In the “Journal of Mental Science” for April, 1876, a short account appeared of the present state of the Irish Lunatic Asylum Service and the action then being taken by Irish Medical Superintendents to obtain a more secure footing under Government, by ranking as Civil Servants. In order to gain this object, it would be necessary that the Executive should become their paymasters, and that their salaries, instead of coming from the rates, should be paid by the Treasury. Once secure of their position as Civil Servants, the rest would follow; their services would reckon, no matter how often changed from one asylum to another; they would no longer hold the anomalous position of men appointed by Government, responsible to central authority but paid by the ratepayers and as Civil Servants they would come under the Superannuation Act of 1859. Above all, they would become more closely connected with the Government, and obtain greater support and assistance in their official duties and in their attempts to further the study of mental disease in Ireland.