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THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.— SUPPLEMENT. 



says at first? But, it will be said, "even if this 

 be so, hearing children can understand all that 

 is said to them, and that is what deaf ones never 

 can." Really! Can hearing children understand 

 all that is said to them ? Then why do mothers 

 and nurses say the same thing, over and over 

 again, a hundred times ? And when the hearing 

 child can imitate what is said to it, does it there- 

 fore know the meaning? Does it know what 

 "papa" or "mamma" means, because it can say 

 the words ? Of course not. 



The objects must be shown with the words 

 spoken, and shown ove'r and over again, too, 

 before the hearing child can connect the object 

 with the spoken word ; and so — exactly so — is 

 it with the deaf child ; you do not let it go on 

 talking its own language; but, just as with the 

 hearing, you educate it to repeat certain sounds 

 after you, and to connect those sounds (spoken 

 words) with certain objects — only with the deaf 

 you cannot teach through the ear, and so must 

 through the eye. It is all by imitation, as with 

 the hearihg child ; it does not " come natural," 

 as unthinking people so often say, either to the 

 hearing or to the deaf. 



Now let us contract the effect of these sys- 

 tems on the after-life of those educated thereon. 

 We will take the "French " system first, as that 

 best known in this country. I have said over 

 and over again, and here repeat, that if the ob- 

 ject of the education of the deaf were to fit 

 them to live in large asylums and comfortable 

 institutions, they should by all means be educat- 

 ed on the " French " system. It is the easiest 

 and pleasantest to the pupils, so long as they 

 are together or with their teachers. But we 

 know well that institution-life can be but the 

 lot of very few. Almost all have, before long, 

 to leave what has to them become a happy home, 

 where every one understands and uses the lan- 

 guage of signs, and to take their place in the 

 world and earn their daily bread. Here they 

 scarcely meet with any one able to use the lan- 

 guage of signs, and very, very few who know the 

 finger-alphabet. But it may be said, " They 

 have writing." Yes, but what does this amount 

 to? 



However much knowledge or education may 

 be justly claimed for the deaf-mute instructed 

 upon the " French " system of signs, still such 

 knowledge is to hearing persons in a great 

 measure a sealed book, by reason of the want of 

 a proper communication between the two classes ; 

 the deaf-mute, in consequence of the peculiar na- 

 ture of his instruction, which gives him language 



in an inverted order, has a difficulty in making 

 himself understood by writing, and in compre- 

 hending the writing of ordinary hearing persons. 

 His own knowledge of language is very imper- 

 fect, and few of those with whom he daily as- 

 sociates are sufficiently educated to read or 

 write with comfort, and many, we know, cannot 

 do so at all. 



Now let us pass to the " Combined " method. 

 This is the system that Gallaudet, the first teach- 

 er of the deaf in America, found in this country, 

 and erroneously supposed to be the " German " 

 method. He took this for granted, because ar- 

 ticulation was taught. He failed to appreciate, 

 as so many do now, the cardinal difference of 

 these systems. It is this, that under the " Com- 

 bined " method a system of signs is the basis of 

 instruction, articulation being only an accom- 

 plishment, just as modern languages were taught 

 in our old public schools, with the result we all 

 know : the thing was looked upon by the boys as 

 a " bore," and the knowledge (or rather want of 

 knowledge) of these languages so gained, and the 

 little use they were in after-life, have passed into 

 a by-word. 



Those thus taught never feel at home in 

 speaking, find great difficulty in making them- 

 selves understood, and so soon cease to con- 

 tinue the attempt. So it is with those taught 

 on the " Combined " method. Articulation is to 

 them a " bore ; " they find people outside their 

 schools unable to understand them, and so they, 

 too, soon cease to make the attempt. 



Thus articulation is brought into discredit, 

 not by its being in any way unsuited to the deaf, 

 but because it has been treated as an accom- 

 plishment. 



Indeed, the case of those thus educated 

 practically differs but little from those under 

 the " French " system, but that little is not in 

 favor of the " Combined " method. In examin- 

 ing the pupils taught on this system, we find 

 them the least educated, and the reason was 

 not far to seek ; for the pupils so taught were 

 taken away from the rest to learn articulation, 

 it may be half an hour a day, more or less. 

 What were the constant remarks of the teach- 

 ers ? Why, that " the articulation-pupils were 

 behind the others." And no wonder; for what- 

 ever takes the pupil away from his companions 

 regularly for ever so short a time, be it articu- 

 lation, drawing, Latin, or any other thing foreign 

 to the ordinary work of his class, must have 

 the effect of making him show to disadvantage 

 with his classmates, whose attention and time 



