THE better to explain and illustrate my ideas and views on the important subject of Classification, I shall, in the first instance, give a brief description of the present plans, arrangement, and manner of proceeding, in my own establishment. Fair Mead House, Leopard’s Hill Lodge, and Springfield, with appendages to each, constitute my present establishment at High Beach; and I wish to have it most distinctly and most fully understood, that they are simply for classification, of a more general or more specific nature; and consequently, besides the advantages derived from having three houses, I have (as far as I could) made arrangements in each for this purpose. Leopard’s Hill Lodge, where I have more especially made arrangements for the purpose of classification, consists of a front, or what may be called the family portion of the house, and galleries behind, with appropriate rooms for patients requiring more restraint. To show that these houses are merely for the purposes of classification, I may mention, that there is no sort of difference in the three houses, excepting that in the one generally and latterly inhabited by ourselves, we prefer having those to whom our individual and more immediate attention may be useful. The same patients are even sometimes at one house, and sometimes at another, according to their state; and sometimes for the mere purpose of change. In fact, the greater part of our first class of patients have been occasionally at Leopard’s Hill, and this with the knowledge and approval of their friends. As I have published some hints on this point, and addressed them to the Commissioners in Lunacy, I may be permitted, in order to show I have long entertained the same views, to quote two or three passages. I there state, “that two establishments on the same grounds should be allowed and encouraged for the purpose of Classification. My reason for this alteration, in the Act relative to such places, is, that large and crowded houses are decidedly objectionable, from the greater chance of noise and disturbance, from their being less healthy, and from their assuming more of a prison-like appearance, than of a family mansion. With two, we can adopt a better and more complete method of classification; and it is a consideration of very great importance, that in one of them the proprietor and his family should reside, and devote themselves to recent, partial, slight, or convalescent cases.” As I conceive this plan of two establishments for the purposes of classification, to be of the highest importance, and essential to the moral regulation, as well as to the cure of the insane, so far from avoiding any investigation of either the principle of their adoption, or their mode of management, I wish the most exact knowledge to be obtained of the one, and invite the fullest scrutiny of the other.