certain taboo words. A
lad in the Santa Cruz mountains explained the taboo by saying that
Anansi had “six” legs. Another said that Anansi’s mother’s name was
“Six.” So in Pamela Smith (JAFL 9: 278), the Queen’s name is
“Five.” Compare Rivière, 177; Krug, JAFL 25: 120; Schwab, JAFL
32: 437, and the next two numbers in this collection.

[Contents]

32. The Law against Back-biting. [Story]

Parkes learned this story on board ship coming from Africa. It is

common in Jamaica, and the wit by which the revenge is effected
seems to be an individual invention, as it varies from story to story. In
Junod’s Ba-ronga version (156–158), Piti, the fool, amuses himself
by the roadside instead of going to herd cattle. Everyone who
reproaches him falls dead. Later he restores his victims to life by
means of fire.
[Contents]

33. Fling-a-mile. [Story]

Jekyll, 152–155, has a good version of this very popular Jamaica

story.

Compare the Bulu tales, Schwab, JAFL 27: 284–285; 32: 434.

In JAFL 27, Turtle sets a trap and by pretending to teach other

animals who come along one by one how to use it, he catches one
victim after another until he is himself caught.

In JAFL 32, Pangolin offers to initiate the animals one by one and
makes them climb a tree and jump upon a concealed rock, which
kills them. Turtle finally circumvents the trick.

In a Jamaica version collected in Mandeville, Anansi holds a

butchering at a place where there is a tree which seizes any person
who leans against it and flings him upon a lance which Anansi has
set up.

[Contents]

34. But-but and Anansi. [Story]

The very popular story of Butterfly’s revenge is a somewhat

obscured version of an old theme—the Jataka story of The Quail’s
Friends, Francis and Thomas, 247–250. Compare Steel-Temple,
Wide Awake Stories, 184; Gerber, Great Russian Animal Tales, Pub.
Mod. Lang. Asso. of Am. 6: No. 2: 19–20; Grimm 58, The Dog and
the Sparrow, discussed in Bolte u. Polívka 1: 515–519.

Though common to-day, the story seems to be of comparatively late

introduction. Old Edwards, over eighty, heard it when he was “ripe.”
Compare Tremearne, 231. [255]

[Contents]

35. Tumble-bug and Anansi. [Story]

The story of Tumble-bug’s revenge is even more common than the

last number. In Wona, 51–55, Tumble-bug is carrying butter and
Anansi only lard. Anansi proposes that they put their loads together,
sees that Tumble-bug’s is at the bottom, and makes the ruling in
order that he may get the butter and Tumble-bug the lard. Compare
number 46 and the opening episode of the last number.

The revenge story is recent. In Wona, Tumble-bug suffers further at

Anansi’s hands.

In Tremearne, FL 21: 213–214, Tortoise and Spider have a bull in

common; Tortoise eats the liver and Spider claims in compensation
the whole bull. Tortoise pretends dead and frightens Spider, who
thinks it is a spirit and gives him everything.

[Contents]
 36. Horse and Anansi. [Story]

For the trick of sending after fire in order to enjoy the whole of a
common store compare Koelle, 166–167; Tremearne, 255, 263;
Hartt, 34; Harris, Friends, 79–80; Nights, 282–284; Christensen, 89;
Georgia, JAFL 32: 403.

For the trick of leaving the knife or the spoon behind, see number 11
in this collection.

For the fire-test see 21a and note to number 9.

It is clear, from the picture drawn of Horse as he starts for the Fire,
that the story-teller thinks of the actors in the story as animals, even
when he shows them behaving like human beings.

[Contents]

37. Anansi in Monkey Country. [Story]

Mrs. W. E. Wilson (Wona) thinks that the second version of the story,
told by Jekyll, 70–72, is not a true negro form, because of the great
respect in which Jamaica negroes hold the rites of the established
church.

Compare Cronise and Ward, 133–145; Fortier, 24–27.

