attained to as high a position as those endowed with vision.

In this respect they greatly surpass the deaf-mutes, who, though attaining in many instances to a respectable mediocrity of talent, have never yet, owing, no doubt, mainly to the circuitous methods by which they are compelled to acquire and to express their ideas, achieved any remarkable distinction in science or art.

But if the intellectual attainments of the blind are superior those of the deaf-mutes, the latter have very greatly the advantage of the former, in their ability to maintain themselves by physical labor. In most manual labors the deaf-mute is fully as competent as the workman endowed with all his faculties; he can be taught readily to manage intricate machinery, to avail himself of steam power, and to engage in any employment which requires these aids. The blind is deprived of all these advantages, the labor of his hands, unaided by any machinery which is not completely under his control, must be in all but a few exceptional cases his sole dependence for a livelihood. But we will, for the present, wave the consideration of this part of our subject.

The idea of the general instruction of the blind seems never to have been entertained in ancient times. It did not occur even to the Christian philanthropy of the early Church. It is stated by Father Charlevoix that the Japanese, availing themselves of the retentive memories of the blind, have employed them as the repositories of their traditional records, but modern visitors to that empire give no account of any establishment for their instruction.

In 1260 Louis XI. of France, better known as Saint Louis, founded in Paris the Hospital de Quinze-Vingts for the benefit of his soldiers, who, in the campaigns in Egypt, had suffered severely from ophthalmia. This hospital, as its name implies, was intended for fifteen score (three hundred) blind persons, though for many years past the number of inmates has been about four hundred.

This institution is under the care of the government. To obtain admission, it is necessary that the applicants be blind and indigent. They are admitted from all parts of France, are lodged in the Hospital, and receive a sum equivalent to about twenty-five cents a day for their

food and clothing. No instruction is afforded them.

The attention of thoughtful and benevolent men was occasionally turned, during the seventeenth century, to the sad fate of the blind, and attempts were made to devise processes which would enable them, to read, but with no great success. After unsuccessful efforts at printing in intaglio, that is, with the letters depressed below the surface, the idea of raised letters was suggested; at first these were carved in wood and made to slide in grooves on a board. These proving inconvenient, Pierre Moreau, in 1640, attempted to cast letters in lead in a more convenient form, but failed, from some cause, to complete his plan. In 1670 the Padre Lana-Terzi, whose benevolent efforts in behalf of the deafmute we have already recorded, published an essay on the instruction of the blind. Nearly a century later the Abbé Deschamps and Diderot, the associate of D'Alembert in the Encyclopedia, proposed plans for their instruction in reading and writing. About 1780 Weissembourg, a blind man born at Mannheim, published geographical maps in relief.

Still there was wanting some noble philanthropic man who, like the Abbé de l'Epée in the case of the deaf-mute, should gather the fragmentary hints and suggestions of the past, organize a system of instruction, and devote himself to the work of enlightening the blind, and, as God has wisely ordered, the man for the time is always raised up when his work is ready for him.

In 1745 a poor weaver of St. Just, a village in Picardy, named Haüy, already the father of one son, clasped to his bosom a second, on whom, as being born on St. Valentine's day, he bestowed the name of Valentin. The good man was very poor, but as the monks of a neighboring convent had offered to provide for his eldest son and bring him up to the priesthood, he resolved to give Valentin what education his limited means afforded. This, in the obscure village of St. Just, was very little, but that little was acquired with an eagerness which betokened his future success. At a happy hour for himself, probably through the kind influence of the monks, who had already aided his brother, he was transferred to one of the colleges at Paris, where he soon distinguished himself by his attainments in classical studies and by his

elegant chirography. His course of study being completed, he received an appointment in the bureau of Foreign Affairs, where for some years he devoted himself to the translation of foreign official papers. While thus occupying his leisure moments, the attention of Haüy was attracted to another class of unfortunates by a little incident, which will perhaps be best related in his own words.

"A singular occurrence drew together, at the entrance of a house of refreshment on one of our public promenades, the largest crowd I had seen for many years. Eight or ten blind men, with spectacles on nose, were ranged along behind a desk, on which was placed their music, and each, instrument in hand, played his part in a discordant symphony, which seemed to give great amusement to the by-standers. An entirely different sentiment penetrated my heart, and I conceived instantly the possibility

of realizing, for the benefit of these unfortunates, that knowledge of which they now made only a ridiculous pretense. Do not the blind, I said to myself, know objects by the diversity of their forms? Do they not understand the value of a piece of money? Why could they not distinguish a fâ from a sól, or an a from an f, if these characters were made palpable to the touch ?"

