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The location of an insane hospital is highly important in regard to the points we are now considering, for on this it very much depends, how far its reputation will be assailed by that kind of scandal and gossip which, in various degrees, is peculiarly incident to this class of institutions. If placed in a rural district and surrounded by the usual neighborhood, it is exposed to a prying observation and meddlesome interference that are only increased by any effort to restrain them. The neighbors assume the right of coming on the grounds at their pleasure, where they mingle with the attendants and patients, exerting an influence that may be positively bad, while it is altogether beyond the control of the officers. The measures of self-protection, to which they resort finally arouse a spirit of inveterate hostility that manifests itself in scandal and abuse. No person can come within their reach, especially if it be for the purpose of making inquiries respecting the institution, whose mind is not poisoned by this people's unscrupulous lies. If he have a friend in it already, favorable prepossessions however well-founded, are replaced by the most painful distrust that sooner or later, perhaps, ends in the removal of the patient. From this focus of ill-feeling, malign influences are disseminated over the whole community which never troubles itself to inquire about their origin, and fortunate is the institution that is able to live down unfavorable impressions thus created and maintained.

The proximity of a small town produces the same consequences. In those little communities where business is never so pressing as to debar any man from making himself acquainted with every other man's concerns, those of so considerable an establishment as an insane hospital, furnish inexhaustible materials for gossip. Every incident as it drops fresh from the lips of the village-butcher, or some prying neighbor, or some leaky attendant who finds a ready market for every thing of the kind he can carry, becomes the nine days' wonder, to be revolved in every circle until made to present some damnatory aspect.

It has been a common practice to place our insane hospitals in the neighborhood of the Capitol, and of all the evils of a bad location, I do not hesitate to say, this is the greatest. The political vortex which is eternally boiling and seething there, does not spare the hospital. Its proximity to the scenes of political intrigue and aggrandizement is enough to suggest the idea of making it an element in every scheme of party-operations, and if the purpose require it, detraction varied by every artifice of a malignant ingenuity, is unscrupulously used. The hospital may thereby lose the confidence of the public, but some needy camp-follower has got his reward, or some other equally commendable political end is obtained.

This is not the only nor the smallest evil incident to the connection in question. The legislature is the foundation of power, and its proximity renders it easy of access to all however remotely connected with the hospital, who have any fancied grievances to be redressed, or are bent on revenging some fancied wrong or slight. The tale of defamation finds eager listeners in men who, like the ancient father, believe because it is impossible, and who have no higher idea of public duty than that of raking among the sewers of village-scandal, for materials where-with to depreciate the value of an institution and blacken the character of its officers. Of course, such wiseacres have no difficulty in finding a mare's nest. Without the least idea how such an institution should be administered, neither knowing nor caring what maybe even the mildest consequences of their interference, they undertake to tear away the veil that shields it from the public gaze, to lay open to the inspection of the curious a class of incidents which the dullest sense of propriety would have withheld any one from revealing, and sit in judgment on conduct and measures which they are as little able to appreciate, as they are to calculate the movements of the heavenly bodies. It is not impossible that some who hear me may be unable to conceive of a sufficient warrant for language like this, but a single fact may convince them that I am not dealing with shadows. Within the last ten years the legislature of an eastern State, has investigated its insane hospital nearly every winter, on a vague charge of abuse, by means of special committees before whom have been summoned domestics, attendants and even patients, to testify whatever they might know, or were prompted to know, against the management. In several instances neither the officers nor directors received notice of the inquiry. In two instances the investigation was instigated by the representations of a discharged patient whose statements betrayed the grossest delusions, and after numerous meetings of the committee who were engaged in listening to such testimony, a vote of censure was defeated by a bare majority of the members. The stream of scandal was not confined to the committee-room, but found its way to the chambers, and in their printed debates, was carried to the remotest sections of the State, filling the minds of all who had friends in the hospital, with mortification and dismay. And yet this establishment was under the control of a Board of Directors, honest, able and vigilant, who would have quietly investigated any alleged abuse, and applied an effectual remedy with-out proclaiming the facts to the public ear. Such are the evils which result from the proximity of the Capitol and I cannot see that they are accompanied by a single counterbalancing advantage. Those institutions have flourished best where the legislature has least interfered, and therefore it is better for both that they should be placed as far asunder as possible.