205 



BLIND, EDUCATION OF THE. 



BLIND, EDUCATION OF THE. 



20 



aptitude for the exact sciences, even though instructed in a degree 

 at the public expense, will have all the advantages which works like 

 Mr Tavlor's aided by good instructors can confer. It is stated that 

 gome of the pupils of the London School for the Indigent Blind 

 worked a few problems for Mr. Taylor, their examiner, at their 

 examination last Christmas. 



Institutions of a philanthropic tendency have frequently originated 

 with members, individual or collective, of learned societies ; and such 

 societies have lent their assistance and patronage to various efforts for 

 advancing the condition of mankind, raid removing the obstacles to 

 improvement. The attempts of M. Haiiy to systematise a plan for the 

 education of the blind are the first which are deserving of especial 

 notice. His methods were submitted to the Academy of Sciences of 

 Paris, where they received all the encouragement he looked for. The 

 commissioners chosen to report upon the means which he proposed to 

 employ suggested to the Academy not only to bestow its approbation 

 upon M. Hatiy, but also to invite him to publish his methods, and to 

 assure him of their readiness to receive from him an account of his 

 future progress. It appears that many of the plans recommended by 

 Haiiy in his ' Essay on the Education of the Blind,' were not so much 

 hi own inventions as adaptations of the ingenious contrivances of 

 individuals of different ages, and in different countries, who had pre- 

 ceded him in this benevolent work. The celebrity of certain blind 

 individuals, partly the result perhaps of pains-taking teachers, and 

 partly of their own highly gifted minds, had reached the ears of Haiiy. 

 By a happy exercise of benevolence and talent, aided by that enthusiasm 

 without which the greatest labour is ineffectual, he formed the outline 

 of a system of instruction, which required only time, and the modifica- 

 tions which discover themselves in every course of rational teaching, 

 to be brought into successful operation. He wished to make the sense 

 of touch do that for the blind which the Abbe 1 de 1'Epee had made the 

 sense of sight do for the deaf and dumb. He wished to see the fingers 

 of the blind employed in reading written language, and for this purpose 

 he invented the noble art of printing in relief, which will hand down 

 the name of Valentine Haiiy with honour to posterity. Haiiy offered 

 to instruct gratuitously the blind children who were under the care of 

 the Philanthropic Society. He commenced his instructions in 1784, 

 and taught his pupils reading, writing, arithmetic, geography, com- 

 posing types, and printing. In 1786 public exercises were performed 

 by the pupils at Versailles, in the presence of the king ; these exercises 

 excited much astonishment, and there seemed to be little doubt of the 

 stability and success of the undertaking. Large funds were subscribed, 

 and the school was filled with pupils; but the commencement had 

 been made on a scale too extensive for its regular maintenance, the 

 Dth of popular feeling cooled, and as the institution was unsup- 

 ported by government, Haiiy never enjoyed the fruits for which he 

 toiled. His school was not however suffered to fall entirely ; it was 

 taken up by the Constituent Assembly of the Revolution, and has 

 since been supported at the expense of the government. The esta- 

 blishment of which we are speaking is the School for the Young Blind 

 at Paris. 



There are at Paris two celebrated institutions for the blind. The 

 more ancient of these is the Hdpital Boyale des Quinze Vingts, founded 

 by St. Louis in 1260, for the reception of such of his soldiers as had 

 lost their sight in the East. At its first establishment it consisted of 

 Mind and teeing persons, the latter being the conductors of the former. 

 As its name indicates, it receives fifteen, score, or three hundred blind 

 persons. This noble asylum continues, as it was originally placed, 

 under the government of the grand almoner of France. To obtain 

 admission it is necessary that applicants be blind and indigent ; they 

 are admitted from all parts of the kingdom, are lodged in the hospital, 

 and receive twenty-four sous (about a shilling) a day for their food 

 and clothing. No instruction is afforded to the inmates of the Quinze 

 Vingts ; some of them, however, execute works, which, for their inge- 

 nuity, attract and deserve attention. The other Parisian establishment 

 for the blind is the Institution Royale des Jeunes Aveugles, of which 

 Haiiy was the founder. It contains about a hundred young persons of 

 both sexes, who are maintained and educated at the expense of the 

 state for eight years. Paying pupils are also admitted. During the 

 last quarter of a century the education of the blind has made great 

 advances, as will be seen when the present state of the various esta- 

 blishments is compared with their actual condition, as described in the 

 article BLIND of the ' Penny Cyclopaedia." The writer of that essay 

 lamented that there was so much that appeared to him censurable, 

 and that called" for animadversion in the modes of education pursued 

 ne nl the schools for the blind. The article was, however, trans- 

 mitt^d to three of these schools previous to its publication, and it was 

 allowed to be a correct statement of facts. A great change for the 

 better has since taken place, not only in the schools referred to, but in 

 others also; new asylums have been established, and the attention of 

 many experienced men has been directed to various branches of educa- 

 tion, and especially to the provision of books in raised type, of which 

 an account is given in the article BLIND, ALPHABETS FOR THE. 



