Burdett's Hospital and Chanties Annual. (The Scientific Press.) —This is
the sixth appearance of this most useful work, and we may therefore assume that it is firmly established amongst the annuals. The industry and research involved in such a work must have been prodigious. Many of the annuals so abundantly strewn before the public are but rearrangements or amplifica- tions of matter accessible to every compiler at little trouble or expense to himself. But in the 832 pages of this book there is up-to-date information concerning four thousand institutions, which could only have been collected by inquiries on the most comprehensive scale and at considerable expense. Persons who have ever endeavoured to obtain accurate intelligence relating to an institution in which they are interested, will realise the extent of the work performed in the present instance, where the inquiry has extended to India, the Colonies, and America. It is not surprising that Mr. Burdett has devoted the larger section of the book to hospitals,—the subject on which he speaks as an expert. In the case of British Hospitals, he furnishes details as to the governing body, officers, medical staff, and hours of attendance, nursing staff, number of beds allotted to different classes of cases, number of patients, terms of admissions income and expenditure, medical schools, nursing institutions, visiting days, &c. The information in regard to Indian, Colonial, and American Hospitals is of almost the same complete character. In addition, there is also a large space occupied by particulars of dispensaries. Fully one hundred pages of the book are reserved for the "Year-Book of Philanthropy," in which are brief descriptions of missionary and religious societies, institutions for the blind, deaf and dumb, orphanages, homes, and other charities. This section of the work is not on the elaborate scale of the hospital section, but it gives just sufficient general in- formation to put inquirers on the road to the sources of full knowledge. The marshalling of the details, assisted as it is by the beautiful paper and printing, is as concisely and clearly done as in the author's indispensable "Official Intelligence," and the eye need lose no time in picking out the particular fact which is searched for. Though there are many figures, it must not be imagined that the book is merely a set of statistics collected together, to be consulted as a dictionary or a Blue- book. About one-third of the work is reserved for the discussion of various questions of hospital policy, and for the frank criticism of the defects of certain institutions. Here we need hardly say that whether we follow Mr. Burdett or not, his views on finance, management, nursing, Hospital Saturday and Sunday Funds,
cannot be ignored by those who are responsible for the manage- ment of all philanthropic enterprises. He makes some timely remarks on the street-collections which are now becoming such an intolerable nuisance ; and we may perhaps make a short quota- tion :— "These street-collections are becoming a positive curse in towns. They irritate thousands of people who habitually give to hospitals, and whose allegiance is imperilled by them. The sums collected on Hospital Saturday in the streets have led to the ex- tension of street collections for all sorts of illegitimate purposes under circumstances the most likely to lead to robbery and mis- appropriation of funds; • and they have even been made the excuse to teach children that begging in the public streets is a corn- mendable act, provided it is conducted under the cloak of some object ostensibly foreign to the beggar."
We are glad to note that it is probable that the Hospital Saturday movement will abandon this method of obtaining funds, and that there will be introduced instead a more systematic collection in the workshops. A striking feature in this Annual is that Mr. Burdett invites his readers to communicate with him on any point affecting hospitals or charities. As he mentions that the number of letters 'non these subjects which pass between the editor of the Annual and his correspondents exceeds twenty thousand per annum, it is obvious that the offer is appreciated. The book is invaluable to nurses, medical men, and to the subscribers and managers of hospitals and charities. Especially is it advantageous to all persons who are contemplating making gifts to these institutions, and who wish to know where their money is likely to do the most good. And we may go so far as to say that it will interest all those who give some thought to the welfare of their neighbours, as it will impress them with the magnitude and efficiency of the machinery which is now being employed to cope with the sickness and suffering of the world. So large is that machinel, now, that we feel that the time has come when there should be some State inspection of it. We should be sorry to see State control in any shape over hospitals supported by charity ; but State inspection need not mean State control, and a report from an expert appointed by the State on the management and condition of each hospital, if sent out every year to the subscribers, would be a very whole- some check on the many faults of management alluded to by Mr. Burdett in the work under review. For instance, there is nothing now to stop any adventurer, with a ready pen for writing appeals, from starting a hospital anywhere he pleases, though there may be absolutely no need for it, except perhaps the neces- sity of its originator. Then, again, subscribers to hospitals have practically no control over the expenditure, and it is getting far too common for hospital committees to embark upon an under- taking which they have no funds at all to meet. Then, again, an inspector would be useful if he were to draw attenbion to the hours and condition of service of the staff and employCs. It has lately been stated in the columns of the Daily News by the Hon. Sydney Holland, who is himself the chairman of a London hospital, that nurses have to work fourteen hours a day, with only two off for recreation and one for meals, for less pay than a lady's-maid receives, and that the lives of nurses are "known not to be long ones." If this be so, and if the conditions of service press too hardly on these women who devote their lives to nursing their fellow-creatures, it would be well that public attention should be called to the fact. Very few people take the trouble to read the yearly report even of hospitals to which they subscribe ; but we can with justice say that it is almost essential that any one engaged in managing a hospital should read Mr. Burdett's preface to his Annual, and that, if the general public would take the trouble to read it, mistakes and extravagances in hospital management would be less common.
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