CIRCULAR,!        SURGEON GENERAL'S OFFICE,
   NTo. 11.    i"        f   Washington City, D. O, Sept. 16, 1862.

   The  Military Hospitals will be open to the authorized agents of
 Soldiers' Relief Associations, and  other  Aid Societies, from twelve
 o'clock m. to six o:clock  p. m., daily; and to the friends  of patients
 and other visitors, if, in the judgment of the surgeons in charge, their
 visits Avill not bo prejudicial to the welfare of the sick.

   Medical  officers in charge of general hospitals are directed to examine
 carefully each provision leturn, comparing the same with the amount
 of subsistence stores on hand, and  the number in hospital;  they will
 expend  the hospital fund as it accrues, for the beuefit of the  sick, and
 especially  in  increasing  the variety  and improving the quality of
 their diet.

  It is believed that many of the complaints re. pectingthe insufficiency
 of food  are due to a mistaken zeal on the part of some medical officers
for the accumulation of a large hospital fund.

                                WILLIAM  A.  HAMMOND.
                                         Surgeon General U. S. A. 
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