11

H.—4

Cost of Maintenance. The total expenditure on the management and maintenance of the insane during the year 1878 was, as shown in Table XII., £35,267 4s. Gid., which is £509 Bs. 101-d- more thau it was in the previous year. From this has to be deducted £2,050 19s. 2d. paid into the Treasury on account of private patients and a certain amount of asylum produce sold ; so that the actual cost to the Government was £32,568 ss. 4id. The average cost per head, exclusive of general expenses, was less by £118s. 9Jd. than that of the preceding year, being £33 Is. 5Jd. per annum, or 12s. Bad. a week, which is less than that in the asylums of Victoria in 1877, where it was 13s. 6-; ld., aud in those of Now South Wales, where it was 12s. 9id., as stated in the Inspectors' reports for that year. Taken for tho financial year, the total expenditure was £33,903 55., or £2,298 15s. 6d. within the vote. 1 have, &c, Fred. W. A. Skae. The Hon. the Colonial Secretary, Wellington. Inspector, Lunatic Asylums.