In every school or class there will be a certain number of young blind children who, from neglect, want of food, or other causes, are feeble in body and defective in intellect; such children are a great burden in any class or school, and require special treatment and instruction. Educational authorities should unite and have one or two schools in a healthful locality for mentally defective blind children.
More and more, in educational work for the seeing, there is a tendency to specialize, and thus enable each student to have the best possible instruction in the subjects that bear most directly on his future calling. To prepare the blind for self-maintenance, there should be an equally careful study of the ability of each child.
A scheme of education which has for its object to make the blind a self-sustaining class should include: kindergarten schools for children from 5 to 8 years of age; preparatory schools from 8 to 11; intermediate schools from 11 to 14. At 14 an intelligent opinion can be formed in regard to the future career of the pupils. They will fall naturally into the following categories:—(a) A certain number will succeed better in handicraft than in any other calling, and should be drafted into a suitable mechanical school. (b) A few will have special gifts for general business, and should be educated accordingly. (c) A few will have the ability and ambition to prepare for the university, and the special college should afford them the most thorough preparation for the university examinations. (d) Some will have the necessary talent, combined with the requisite character and industry, to succeed in the musical profession; in addition to a liberal education, these should have musical instruction, equal to that given to the seeing, in the best schools of music. (e) Some may achieve excellent success as pianoforte-tuners, and in a pianoforte-tuning school strict business habits should be cultivated, and the same attention to work required as is demanded of seeing workmen in well-regulated pianoforte factories.
The United Kingdom stands almost alone in allowing the education of the blind to depend upon charity. In the United States, each state government not only makes liberal provision for the education and training of the blind, but most of them provide grounds, buildings and a complete equipment in all departments. Although it costs much more per capita, from £40 to £60 per annum, the blind are as amply provided with the means of education as the seeing. The government of the United States appropriates $10,000 per annum for printing embossed books for the blind. Most of the European countries and the English colonies provide by taxation for the education of the blind.
Types
The earliest authentic records of tangible letters for the blind describe a plan of engraving the letters upon blocks of wood, the invention of Francesco Lucas, a Spaniard, who dedicated it to Philip II. of Spain in the 16th century. In 1640 Pierre Moreau, a writing-master in Paris, cast a movable leaden type for the use of the blind, but being without means to carry out his plan, abandoned it. Pins inserted in cushions were next tried, and large wooden letters. After these came a contrivance of Du Puiseaux, a blind man, who had metal letters cast and set them in a small frame with a handle. Whilst these experiments were going on in France, attempts had also been made in Germany. R. Weissembourg (a resident of Mannheim), who lost his sight when about seven years of age, made use of letters cut in cardboard, and afterwards pricked maps in the same material. By this method he taught Mlle Paradis, the talented blind musician and the friend of Valentin Haüy.
To Haüy belongs the honour of being the first to emboss paper as a means of reading for the blind; his books were embossed in large and small italics, from movable type set by his pupils. The following is an account of the origin of his discovery. Haüy’s first pupil was François Lesueur, a blind boy whom he found begging at the porch door of St Germain des Prés. While Lesueur was sorting the papers on his teacher’s desk, he came across a card strongly indented by the types in the press. The blind lad showed his master he could decipher several letters on the card. Immediately Haüy traced with the handle of his pen some signs on paper. The boy read them, and the result was printing in relief, the greatest of Haüy’s discoveries. In 1821 Lady Elizabeth Lowther brought embossed books and types from Paris, and with the types her son, Sir Charles Lowther, Bart., printed for his own use the Gospel of St Matthew. The work of Haüy was taken up by Mr Gall of Edinburgh, Mr Alston of Glasgow, Dr Howe of Boston, Mr Friedlander of Philadelphia, and others. In 1827 James Gall of Edinburgh embossed some elementary works, and published the Gospel of St John in 1834. His plan was to use the common English letter and replace curves by angles.
| Fig. 1.—Moon Alphabet. |
In 1832 the Edinburgh Society of Arts offered a gold medal for the best method of printing for the blind, and it was awarded to Dr Edmond Fry of London, whose alphabet consisted of ordinary capital letters without their small strokes. In 1836 the Rev. W. Taylor of York and John Alston in Glasgow began to print with Fry’s type. Mr Alston’s appeal for a printing fund met with a hearty response, and a grant of £400 was made by the treasury; in 1838 he completed the New Testament, and at the end of 1840 the whole Bible was published in embossed print. In 1833 printing for the blind was commenced in the United States at Boston and Philadelphia. Dr S.G. Howe in Boston used small English letters without capitals, angles being employed instead of curves, while J.R. Friedlander in Philadelphia used only Roman capitals. About 1838 T.M. Lucas of Bristol, a shorthand writer, and J.H. Frere of Blackheath, each introduced an alphabet of simpler forms, and based their systems on stenography. In 1847 Dr Moon of Brighton brought out a system which partially retains the outline of the Roman letters. This type is easily read by the adult blind, and is still much used by the home teaching societies. The preceding methods are all known as line types, but the one which is now in general use is a point type.
In the early part of the 19th century Captain Charles Barbier, a French officer, substituted embossed dots for embossed lines. The slate for writing was also invented by him.