As a device for getting victims cooked and eaten, the story is related
to numbers 16 and 38 in this collection.
[Contents]

38. Curing the Sick. [Story]

In Parkes’s version, the substitution of the human for the fish victim
not only spoils the wit of the story but obscures its relation to the
story of Anansi’s visit to fish-country as it appears in number 39. The
identity of the two is proved by the structure of the [256]story, which
falls into two parts. (1) Anansi, pretending to cure a sick relative, eats
her instead. (2) The mule offers to avenge her and plays dead
outside Anansi’s door; when he attempts to make use of her for food,
she drags him into the water and drowns him, as in number 6.

For (1) compare Cronise and Ward, 226–230, where Rabbit pretends
to cure Leopard’s children and eats them up; Nassau, 125–126,
where Tortoise pretends to bring children out of Crocodile’s hundred
eggs, and eats them all.

(2) In Parsons’s Portuguese negro story, JAFL 30: 231–235, Lob

escapes from the island where the indignant birds have abandoned
him, by bribing Horse-fish to carry him across. He promises to pay
her well, but abandons the horse-fish as soon as he touches shore.
She remains weeping on the shore. Lob thinks her dead and starts
to cut her up. She drags him into the sea and drowns him. There are
small touches in the story which prove its identity with the Jamaica
version. When Lob’s wife weeps, Lob says, “She is just playing with
me, she is not going to do anything.” In Parkes’s story, Anansi says
to the mule who is dragging him into the sea, “A little fun me mak wid
you, no mean i’.” In both Jamaica versions, Mule turns Anansi over
to the vengeance of the fishes; in the Portuguese, he is drowned.

In Jekyll, 135–137, an old lady meddles with a jar she has been told
not to touch and which, as soon as she gets her hand in, drags her
to the sea and drowns her.

In Jekyll, 125, “Cousin Sea-mahmy” makes his son Tarpon carry

Anansi to shore, and Anansi gets him into the pot by the trick of
taking turns weighing each other, as in number 16.

In Pamela Smith, 44–46, Anansi eats the sick mother under pretence
of cure, and bribes Dog to carry him across the river, but there is no
vengeance; Dog himself is swallowed by Crocodile.

[Contents]

39. Anansi, White-belly and Fish. [Story]

Jekyll, 129–131, and Milne-Home, 35–39, have excellent versions of

this very popular Jamaica story, which, in its full form, is made up of
four episodes. (1) The birds take Anansi across the water to their
feeding-place where, because of his bad behavior, they abandon
him. (2) Anansi visits Fish and claims relationship. Fish tests him
with a cup of hot pop, which he cools in the sun under pretence of
heating it hotter. (3) He is lodged for the night with a box of eggs, all
of which he eats but one; and when called upon to count the eggs,
brings Fish the same one every time, [257]after wiping off the mark.
(4) Fish sends her children to row him home. He fools them out of
heeding her call when she discovers the loss of the eggs. Once on
shore, he fries and eats the children.

Compare Tremearne, 265–266; Head-hunters, 324–326; Rattray, 2:

88–104; Parsons, Portuguese negroes, JAFL 30: 231–235; Andros
Island, 2–3.
(1) The episode of the birds’ feeding-place is to be compared with
that of Fire-fly and the egg-hunt, number 7, and with the visit “inside
the cow,” number 22. In the Portuguese version, the birds take Lob
to a dance and he sings insulting songs because there is no feast.

(2) The test of relationship occurs in Jekyll and in Tremearne, Head-

hunters. It belongs to the same class of boasts as those of the
Clever Tailor in Grimm 20 and 183.

(3) In Milne-Home, the scorpion trick is employed to guard the eggs,

as in number 7, and Anansi complains of “fleas” biting him. The
episode is lacking in Jekyll.

In Tremearne, Head-hunters, when Spider breaks the egg-shells, the

children cry out to know what is the matter and Spider says he is
hiccoughing.

The egg-counting trick generally occurs in a different connection.

