DESCRIPTIONS OF INTERIOR.

75

ing commentary on the past and present appearance of an asylum gallery.

In a poem bearing the title of "Bedlam," and dated 1776, the writer, after bestowing praise on the building, adds:

"Far other views than these within appear,
And Woe and Horror dwell for ever here;
For ever from the echoing roofs rebounds
A dreadful Din of heterogeneous sounds:
From this, from that, from every quarter rise
Loud shouts, and sullen groans, and doleful cries;

*

Within the chambers which this Dome contains,
In all her 'frantic' forms, Distraction reigns:

Rattling his chains, the wretch all raving lies,

And roars and foams, and Earth and Heaven defies."

Ned Ward, in his "London Spy," gives a graphic account of his visit with a friend to Bedlam :-" "Thus," he says, "we prattled away our time, till we came in sight of a noble pile of buildings, which diverted us from our former discourse, and gave my friend the occasion of asking me my thoughts of this magnificent edifice. I told him I conceived it to be my Lord Mayor's palace, for I could not imagine so stately a structure to be designed for any quality inferior; he smiled at my innocent conjecture, and informed me this was Bedlam, an Hospital for mad folks. In truth, said I, I think they were mad that built so costly a college for such a crack-brained society; adding, it was a pity so fine a building should not be possessed by such who had a sense of their happiness: sure, said I; it was a mad age when this was raised, and the chief of the