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Gentlemen ---The twelfth annual report of the institution, of which I have the immediate supervision, is herewith respectfully submitted.

The close of the year finds all connected with the institution, in good health; nor has there been for the year past a single case of sickness among our pupils, requiring a removal to the hospital room. In fact during this whole period very few of the pupils have failed to make their appearance in the dining-rooms at the regular meal times. This exemption from sickness of course materially reduces the care and trouble involved in the management of a family as large and helpless as ours.

We have had on our list of pupils during the past year one hundred and forty-seven. The largest number in the house at any one time was one hundred and forty-one.

These may be classified as to their mode of support in the institution as follows :

Thirteen were full pay pupils. Two paid two-thirds of the actual cost of their board and instruction. Three paid one-half, and one one-third of the cost of board and instruction. The remainder were supported entirely by the State appropriation.

The present annual appropriation to the Asylum was based upon the supposition that the Trustees would be able to provide for one hundred and twenty State pupils and twenty paying pupils. It will be seen by making the proper allowance for the fact that of the nineteen pay-pupils, but thirteen paid the full amount of their cost and maintenance, that the Asylum has really provided for one hundred and twenty-four State pupils.

The entire revenue of the institution applicable to the board and instruction of the pupils for the year was, $20,617. The average per capita cost was, therefore, $147.26. This is exclusive of clothing, but inclusive of all sums expended for repairs, and improvements of building and grounds.

Since the last annual report, fifteen of the pupils have left the Asylum.

One of these from Virginia was removed on account of the war. One was transferred to another similar institution. Two received on trial were dismissed after a short time, not being suitable subjects. In the case of the remaining eleven, the institution had accomplished all that was ever anticipated in its establishment. That is to say, those pupils were either in a condition to be educated still farther at home with ordinary school privileges or were capable of useful occupation under intelligent management and direction, elsewhere.

Four of the above number were females, who left the Asylum not only able to read and write a little, but what was of far more importance they had acquired considerable dexterity in common feminine employments, and were quite capable and willing in the performance of simple household occupations.

The others, males, had received a corresponding amount of education in school, and all of them who were old and strong enough had been taught a variety of farming operations. One of the number is now serving as a volunteer in the army in Virginia.

In the last report to the board, the fact was mentioned that one of our pupils had previously enlisted in the army. I desire to refer briefly to him again in this.

He was some six months in the service, during which time he wrote quite frequently to various members of the family, mentioning the incidents of his camp life, and giving expression to a patriotism that was zealous, if not eminently intelligent. Some six months after his departure he presented himself at the door, having been discharged on account of sickness.

Emaciated by disease, and quite prostrated by the fatiguing journey from Washington, he had barely strength enough to reach the Asylum.

Under the influence of the comforts that we were able to furnish him, he rallied from a state of prostration, and passed quite comfortably through the stages of a typhoid fever. But when we thought him fairly past all danger, he sunk rapidly, and died from the recurrence of a violent hemorrhage from the bowels. When he joined the army, I had cautioned him among other things to be sure and bathe himself frequently, and also to save his money and his health by avoiding the sutler's tent. During the first few days after his return he told me that he had followed my instructions in his camp life, and he entrusted to my charge all the money he had received from the paymaster, with but slight reduction. After his death, on opening the little book in which he had carefully set down the few articles that he had purchased, I found recorded the principal items, towels for bathing. I mention this to show that in the case of one of our pupils there was exhibited a power of self-control and an obedience to suggestions, kindly offered, even when beyond the restraining influences of the institution and amid the extreme temptations of camp life. In this very case the leading consideration in the minds of his friends in sending him to the Asylum, but a few years previous, was that, in connection with the deficiency in his mental powers, there had been a still more marked inability to resist the temptations to evil that life under ordinary circumstances presented. As a pupil here, the policy adopted was not only to furnish him with the means for his intellectual development, and to supply him with such industrial occupations as might draw forth and expend his energies, and give him self-reliance, but it was also sought to extend the scope of his moral perceptions, and thus to fortify his will to resist the various promptings to evil he might encounter. The effort succeeded, as I have described. This leads me to say that a thoughtful consideration of the probabilities, as well as an examination of the actual results, will convince any candid person that there need be no apprehension that the benefits conferred here, in the case of the great body of the pupils, will be limited in their influence by the period of the parties sojourn in the institution. The same fruitlessness might as well be predicated of the common school in relation to pupils of ordinary endowments.