Middlebury register. (Middlebury, Vt.) 1886-1937, 1888-03-23
MAKING THE DEAF HEAR,
System of Education Given by the vari-
Gus Schools for Deaf nIutes.

Gus Schools for Deaf nIutes.
There are doubtless a large number OF
children born deaf, or who have become
deaf since birth through the evil effect of
measles or scarlet fever or some other of
the kindred scourges of childhood, who
ere going through the world as deaf
nutes for lack of knowledge, on the part
of those that have the care of them, that
schools exist to which they may be sent
almost free of charge, and sometimes
quite free.
In these schools deaf children are not
only taught to speak and to know what
other people are speaking, but they ac-
quire a thorough education in all
branches, and in addition receive instruc-
ton in sewing, in the use of tools and
general industrial training, SO that when
they leave school they are quite prepared,
if need be. to earn their own living by
their own hands or head.
1t would seem that no parent could be
indifferent to the possibility contained in
the system of education given by the
various schools for deaf mutes, if aware
of their existence The little people,
who might otherwise go through the
world aided only by signs, here acquire
I language SO completely that it is only in
the dark that they are returned to their
world of silence, being deaf only as the
hero of Jean Paul's Titan became blind,
after sunset, and returning to all the
pleasures of sound with the lighting of
the lamps. The children thus educated
ask no odds of those other children pro-
vided by partial nature with better means
of taking care of themselves. Compar-
ison of graduates of deaf mute schools
and of those of other schools shows no
difference whatever in proficiency and
intelligence, and in mingling with
the world afterward the deaf mute pu-
pills are not accompanied by any painful
sense of deficiency. In fact, the more
they mingle with the world, as in the
case of other youth, the more self-confi-
dence and the larger vocabulary do they
acquire, and they are more injured by
receipt of exceeding sympathy than they
are by the withholding of it, many of
them complaining of the tendency to
magnify their misfortune, which almost
ceases to be misfortune to them when
they find themselves readily understand
ing all that goes on about them, finding
their way about, and often Going to
church, to concerts, to theatres, and
taking as much enjoyment as those do
who are in the possession of all their
senses.
Indeed, many educated deaf mutes
who have acquired language, and who
have any superior intelligence of their
own, claim that they have an advantage
in their deafness itself; for it has obliged
them toconcentrate in thought and quick
wit and in eyesight the amount of force
which is by others dissipated in the world
of attaching and detaching sound, and
they are, they are apt to think, and that
not without reason, the deeper and
broader, reader and better, for the oc-
clusion of one of their senses. When
Mr.. Fawcett, lately high postoffice off
cial of Great Britain, became in his early
boyhood entirely blind, it is said that he
resolved that he would go through life
exactly as if he saw; and he carried out
his intention, as we all know, as far as
that was a possible thing, and a large
share of his achievement was due to this
determination. 1t would be well if all
people robbed of one of their senses
formed the same resolution, and carried
it out but half as well.
But long before children who are shut
out from all actual sound are old enough
to make any such determination for
themselves, and while they can only see
with poignant pain that they are diff
erent from other children. ignorant of
any means by which the difference may
be cured, it is the duty of parents to sup
ply to them, as far as may be, every
deficiency of their senses. This, to a
certain extent, can be done at home, and
a singular success has attended the prac-
tice of treating the deaf child exactly as
if it could hear, so that, almost as it were
by intuition, it has acquired the art of
speech to a limited extent. But as that
extent is very likely to remain limited,
the rest of the deficiency can only be
supplied by schools having no other object
than the instruction of the deaf, and it is
at once to be seen that every guardian of
such child is under an obligation to the
child to inform himself about such
Schools and to give the child the advan-
tages to be gained from them, even if in
SO doing the child in SO far has to become
Il beneficiary of the state. The debt to
the state is not serious one, since it is
for the interest of the state that every
member of the community shall be
brought to the highest perfection. -Har-
pers Bazaar.