Deeply impressed with this thought, Hauy applied himself at once to the experiment of instructing a blind person. His first pupil was a young man named Lesueur, about seventeen years of age, whom he had observed begging at the gate of one | of the churches. Attracted by the ingenuons and intelligent expression of his countenance, Haüy had made his acquaintance and offered to teach him. Lesueur was very willing to be taught, but himself and a large family were dependent upon the sums he received in charity for their support. To obviate this difficulty, Haüy paid him from his own purse a sum equal to that he had daily averaged, and commenced his instruction.

This was in 1784, and his first instruction in reading seems to have been made with movable types, with a raised letter on each end, the invention of Weissembourg, whose pupil, Mademoiselle Paradis, was at that time in Paris, and attracting much attention by her admirable musical performances. She rendered much assistance to Hauy in his first efforts at instruction.

Success speedily crowned his efforts; at the end of six months Lesueur could read readily and calculate rapidly by means of the types; he had also acquired some

knowledge of geography and music. The friends of Haüy became interested in the result, and soon after he was invited to appear with his pupil before the Academy of Sciences and Arts, and explain the processes by which he had attained these results. The examination was interesting and satisfactory to all concerned, and Haüy found himself encouraged to extend his instruction to other blind children.

Soon after the report of the commission appointed by the Academy of Arts and Sciences, which was made in the beginning of 1785, the Philanthropic Society took his enterprise under their patronage, and provided for the support and instruction

of fourteen blind children.

It was probably owing to the difficulty of instructing a number of children at the same time, by means of the movable types, that Haüy was led to seek for some method by which books might be so printed that the blind might read them. Here, too, accident seems to have directed to the best method of accomplishing the object. His first pupil, Lesueur, was one day seeking with his fingers for something on Haüy's desk. While thus engaged he took up a note of invitation to a funeral; it had been very strongly impressed by the type, and on passing his fingers over the back of the sheet, Lesueur detected an o; Haüy observed this, and making letters on a sheet of paper with a pointed stick, he reversed the sheet, and gave it to his pupil, who read them at once. Here was a discovery of which Haüy was not slow to avail himself. He immediately commenced printing sheets and books for the blind, using first the Illyrian letter, which, from its sharp angles, is more easily read than the common letter, to which, however, for some reason, he subsequently returned.

The next year (1786) Haüy had introduced the study of music, instrumental and vocal, into his school, as well as some branches of manual labor. On the 26th of December of that year he brought his pupils, now twenty-four in number, to perform their exercises before the king and royal family at Versailles. These exercises consisted of musical performances, instrumental and vocal, in which twelve of the pupils participated, spinning, lace-work, modeling in wax, and brief recitations in reading, writing, geography, history, the use of maps, etc.

Thus fairly established, and enjoying

the sympathy of the people and the protection of the monarch, the School for Blind Youth went on prospering for several years; its pupils increased, its course of study was extended, the proficiency of its pupils in music was such, that his orchestra was in frequent request to perform masses at the great churches of Paris, and some of these pupils in after years took rank among the most celebrated musical performers of their time.

This period of prosperity continued till 1791, when the Revolution being fairly inaugurated, and the Philanthropic Society, the original patron of the school for the blind, broken up by the banishment or voluntary exile of many of its members, among whom were some of the best men in France, the school was taken under the patronage of the state. On the 21st of July, 1791, the National Assembly devoted to the use of the schools for the instruction of the deaf-mutes and the blind the buildings previously occupied by the Celestin's Convent, appropriated an annual sum for the support of each, and, by special decrees in September following, provided for their organization.

Steps were immediately taken for the organization of the school for the blind in accordance with the decrees of the National Assembly, but before this was accomplished, the National Assembly had given place to a Legislative Assembly, whose views did not coincide with those of its predecessor. They, however, voted a sum of money for its support, but, amid the confusion and anarchy which prevailed during the reign of terror, these appropriations were paid only in assignats, whose value was very much depreciated. Want stared the institution in the face. Haüy devoted freely his own little means for the support of his children, as he called them, and these proving insufficient, he himself and his pupils employed much of their time in the severest manual labor for their sustenance. In the time of prosperity he had purchased an ordinary printing press and type in order to print some works relative to the blind, for circulation. This press now became, with the assistance of Lesueur, a means of contributing to their support. The hand-bills, placards, circulars, and tracts which were scattered so abundantly at this period were many of them printed at this press.

