354 



SCIENCE. 



[Vol. XVI. No. 412 



commonly spoken of as ' deaf-mutes ' there is no more likeli- 

 hood of giving the legacy of deafness to offspring than with 

 perfectly normal people." That fact was pressed in my 

 article to which the doctor alludes, and, as he plainly shows, 

 has been admitted by Dr. Bell. Dr. Bell's classification is 

 doubtless the most philosophic of any yet promulgated, but 

 whether it will be sustained by future investigations remains 

 to be seen. Science is progressive because of the ascertain- 

 ment of new truths. Its history shows us that the science 

 of to-day may not be accepted as the science of to-morrow. 

 It is too soon to predicate any positive theories upon the 

 statistics as yet collected. The time during which they have 

 been collated is too short, and their accuracy too unreliable 

 (some being merely hypothetical, and many furnished by 

 undiscriminating parties), to warrant deducing positive 

 opinions from them, or the enunciation of any general law 

 leased upon them. The investigations of Dr. E. A. Fay, 

 now in prosecution, will no doubt be of greater value than 

 any preceding. 



It is scarcely half a score of years since a really intelligent 

 movement in this direction was inaugurated by Dr. Alex- 

 ander Graham Bell, a philanthropist as well as an eminent 

 scientist and inventor. Statistics relative to the deaf had 

 been taken previously, to some extent, in several institutions, 

 but the inquiries for them had not been general. Statistics, 

 supposed to be reliable at the time of taking them, were by 

 subsequent inquiries, which developed new or additional 

 facts, materially changed ; so that former deductions were 

 necessarily reviewed and discarded. One man's lifetime is 

 too short, and his observations too limited, to furnish data 

 upon which to predicate the formulation of a general law. Dr. 

 Bell may have discovered a law governing the offspring of 

 the congenitally deaf persons, or he may have formed an 

 assumption. I think there is as much evidence going to 

 show that an inherent predisposition to deafness exists in 

 some families (using this term in its extended sense), but 

 that it expends its force in a particular line while it remains 

 in others, as there is to show that it perpetuates itself from 

 parent to child. Within my observation there have been 

 more cases of deafness among children only one ofjvhose 

 parents was congenitally deaf than among those l^h of 

 whose parents were congenitally deaf. I am not ^rtain 

 but that the percentage of the former would also be»)und 

 less if careful investigation was made. Statistics comd be 

 so presented as to show that the intermarriage of the deaf 

 tends to reduce the number of deaf children more effectually 

 than for the congenitally deaf to marry the hearing, or 

 persons whose deafness was acquired after birth, since by 

 the latter means there is more probability of scattering the 

 infirmity than there is in intensifying the predisposition to 

 it by the former. It is undeniable that this predisposition 

 is not obliterated by marriage with one who has it not: hence 

 Dr. Gallaudet's ideal marriage of the congenivally deaf with 

 the hearing, or Dr. Bell's suggestion that they marry the 

 non-coogenitally deaf, if there is any truth in the law of 

 heredity, will most tend to increase the number of the deaf; 

 because, where two persons in whom inheres the probability 

 of having deaf offspring intermarry, there can result only 

 one family of deaf children, whereas, if they marry hear- 

 ing or non-congenitally deaf j ersons, two such families may 

 result. 



If the congenital deaf-mute must have so much solicitude 

 for his offspring as Dr. Bell and Dr. Gallaudet insist on, 

 shall the hearing person or the non-congenital deaf have none 

 for his ? The deaf man or woman has the same right to 



exercise his judgment in the selection of a partner for life 

 that any other person has. If they desire to compare their 

 family histories with reference to Inherent predisposition to 

 deafness, I know of no one who could object, or of no rea- 

 son why they should not do so, and not as much as that 

 they and all others should consider a phthisical, scrofulous, 

 or cancerous family diathesis. Dr. Gallaudet's argument 

 with reference to the marriage of the deaf with the hearing 

 is good, but is quite as forceful on the other side of the ques- 

 tion. Both parties to a marriage have an equal right to 

 forecast the future. No one will deny that a family where 

 one parent is deaf suffers greater disadvantage than one where 

 both parents can hear. Unless there is sincere love between 

 the parties, the hearing person will not enter into such a 

 marriage. A question of this kind is not to be considered 

 from the standpoint of the deaf alone. 



After considering Dr. Gallaudet's objection, I still main- 

 tain, that, for those deaf persons who improve the opportuni- 

 ties afforded them under the geniusof ourcivilization, deafness 

 may properly be termed only a serious inconvenience. The 

 term "misfortune" is indefinite, and may imply little or 

 much. The loss of an arm is a misfortune, and so is the loss 

 of a finger. I know of no one who says deafness is not a 

 misfortune. My statement to which the doctor objects was 

 to the effect that what was once a calamity (a very strong 

 term) is now only a serious inconvenience. I suppose, as 

 Dr. Gallaudet objects to this, that he uses the term "grave 

 misfortune " in the sense of a calamity. It may or may not 

 be such, according to circumstances. I have known in- 

 stances in which the visitation of deafness' proved to be a 

 stroke of good fortune. I decidedly protest against forever 

 holding up the deaf as victims of a terrible misfortune, and 

 objects of commiseration and charity, after an intelligent 

 public has, at enormous expense, made elaborate, and in 

 some cases palatial, provision for their education, mental, 

 moral, and manual, and while it continues a generous annual 

 outlay for the prosecution of this good and necessary work; 

 and especially do I object to impressing on the deaf them- 

 selves, as Dr. Gallaudet's article is calculated to do, that the 

 time is never to come when they shall cease to belong to a 

 special class who are to be looked after by others. I deem 

 it wiser to instill into them the idea that they stand upon 

 the same plane as others, and must provide for themselves as 

 others do; and that, being handicapped with the incon- 

 venience of deafness, they must expect to do a little better 

 than others do in similar walks of life, and thus make them- 

 selves desirable to employers. I regard this as one of the 

 important duties of a teacher of the deaf, and of none more 

 emphatically than of one who stands at the head of a college 

 for the deaf, where the choicest spirits and minds culled from 

 a continent are assembled. Surely the public expects this, 

 when the various States and the general government expend 

 more than ten million dollars for buildings and grounds for 

 the accommodation, comfort, and pleasure of the youthful 

 deaf while securing their education, and annually expend a 

 million and a half dollars for their instruction and mainte- 

 nance. The traveller in European countries beholds palaces 

 erected by public moneys for kings, princes, and prelates; 

 but it is one of the crowning glories of America that our 

 grand structures are mostly for humanitarian and educa- 

 tional purposes, which enlighten and elevate the common 

 people. Prominent among these are some for the deaf, not 

 to make them a pampered and favored class, but to fit them 

 for an equal chance in life. In many cases this is done to 

 such an extent that they distance tl:eir hearing relatives. 