The trickster visits Tiger’s house, eats all the cubs but one, and
counts that one many times. Compare Callaway, 24–27; MacDonald
1: 55–56; Theal 111; Jacottet, 40–45; Rattray, Chinyanje, 137–138;
Harris, Nights, 346–348.

(4) In Jekyll, Anansi visits “Sea-mahmy,” who is a mermaid, and her

son, “Trapong,” or tarpon, takes him home. In Milne-Home,
“Alligator” is host; a “boatman” the ferryman. Lob gets “aunt” sea-
horse to carry him to shore. In my Jamaica versions, the sons are
the ferrymen and are generally cooked and eaten at the other end.
The misinterpreted call occurs in all Jamaica versions and in
Tremearne, Head-hunters. In the Lob story, Lob mutters an insult;
when asked to repeat his words, he declares that he has merely
praised the sea-horse’s swimming; compare Parsons, Sea Islands,
54–56. For the fate of the ferryman, see also note to number 38 and
compare Anansi’s treatment of Rat in the note to number 7.
[Contents]

40. Goat’s Escape. [Story]

The story of Goat’s Escape is a favorite in Jamaica. See Milne-

Home, 58–60; 65–66. It falls into two parts. (1) Goat and Dog are
pursued and Dog escapes over a river which Goat cannot [258]cross.
(2) Goat transforms himself into a stone, which the pursuer himself
throws across the river. The introduction to the flight varies but (2)
remains constant.

Compare: Jacottet, note page 262; Parsons, Andros Island, 103 and
note; Jones, 121–123; 133–136.

Version (a). Compare Jones, and Milne-Home, 58–60.

Version (b). In Jekyll, 46–47, Puss gives the rats a ball and only
those members of the family escape who attend to little Rat’s
warning, for he has heard the cat’s song. Compare Chatelain, 189–
191, and see note to number 86, where the little brother or sister
discovers by the words of a song a treacherous intention.

[Contents]

41. Turtle’s Escape. [Story]

See number 58, part (3).

[Contents]

42. Fire and Anansi. [Story]

A less witty version of this popular Jamaica story occurs in Jekyll,

129–131.

In Dayrell, 64–65, Sun and Water are great friends. Sun visits Water,
but Water never visits Sun. At length, Sun invites Water and builds a
great compound to receive him and his friends. All come, take
possession, and crowd Sun and his wife, Moon, out into the sky.

[Contents]

43. Quit-quit and Anansi. [Story]

A story which turns upon teaching the wrong song to a dull-witted

rival, never fails to raise a laugh in Jamaica. See numbers 4, 106 in
this collection.

[Contents]

44. Spider Marries Monkey’s Daughter. [Story]

Compare Tremearne FL 21: 353–354 and number 92 of this

collection.
[Contents]

45. The Chain of Victims [Story]

Common as is the story of the “chain of victims” in Africa, Falconer

gave me the only version I heard in Jamaica.

Compare Koelle, 158–161; Dayrell, 6–10; Nassau, 245–247;

Tremearne, 373–374; FL 21: 211–212; Lenz, 39–40; Boas, JAFL 25:
207–209; Rattray, 2: 58–72.

[Contents]

46. Why Tumble-bug Rolls in the Dung. [Story]

Compare Tremearne, 261; FL 21: 498–499; Christensen, 96–98; and

note to number 35 in this collection. 1 [259]

[Contents]

47. Why John-crow has a Bald Head. [Story]

The explanatory story of “John-crow peel-head” is very popular in

Jamaica. See Pamela Smith, 25–26, and number 17d.
[Contents]

48. Why Dog is always Looking. [Story]

In Milne-Home, 121, “Jack Spaniard” (a wasp-like fly) laughs at

Mosquito’s boast till “he broke his waist in two.”

In Jones, 22, Sparrow makes the boast about his father’s crop of
potatoes. 2

[Contents]

49. Why Rocks at the River are covered with Moss.

[Story]

See Milne-Home, 94–95; Jekyll, 52.

