DUMB AND DEAF. 



191 



Dumb and already contains 33 pupils, and yet we are persuaded 

 Deaf. that its advantages only require to be more generally 



<W "V*' known in this part of the island, to secure to it still 

 more of the public favour than it has already enjoyed. 

 We can speak from our own observation, as to the jus- 

 tice done this institution by the teacher Mr Kinniburgh, 

 who is a person in every respect well qualified for the 

 important and laborious duties of his situation. 



History of We shall conclude this article with a few historical 

 Education remarks. 



of Deaf and jf the authorities to whom we have found reference, 

 relative to this point, be correct, a Spanish Benedictine 

 monk, of the convent of Sahagun in Spain, named Pe- 

 dro de Ponce, who died in 1584, is the first person 

 who is recorded to have instructed the Deaf and Dumb, 

 and taught them to speak. Ambrosio Morales, the con- 

 temporary and friend of this Pedro de Ponce, in a work 

 on the Antiquities of Spain, which seems to have been 

 Pedro Oe written about 1583, speaks of him thus: " Pedro de 

 \ Ponce, the Ponce has taught the Deaf and Dumb to speak with 

 first who singular perfection. He is the inventor of that art. He 

 lias already taught, in this manner, two brothers and a 

 sister of the Constable ; and is at present occupied in 

 instructing a son of the Governor of Arragon, who, like 

 the preceding, has been Deaf and Dumb from birth. 

 What is most surprising in this art, is, that his pupils, 

 notwithstanding their deafness, speak, write, and rea- 

 son very well. I have a paper belonging to one of 

 them, Don 1'edro de Velasco, the brother of the Con- 

 stable, in which he tells me, that it is to Father Ponce 

 he is indebted for being able to speak." ( Quoted by 

 Don Emmanuel Pftutc; de Taboada, in a note to p. 

 xxxviii. of Pref. to Anatomie el Physiologic dit Systeme 

 Ncrveux en General, par F. J. Gall et G. Spurzheim, vol. 

 i. 4to, Paris 1810.) Valles, also a contemporary and 

 friend of De Ponce's, in a work entitled, De Sacra Phi- 

 losophia, published about 158S, has this expression re- 

 specting him : " Petrus Pontius, Monachus Sancti Be- 

 nedicti, amicus meus, qui, res mirabilis ! natos surdos 

 docebat loqui." In confirmation of these testimonies, 

 Don Emmanuel Nunez, a Spaniard, mentions that, he 

 has read in the register of deaths of the Benedictine 

 Convent of San Salvador de Ona, where Pedro de 

 Ponce passed the greater part of his life, the following 

 note: " Obdormivit in domino, frater Petrus de Ponce, 

 hujus domus benefactor, qui. inter ceteras virtutes, quae 

 in illo majtime fuerunt, in hac praecipue floruit, ac cele- 

 berrimus toto urbe fuit habitus, scilicet, MUTOS LOQUI 

 DOCBNIM. Obiit anno 1584 mense Augusto." (H'ork 

 rjiio/rd alirivr, p. xl.) The same person states, too, that 

 other Spanish authors, such as Le]>ez and Castaniza, 

 some of them contemporaries of De Ponce's, also speak 

 of him in the highest terms, and assure us that he not 

 only taught his pupils to speak, but instructed them in 

 every science which it is possible to teach to those who 

 enjoy all the senses. 



..iby In the anonymous translation into English of the 



Bvr.ntt. Abbe de 1'Epee's Melhod of Educating the Deaf and 

 Dumb,' (8vo. London, 1801,) the translator, in a pre- 

 face, makes the following rciiKirk : " Of'former instruc- 

 tor- , he who seems to. have obtained greatest notice was 

 Bonct, a priest, Secretary to the Constable of Castile, 

 Whose younger brother had lost the sense of hearing 

 when two years old. The difficulty of procuring in- 

 rtrurtion for him creating much distress in the family, 

 Bonet, qualified for the province of tuition by great 

 knowledge and uncommon learning, undertook the 

 care of his education ; in which he succeeded beyond 



every hope. The system which he formed on the oc- Bumb and 

 casion was printed at Madrid in 1620, under the title ^?' a ^_ f . 

 of Reduction de las Lelras, y Arte para ensenar a hablar """Y""" 

 los Mudos, dedicated to Philip III. and accompa- 

 nied, according to the custom of the age, with encomi- 

 ums in verse and prose, from poets and philosophers. 

 The author is said to have been afterwards in the ser- 

 vice of the Prince of Carignan, and to have continued 

 many years to teach persons to whom the misfortune of 

 Deafness made his lessons needful." 



Nunez, however, to whom we have already referred, 

 maintains, that Juan Paulo Bonnet must have derived 

 his knowledge and his method regarding this subject, 

 entirely from De Ponce ; for Bonnet was secretary to 

 the Constable at the very time De Ponce was employ- 

 ed in teaching the Constable's two brothers and sister. 

 (Work quoted above, p. xli. ) 



There is, therefore, some obscurity connected with 

 the history of this' work, which it will not now, per- 

 haps, be easy to remove. We have neither seen the 

 Treatise itself, nor any account of its contents ; but we 

 presume it has considerable merit, as we observe that it 

 was much consulted by De 1'Epee, when he first began 

 to teach his pupils to speak. 



The translator of De 1'Epee's Method, mentions a Dr Bulwer's 

 treatise as having been published by Dr John Bulwer, Treatise. 

 an English physician, in 1648, entitled, Philocophus, 

 or the Deaf and Dumb Man's Friend. We have not 

 seen this work either; but we believe we can form some 

 idea of its value, from two other short publications by 

 the same author, which appeared in 1644, the one enti- 

 tled C/iirolngia, or the Natural Language of Hie Hand, 

 and the other, Chironmnia, or the Art of Manual lihelo- 

 rique; in neither of which are there even absurdities suf- 

 ficient to reward their perusal. We presume it is the 

 same Bulwer who wrote a curious book, entitled, An- 

 t/iro/iomorp/iosis; in which he treats of the various shapes 

 and dresses, which men have assumed in the different, 

 ages of the world. 



In 1653, a work of great labour appeared by Dr Dr Wallis's 

 Wallis, entitled Grammatica Lingual Anglicance ; and to Writings 

 this was prefixed, by the same author, a treatise of con- " ml Fiac- 

 siderable acuteness and originality, De Loqucla, sive de tlce " 

 Sonortim omnium lo<inetarium formalinne. In conse- 

 quence of these investigations, his attention seems to 

 have been directed to the subject of the education of 

 the Deaf and Dumb. A very interesting letter of his 

 to Mr Boyle, dated from Oxford, March 1 66'2, is in- 

 serted in the Philosophical Transactions for July 

 1670 ; wherein he informs Mr Boyle of his having just 

 entered on the task of endeavouring to teach a person 

 to speak and to understand a language, who had lost 

 his hearing, and consequently his speech, when about 

 five years old. He states the considerations which in- 

 duced him to attempt this work, and the manner in 

 which he proposes to conduct it ; and nothing can be 

 more sound or judicious than all his remarks on this 

 subject. " The task itself," says he, " consists of two 

 very different parts ; each of which doth render the 

 other more difficult : for, beside that which appears up- 

 on the first view, to teach a person who cannot hear, to 

 pronounce the sound of words, there is that other, of 

 teaching him to understand a language, and know the 

 signification of those words, whether spoken or writ- 

 ten, whereby he may both express his own sense, and 

 understand the thoughts of others : without which lat- 

 ter, that former were only to speak like a parrot, or to 

 write like a scrivener, who, understanding no language 

 but English, transcribes a piece of Latin, Welch, or 