Whenever opportunities offered for the

employment of his orchestra, Haüy at once availed himself of them, but the churches, hitherto his most liberal patrons, were all closed, and the infuriated multitude were generally too much crazed by their thirst for blood for any song except such as might accompany a bacchanal revel.

Meantime, a large part of the buildings which had been devoted to their use, were occupied by the government in the fabrication of the munitions of war. Amid the physical and moral dangers to which they were thus exposed, Haüy and his pupils managed to maintain a precarious existence, ever hoping for something better in the future.

Toward the close of the year 1794, the school was removed to the convent of St. Catherine, but without any increase of its resources, and for nearly a year the pupils were compelled to suspend their manual labor from the want of means to purchase material.

On the 28th of July, 1795, the Convention passed a law reconstituting the institution, and giving it rather the character of a workshop than of a school. Eightysix scholarships were created, (one for each department of France,) and a sum allowed for each which, if paid in specie, might have served for the support of the institution in connection with the labor of the pupils; but it was paid as before in assignats, and these were almost valueless. Haüy and his pupils, however, struggled on yet hopeful, though at times on the very verge of starvation. In 1797, one of the pupils, afterward widely known as the blind poet, Avisse, addressed a poetical letter to the minister of instruction, in which, referring to an occasion when, a fête being given to one of the generals of the republic, he had invited the pupils of the institution to sup at his house, he demands for himself and his fellow-pupils that he should either cause their monthly appropriations to be paid in money, or invite them daily to sup with him.

This appeal brought some relief. The circumstances of the institution began gradually to improve, and, at the commencement of the present century, they were looking forward to a brighter period. But they were destined to another reverse. The directory had taken the place of the consular government, and on the 27th of October, 1800, issued two decrees, which

united in one establishment under the title of blind of the first class and blind of the second class, the inmates of the Hospital des Quinze-Vingts, and the pupils of the Institute for Blind Youth. Two hours a day were to be devoted to study, the remainder to labor in a manufactory of cloths to be established on or near the premises. In their intervals of leisure the pupils were to be thrown into the society of the inmates of the hospital, all of whom were living in indolence, and many of whom were vicious. The removal and organization under the new plan was not completed till some time in 1801.

This was to Haüy almost a death-blow. For seventeen years he had labored with all the assiduity of a parent for his offspring, for these poor children of misfortune. With them and for them he had borne with hunger and want; had subsisted for a time even on a single meal a day that they might not suffer for want of food; and that now, when the skies were brightening, they should be thrust into the society of the ignorant, indolent, and vicious, and deprived of the opportunities of instruction they had hitherto enjoyed, was more than he could bear. At the commencement of 1802 he resigned his post. The government soon after passed a decree suppressing the office of first instructor of the blind of the second class to which it had appointed Haüy, and allowed him a pension of four hundred dollars per annum!

It is greatly to the honor of this noble philanthropist that he did not sink under the discouragements which surrounded him. He opened a few months later a private institution for the blind under the title of Musée des Aveugles, which, during the three years in which it was maintained, educated several distinguished | pupils; but the income of the institution was not sufficient for its maintenance, and, in 1806, he accepted the urgent invitation of the Russian Government, and organized at St. Petersburgh an institution for the blind, under the patronage of the imperial family, over which he presided with ability for some years.

Meanwhile, the Institution for the Blind in its new quarters was going on from bad to worse. M. Bertrand, who had succeeded Hauy as its director, was ignorant, indolent, and incapable. Of the subordinate teachers, two only were possessed

of much ability. Music was the only subject taught with any care, and, despite the disadvantages under which they labored, this gloomy period produced several very eminent musicians; but those who possessed no particular taste for music were, after the failure of the manufactory in 1805, left in idleness and under the pernicious influence of constant association with the old inmates of the hospital.