Compare Parsons, Andros Island, 119–121 and note for references;

Bundy, JAFL 32: 412–413, and see note to number 138.

For a discussion of Grimm 110, The Jew among Thorns, see Bolte u.
Polívka 2: 490–503.

[Contents]

50. Why Ground-dove Complains. [Story]

See number 21.

[Contents]

51. Why Hog is always Grunting. [Story]

See number 10. In Pamela Smith’s “Dry-head” story, Anansi’s nose

turns long, and he goes about persuading other people to screw on
snouts.

[Contents]

52. Why Toad Croaks. [Story]

See note to number 29.

[Contents]

53. Why Woodpecker Bores Wood. [Story]

In Barker, 123, three sons wish to do honor to their mother and the
first declares that he will make her a “sepulchre of stone.”
[Contents]

54. Why Crab is afraid after Dark. [Story]

The story represents a very wide-spread folk motive—that of a weak

being who appeals to some deity for more power, but whose request
is proved to be either needless or disastrous.

In Tremearne, FL 21: 360, an old woman is to teach Spider cunning.

She sends him for a bottle of lion’s tears, an elephant’s tusk, a dog’s
skin. Spider secures them all, and escapes her when she tries to kill
him. She says, “If I taught you more cunning, you would destroy
everybody.” This story is popular in Sea Islands, according to Dr.
Parsons, JAFL 32: 404, and Sea Islands, 14–19. Compare Bundy,
JAFL 32: 416–417, and note, page 416. [260]

In Tremearne, 270–271, Snake promises Scorpion a poison that will

kill a man at once. Scorpion accidentally bites Snake, and she
refuses the poison lest he kill everybody.

In Fortier, 13–19, the Devil gives the little Earthworm his wish: “I
want to become big big and beat everybody who will come to trouble
and bother me. Give me only that and I shall be satisfied.” The
consequences are disastrous for the earth-worm.

In Folk-tales of the Malagasy, FLJ 1: 238–239, “the little Round Boy”

smokes out God’s children and so wins his desire.

In Ralston, 1–20, Sukra grants all an ambitious king’s wishes until he

finally wishes to push Sukra himself off his seat. See Grimm, 19, The
Fisherman’s Wife, Bolte u. Polívka 1: 138–148.

Compare the Panchatantra story quoted by Ralston, introduction to

Tibetan Tales, Liii, of the weaver who asks for two pairs of arms and
two heads in order to work faster, but is pelted by his terrified
neighbors for his pains.

[Contents]

55. Why Mice are no Bigger. [Story]

Compare Parsons, Sea Islands, 19–22.

[Contents]

56. Rat’s Wedding. [Story]

This story is told in Milne-Home, 63–64. 3

[Contents]

57. Cockroach Stories. [Story]

For version (a) compare number 6.

For version (b) compare Tremearne, 314; Parsons, Andros Island,

90–91 and note.
[Contents]

58. Hunter, Guinea-hen and Fish. [Story]

The story as Williams tells it is made up of three parts. (1) Bird and
Hunter set up the same home without either knowing of the other. (2)
Bird supplies Fish with wings and brings him to the feeding-patch,
then takes the wings and flies away when Hunter comes in pursuit.
(3) Fish is captured as the thief, but escapes by song and dance into
the sea.

(1) See Grimm 27, Bremen Town Musicians, Bolte u. Polívka, 1:

237–239. Compare Barker, 141–143; Tremearne, FL 21: 495; Renel
2: 12–13; Parsons, Andros Island, 135; Rattray, 2: 34.

(2) The episode is identical with Anansi and the Birds in number 39,
but motivated differently. See numbers 2b, 5b, 21b. In Bates’s
Jamaica version, JAFL 9: 122–124, Mudfish is left in [261]the
Watchman’s hands without the preliminary episode of the common
dwelling, and the escape is effected in the same manner.

(3) See number 41 and compare Renel 2: 165; Parsons, Andros

Island, 135–137 and references note 2, page 137.

