"  In  presenting  to  you  the  Ninth  Biennial  Report  of  this  hospital,  I  feel  I  may
say,  while  some  obstacles  have  arisen  in  our  path,  and  we  have  met  with  some
discouragements  on  the  way,  a  fair  degree  of  success  has  attended  our  best
efforts  t')  make  the  period  a  prosperous  one  in  general.  The  obstacles  and  dis-
couragements have  been  in  part  the  same  that  I  have  remarked  upon  in  former
reports — the  uncomfortable  overcrowding  of  the  hospital  and  the  lack  of  facil-
ities for  treating  or  properly  caring  for  so  large  a  number — amounting  to,  at  the
close  of  this  period  of  twenty- three  months,  608  persons— a  number  represent-
ing more  than  twice  the  capacity  of  the  hospital.  Still,  we  have  got  along  with-
out any  serious  accident  or  epidemic,  though  constantly  exposed  to  both,  for
which  immunity  some  credit  may  be  fairly  claimed  to  be  due  to  all  who  have
had  ihej  care  of  patients,  in  the  watchfulness  that  has  prevented  collisions  and
violence,  and  the  high  degree  of  cleanliness  that  has  been  maintained,  so  neces-
sary to  preserve  health.  Another  obstacle,  and  one  that  added  much  to  the
cares  and  perplexities  inseparable  from  the  management  of  a  large  and  crowded
hospital,  one  that  has  caused  much  anxious  thought,  was  the  occurrence  ot  a
destructive  fire,  to  which  all  institutions  of  the  kind  seem  peculiarly  hable.  On
the  afternoon  of  the  18th  of  April,  1876,  a  fire  was  discovered  by  one  ot  the
patients  upon  the  roof  of  the  original  engine-house,  over  the  ironing  and  drying-
rooms,  near  the  bell-tower  and  the  ducts  through  which  air  was  supplied  to  tbe
ventilating  fan.  How  the  fire  originated  is  not  known,  but  if  it  was  not  an
incendiary'    work,  it  must  have  taken  from  a  spark    from  the  ironing-stove


438  HISTORY  OF  HENRY  COUNTY.