Among the few pupils whose brilliant career illumined the darkness of this mournful period, two are especially worthy of notice. Penjon, who had been a pupil of Haüy for four years before his resignation, and had at that time given evidence of the possession of mathematical powers of the very highest order, continued under every disadvantage to pursue his studies, mostly, however, in other institutions than that with which he was connected, till having made himself master of the entire course of mathematical study in the University of France, he applied for and obtained, at the age of twenty-eight years, the appointment of mathematical professor at the College of Angers, which he filled with distinguished ability for thirty years. Gailliod, who had been a pupil of Haüy from 1788, and who at the time of his resignation was already distinguished as a musician, had taken charge of the orchestra at the hospital, and it was owing to his zealous and incessant efforts that this department of instruction maintained something of its old reputation. Gailliod became celebrated not less as a composer than as a skillful performer. In 1814 M. Bertrand, the inefficient director, died, and was immediately succeeded by Dr. Guillié, an active, enterprising man, possessed of considerable tact and ability for display, but jealous and vain in the extreme.

He seemed possessed by the most malignant spirit of jealousy of Haüy, who had now returned to Paris to spend the evening of his days. He refused him admission to the institute after its removal to its new location; forbade the mention of his name; attributed the founding of the institute to Louis XVI.; and even published a history of the institution, in which he makes not the slightest reference to its real founder.

In pursuance of his plans for display, he established public sessions of the insti

tute weekly. At these sessions the performances in instrumental and vocal music were of brilliant pieces, which the pupils by dint of practice had learned by the ear, for very few if any of the new pupils were taught to read music readily; pieces composed by the assistants, who had been taught by previous instructors, were exhibited as the productions of the pupils. Classes in Latin, Greek, English, Spanish, and Italian were called upon to read and translate from the works of the most eminent writers in these languages, but while the visitor was supplied with the true text, the pupil had his exercise (printed in the raised letter) arranged in the French order of construction, and accompanied by an interlinear translation. The wonderful products of the workshops were exhibited, and elicited, great commendation; but it was almost invariably the case that they had either been purchased in the market the day before, or were the work of some of the blind assistants who had been for many years connected with the institution.

Dr. Guillié announced with great pomp, soon after assuming the office of director, that he had modified the raised letters so as to make them much more available in printing for the blind; the blind themselves complained that his type were not so easily read as Haüy's. However this may be, during his administration the press of the institute was kept in constant activity. We have already alluded to some of the classical works. He also published English, Latin, Greek, Spanish, and Italian grammars, all of large size, and which were of more service in the reports and public announcements of the director than in the hands of his pupils. He issued editions of classical works in all the languages we have named, both prose and poetry, but all with no text except that arranged in the French order of construction, and accompanied by interlinear translations.

It is to be hoped that the blind acquired some ideas from these works; they could hardly have attained to much knowledge of the style of the authors. He printed also several religious works and a treatise on geography. Meantime, with all these classical treasures, the institute did not possess a treatise on arithmetic or history, even of the simplest and most elementary description.

This system of deception could not last. The wrong done to Haüy and some of his pupils had raised up too many enemies to the director. Accordingly, we find that in 1820 a commission was appointed by the government to investigate the condition of the institute. They examined everything very carefully, and reported that they found everywhere evidences of falsehood and quackery. They exposed with an unsparing hand the artifices of Dr. Guillié, and drew up a plan of instruction, which should be at the same time thorough and advantageous to the blind. Unable to endure the scorn which followed these revelations, Dr. Guillié resigned in February, 1821, and Dr. Pignier was installed as his successor the same month.

The appointment was, in many respects, an unfortunate one. Dr. Pignier was not only entirely unacquainted with the special methods of instructing the blind, but he had never had any experience in teaching. Educated by the Romish clergy, he regarded their system of education as a perfect model, and endeavored as far as possible to conform the institute to it. During his administration the press of the institute printed little except histories of saints, masses, matins, and vespers, and other works adapted to instruction in the Roman Catholic faith.

In the early years of his administration he had to contend with the difficulties of an empty treasury and the malicious misrepresentations of Dr. Guillié, whose hatred was of the most intense character. Dr. Pignier was a modest and good man, but the situation was one in which he should never have been placed.

We cannot forbear, however, expressing our approval of one of the earliest acts of his administration. On the 22d of August, 1821, he gave a public concert in the name of the institute in honor of Valentin Haüy; and his pupils, in songs and choruses, composed for the occasion, expressed their gratitude to their early benefactor. Haüy, then seventy-six years of age, and weighed down with disease, was completely overcome by this demonstration of their affection. Unable to speak, his happiness expressed itself by his tears. It was his last appearance in public. On the 18th of March, 1822, he died at the residence of his brother, the Abbé Haüy. A marble tablet was erected in the institute to his memory.