[Contents]

59. Rabbit Stories. [Story]

These three and number 17b are the only Rabbit stories I heard in
Jamaica. A woman named Ellen told the stories to the lads from
whom I heard them, but she refused to be interviewed. See numbers
21a, 12, 23.

[Contents]

60. The Animal Race. [Story]

The wit of the animal race turns upon the fact that a slow animal,
contrary to all expectation, wins over a swift. The story takes three
forms. (1) The swift animal is so sure of winning that it delays and
“slow but sure wins the race.” (2) The little animal wins by hanging
on behind while the other runs, and thus slipping in ahead at the
end. (3) The slow animal arranges a relay by placing one of its kind
along the road and taking its own position in hiding near the goal.
See Dähnhardt 4: 46–96.

(1) The classic Aesopic moral appears in Parsons, Andros Island,

102–103; and in JAFL 30: 214.

(2) Compare Barker, 155–157; Madagascar, FLJ 2: 166–168;

Natchez Indians, Swanton, JAFL 26: 203; Saurière, 104; Lenz,
Estudios, 185, 187.

In Grimm 20 (Bolte u. Polívka 1: 148–165), while the giant bears the

trunk of the tree on his shoulders, the valiant tailor rides home from
the forest in the branches and pretends that he has been carrying
the heavier load of the two.

(3) The Jamaica stories always follow the form of the relay race, as
in Jekyll, 39–43. Compare Basset 1: 15; Bleek, 32; Frobenius 3: 15;
Rattray, Chinyanje 131; Renel 2: 150–152; Schwab, JAFL 27: 277;
Hartt, 7–15; Smith, 543; Christensen, 5–9; Jones, 5–6; Edwards, 69;
Harris, Uncle Remus, 87–91; Boas, JAFL 25: 214–215; Parsons,
Sea Islands, 79; JAFL 30: 174; 32: 394; and references to American
Indian stories in Boas, JAFL 25: 249; Ponape, Hambruch, Südsee-
Märchen, p. 196; note, p. 347.

The story is told in Grimm 187, discussed by Bolte u. Polívka 3: 339–

355.

For the flying-trial for a bride, compare Parsons, Andros Island, 101.

[Contents]

61. The Fasting Trial. [Story]

See number 149, where the bird in the tree starves and Hopping
[262]Dick on the ground picks up worms and wins the match. In this
story, though incomplete, it is intimated that the bird in the tree wins.

Compare Dayrell, 153–155; Harris, Nights, 370–373; Fortier, 34–37;

Parsons, Andros Island, 97—99.

In Dayrell, the birds propose to starve seven days to see which will
be king. One leaves a hole out of which he creeps unobserved to
feed.

In Harris, as in this Jamaica version, the winning bird takes up his

station in the tree; the “fool bud” stays down by the creek.

In Parsons, one bird chooses a fruit tree, the other a “dry” tree. The
song sung by the winning bird runs,—
“This day Monday mornin’
Tama tama tam!”

and so on for the remaining days of the week.

In Fortier, the lady-love brings food to her favorite bird. The cooing
song in the Jamaica versions suggests this connection.

[Contents]

62. Man is Stronger. [Story]

Compare Koelle 177–179; Harris, Nights, 33–38; 330–333; Radin,

JAFL 28: 397–398, and see Grimm 72, discussed by Bolte u. Polívka
2: 96–100, and Sebillot, Le Folk-lore de France, 3: 63.

[Contents]

63. The Pea that made a Fortune. [Story]

Compare: Bleek, 90–94; Callaway, 37–40; Theal, 102–105; Renel 2:

60–63; Rivière, 95–97; Tremearne, 237–242; FL 21: 213–214;
Barker, 177–180; Cronise and Ward, 313; Torrend, 169–172;
Elmslie, FL 3: 92–95; Krug, JAFL 25: 113–114; Harris, Friends, 182–
186, and see Grimm 83, Hans in Luck; Bolte u. Polívka 2: 201–203.