The first British Asylum for the Blind was established at Liverpool, 

 in the year 1791. This institution has hitherto been liberally sup- 

 ported. During the ye'ar 1858, its expenditure was 3COCJ., its income 

 about 340Gi., derived from goods disposed of (the work of its inmates), 

 from the payments made on behalf of the pupils, from legacies, dona- 



tions, and subscriptions, from dividends, and the pew-rents of its 

 chapel. The sums received for articles manufactured exceeded 90(V., 

 but the produce of these labours does not assist the funds of the esta- 

 blishment. The instruction of the blind hi manual labour seems to be 

 the primary object with the directors of the institution. The trades 

 which are taught are those of basket-making, rope-making, weaving, 

 shoemaking, sewing, knitting and platting sash-line. The most profit- 

 able of these arts is the rope-making ; the locality of the institution 

 contributes to the advantages derived from this trade. The sugar- 

 houses require so vast a supply of cordage, that it can scarcely bo 

 furnished in a sufficient quantity. The next most profitable labour is 

 the weaving of carpets, lobby-cloths, and bear-rugs. Masters possessing 

 sight are regularly employed in teaching the various trades ; the reasons 

 why the institution derives no pecuniary advantage from the extensive 

 labours carried on are sufficiently obvious when the expense of expe- 

 rienced masters is considered, the waste of materials by the labourers 

 who are chiefly learners, and their quitting the asylum when they can 

 earn enough to maintain themselves. 



The total number of persons who have been received into this asylum 

 from its commencement to the publication of the report, January 185?, 

 was 1429. Some very interesting details are given in the same docu- 

 ment on the causes of the calamity under which the pupils labour, so 

 far as could be ascertained by the officers of the institution. 



LIVERPOOL INSTITUTION, TOTAL NUMBER RECEIVED 1429. 



Totally. Partially. Total. 



Blind from their birth 

 small-pox 

 inflammation . 

 cataract 

 external injury 

 defect in the optic nerve 

 amaurosis . . . 

 imperfect organisation 

 Lost their sight at sea 



by gradual decay 



after fever . . 



after measles . 



after convulsions . 



from causes not mentioned 



or imperfectly described / 



70 



202 



278 



56 



99 



76 



25 



6 



8 



5 



14 



8 



3 



28 

 878 



49 



48 



177 



93 



47 



64 



15 



14 



1 



3 



5 



5 



3 



27 



551 



119 



250 



455 



H9 



146 



140 



40 



20 



9 



8 



19 



13 



6 



55 



1429 



From the reports of the Liverpool Asylum, as well as from others 

 which we have seen, the blind seem to be 'pretty equally scattered in 

 all parts of the kingdom. Of the 1429 persons who have been inmates 

 of the Liverpool Asylum, 225 have belonged to Liverpool, 294 to other 

 parishes in Lancashire, and 910 to distant parts of the kingdom. A 

 large proportion of the income of the institution is derived from Liver- 

 pool and its vicinity. The blind of that district have therefore a just 

 priority of admission. There are 79 pupils in the Liverpool Asylum ; 

 18 were admitted in 1858, and 21 left. Among those thus admitted, 

 8 are between fourteen and twenty, 4 are between twenty and thirty 

 years old, 4 are upwards of thirty, and of 2 the ages are not 

 specified. Most of those who have completed their education receive 

 a gratuity of from two to five guineas when they quit the asylum, 

 which sum is intended to assist them in procuring a few tools and 

 materials for commencing the trades they may have been taught. This 

 provision is both benevolent and wise ; for there are numerous cases 

 which come under the notice of the directors where poverty accom- 

 panies the deprivation of sight, and where, consequently, the instruc- 

 tion imparted would be of no practical benefit were not some means 

 afforded of making it available to provide for their common necessities. 

 The observances of religion appear to be regularly regarded : prayers 

 are read in the chapel morning and evening, and the chaplain attends 

 twice in each week to teach the catechism. The appointed hours for 

 labour in the Liverpool Asylum are from six in the morning to six in 

 the evening, one hour being allowed for breakfast and recreation, and 

 another for dinner. Some of the pupils occupy a. large portion of their 

 time in the practice of music, singing, reading, &c. Frere's system of 

 raised type is used, but the superintendent is not prepared to say which 

 of the several series of book* is most eligible for the blind. There are 

 no fixed hours for acquiring the art of reading by touch, but instruction 

 is given at such times as the teachers can spare from their other duties. 

 Many of the inmates are middle-aged adults, whose object in entering 

 the institution is expressly to acquire facility in some employment by 

 which they can maintain themselves, and who leave as eoon as they 

 have succeeded in learning a trade, some of them only remaining under 

 instruction from six to twelve mouths. This information has been 

 supplied by the superintendent. 



In the year 179;J an Asylum for the Blind was established in Edin- 

 burgh. The benevolent Dr. Blacklock, who resided in that city many 

 years, had long anxiously wished that such an establishment should be 

 formed for the education of those persons who, like himself, were 

 deprived of sight. He mentioned iiis wishes to his friend Mr. David 

 Miller, who was also blind, and was himself an eminent example of 

 what might be effected under the influence of early and judicious 

 instruction. In the year mentioned, it was determined by Mr. Miller 

 and the Rev, Dr. David Johnston, of Leith, that an attempt should be 



