VARIOUS MEDICAL CHARITIES.

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The Woman's Clinic, located at 1833 Fourteenth street NW., has a large staff; it receives no appropriation.

VI.

The Children's Country Home, located on the Broad Branch and Grant roads, near Tennally town, has been in operation for about fifteen years, and cares for about 150 girls and 100 boys each summer. The home is under the care of the Sisters of St. Margaret. On February 24, 1897, the home had a balance of $57.80 on hand, and up to November 1 received $1,546.17 interest on Kellogg & Co.'s notes, $552.42 from the estate of the late Michael Briel, besides one-third interest in realestate notes amounting to $12,940.84, and a store and dwelling estimated to be worth $12,000. The buildings and grounds are valued at $12,000, and the total assets of the home on November 1, 1897, were $29,898.71. This charity is maintained entirely by private subscription. The home is open from June to October, and receives children of all denominations and creeds; 45 children can be accommodated at one time, and each child stays two weeks. The officers are: Miss Kate L. Roy, president; Mrs. E. M. Chapman, vice president; Miss Frederica L. Rodgers, secretary; Mr. F. V. Robinson, treasurer.

The Diet Kitchen was begun April 24, 1896, by Mrs. Sarah S. Fuller, who acts as secretary. Her only helper was a matron, who cooked, under Mrs. Fuller's direction, what was necessary. From April to November, 1897, 26 white and 36 colored patients were served for periods varying from five days to two weeks.

Various religious denominations maintain small dispensaries for special purposes. For example, there is a Lutheran eye, ear, and throat infirmary, organized in 1889, located at the corner of Fourteenth and N streets NW. During 1896 7,064 persons were treated at a total expense of $178, not including rent.

1Letter from Mr. F. V. Robinson, treasurer, to clerk of joint committee, Oct. 29, 1897.

CHAPTER VII.

FOUNDLING ASYLUMS.

THE St. Ann's Infant Asylum was started in August, 1860, by Sister

Dyonisia, in a building on the corner of Pennsylvania avenue and Thirteen-and-a-half street, under the name of the Washington Infant Asylum. It was the first distinctly foundling asylum in Washington. Within a year the asylum was removed to a large building owned by Mr. W. W. Corcoran, on Vermont avenue between H and I streets, where it was continued until the Sisters purchased the three lots in Square No. 39, now occupied, on the corner of K and Twenty-fourth streets.

St. Ann's Infant Asylum was incorporated by the act of March 3, 1863, with the following incorporators: Theresa A. Costello, Lucy Guynn, Margaret Bowden, Sarah M. Carroll, Catherine Ryan, Louisa Fisher, and Catherine Shea. The objects of the institution, as given in the act, are the support and maintenance of foundlings and infant orphan and half-orphan children, and also to provide for deserving indigent and unprotected females during their confinement in childbirth. The corporation is empowered to hold real and personal property to a value not exceeding $100,000; "children are committed to its charge as fully and completely, to all intents and purposes, as if they were regularly indentured and bound apprentices of the institution, until they shall attain the age, if males, of 21 years, and if females, 15 years, or for any shorter period that may be agreed upon; and to the corporation is given the power to bind out children as apprentices, to learn any trade or business or to learn to be useful in housekeeping." The corporation is not restricted in the exercise of their powers in binding and placing out in the District of Columbia; and Congress reserved the right to alter, amend, or repeal the act.

In 1867 there were 40 children receiving the protection of the charity; and the Asylum was at that time entirely dependent upon the liberality of the public for its support. A lying-in department was attached to the institution, Dr. W. G. H. Newmann being the attending physi cian, and Drs. B. Magruder, N. S. Lincoln, and J. Eliot the consulting physicians.

The cost of the land occupied was $24,000, and the value of the buildings is about $100,000. The present rules of the institution limit

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WASHINGTON HOSPITAL FOR FOUNDLINGS.

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the age of children at the time of reception to 6 years. Foundlings left in baskets on the doorstep or elsewhere, or found by the police and brought to St. Ann's Infant Asylum, are received. After the boys reach the age of 6 years a majority of them are sent to farms in the country, and the girls are taught trades.

The number of inmates on January 1, 1897, was 125, of whom 110 were admitted during the year 1896. The number of children placed in free homes during the year was 11, and the number restored to parents and relatives, 50; the number of deaths was 64. All but 8 of the children were residents of the District of Columbia. The income from Congressional appropriations during 1896 was $5,400, and from private gifts $1,749.29. There was also a legacy of $3,398.71 received. The institution receives colored as well as white children. In 1877 the institution received its first appropriation from the Government, and from that year to the present time it has been receiving an appropriation from Congress. From 1877 to 1887 the appropriation was $5,000, after which it received $6,000 until 1891, when the amount was raised to $6,500. In 1872 it received $7,079; in 1893, $6,500; in 1894, $3,840; in 1895, $5,400. The annual expenses are from $12,000 to $15,000.

There is a medical staff connected with the institution, the medical board filling vacancies as they occur. In case homes have not been found for children who have arrived at the age of 6 years, they are sent to St. Joseph's or St. Vincent's Orphan Asylum, where they continue until the age of 15 years. They are then sent to homes in the country, if such homes can be found. If the girls show an aptitude for needlework, they are sent to St. Rose's Industrial School. The president of the institution is Sister Elizabeth Relihan.

II.

The Washington Hospital for Foundlings exists by virtue of the act of April 22, 1870, the incorporators being G. W. Samson, Gen. O. O. Howard, Z. D. Gilman, William Stickney, A. C. Richards, B. Sunderland, A. N. Zevely, Wright Rives, Dr. James C. Hall, David K. Cartter, William B. Todd, jr., D. W. Middleton, George L. Sheriff, B. B. French, Joseph S. Stettinius, and John R. Arison. The control of the hospital was intrusted to a board of ten directors, to be made up of the first seven above-mentioned incorporators and three others, to be selected by the corporation. The object, as stated, was to found in the city of Washington a hospital for the reception and support of destitute and friendless children. The foundlings received were to be wholly under the guardianship, care, and control of the institution, to be educated, apprenticed, and otherwise disposed of until they reached the age of 18 years, when the care and control was to cease. The property, both real and personal, of the hospital was made exempt from taxation, and Congress reserved the right to alter, amend, or repeal the act.

The hospital was founded to carry into effect the bequest contained