I am optimistic enough to believe that if the physical conditions of each inmate were studied; if his ills were cured and he was made stronger in body, he would be given courage, more ambition and more purpose in life. To this extent pauperism is directly curable. True, there are among the destitute those who are hopelessly marked--branded by heredity; cursed by environment; wrecked by disease; deficient in body and in mind, with little or nothing to work upon. By the same token there are those in other branches of medicine who are hopelessly sick--those who are beyond the reach of the surgeon's knife or the physician's prescription. There are those among the insane who give no ray of hope to the most enthusiastic alienist. But when we progress to the point of classifying our paupers; of studying intelligently the various causes of destitution; of endeavoring to make our almshouses places of cure rather than mere asylums for the victims of poverty, our percentage of "recoveries" will be surprisingly high. [Illustration] The difference in methods between the modern insane hospital and the almshouse is striking. A man is admitted to an institution for the insane in a thoroughly irrational and excitable condition. His case is studied and it is found that he has cerebral syphilis. Proper treatment is instituted and, in all probability, the patient is returned to his family cured and a useful member of society. In another case, syphilis has rendered a man physically inefficient, dissipated and despondent. He drifts to the poorhouse where he is catalogued simply as a "pauper." The chances are that the cause of his pauperism is not detected. If he announces it himself, he may receive the hurried, occasional visit of a contract doctor. Even the drugs that are given him may be crude and impure, bought by contract from the lowest bidder. Little or no provision is made for his intelligent and systematic treatment. He may be drugged with mercury until he is salivated; he may be neglected until his open sores cause him to be housed in the basement away from the other inmates. He is merely a syphilitic pauper and the rough fare of the poorhouse is looked upon as better than he deserves. As a matter of fact, he is a sick man; sick of a curable disease and his cure may restore him to useful citizenship and remove him from the county expense.