Page:Encyclopædia Britannica, Ninth Edition, v. 3.djvu/848

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BLIND

strips of leather, and other occupations which combine play with work, are carried on with advantage. A good manager of Kinder garten can do them great good, and gymnastics give them the power of controlling their limbs ; but every exercise must be first taught singly.

Object lessons must be given by means of models, stuffed animals, birds, fish, &c., to bring out the powers of memory and reason. Simple hymns and ballads are practised.

Very little technical work can be taught, except making rush baskets, &c., as the children are all under ten. This school has been carried on for eleven years, and the benefits of teaching blind children so early are plainly seen by all who watch the progress which they make when removed to the Blind Institution ; they are lit for independent work at an age three years less than the average of those who do not go through it.

As the children pass through the institution more rapidly, there 13 also more room for those who become blind as adults."

Of the National Blind Institution at Dresden, Dr Keinhard, the director, said "It is organized so that the working school forms an essential part of it, and when children enter it, consideration is at once given, not only to their physical, religious, and intellectual education, but also to their instruction in work. Whilst between the ages of six and eleven they remain in the preparatory school, and find inexhaustible occupation in Frobel s system of play and exercise.

Playwork is given them as they become fit for it ; for the feeling that they can make something useful rejoices the little workers and excites their activity ; it is important that they should learn early to aim at real work. They learn to plait reed mats, which is an excellent means of strengthening the muscles of the arm and hand, and they also make little rush baskets.

The range of their work is extended when they are transferred to the higher class, which is usually during their eleventh year ; and from that time till their confirmation, which is generally at the end of their fourteenth year, they have at least three hours work every day in the shops.

The work of the girls is, unfortunately, much restricted, and it is doubtful whether their learning to make baskets and rope is without injury to their constitution. Besides, we must not lose sight of the evils arising from their working with male overseers and workmen. Hence, girls learn in general only knitting, plaiting counterpanes, chair-caning, hair-working, and sewing as much as is required for mending their linen.

Hair-work has already been adopted in another institution, and is the most profitable work for blind girls, as a clever one can earn 7 or 8 groschen (about 9d.) a day by it, whilst the quickest knitter can scarcely make 2 groschen a day.

The boys learn either basket-making or rope-making ; they learn in the rope factory various kinds of light work, and, when they have been confirmed, choose for themselves between these two trades, their muscles being strengthened by alternately being em ployed at both.

It is important to consider the grounds of fitness for these trades. Rope-making requires strength and health of body, for much of the work must be carried on in places exposed to the weather ; and besides this it requires a great deal of dexterity which is not indis pensable in basket-making. It is also of great importance that each should learn the trade in which he is most likely to succeed after leaving the institution ; for the great object is that pupils should be fitted for independent work eventually.

All those who understand the subject are now convinced that the blind cannot be really helped by building asylums. If there were three times as many asylums as there are schools, there would not be room for all, and the inmates would never be satisfied with their condition. Even women prefer an independent life full of care to the sameness of an asylum, where one quarrelsome person often embitters the whole life of the institution.

If there is any possibility of establishing pupils of either sex without exposing them to the risk of losing their health, there can be no doubt that it is to be preferred to placing them in asylums.

" The Dresden Blind Institution is managed on the principle that the pupils, on commencing independent work, require much assistance before they can support themselves by it, and ti.at the institution must give the necessary help. The director of the institution makes known to the manufacturers that a blind worker is coming to settle near them, and induces some of the families around to take an interest in him, and recommend him for employ ment. He also inserts in the newspapers short notices describing his capacity for work, and his difficulty in finding customers, &c., and requesting people to employ him.

The outfit required for pupils on leaving the institution consists of tools and clothing, and materials must also be provided at first. The cost of these is partly defrayed by the fund established for the purpose, partly by the savings of the pupils, and partly, if necessary, by a grant from the parish.

It is indispensable that the blind worker should have some person near in whom he can fully confide, and from whom he can get advice and help in any time of temporary difficulty, whilst the manager of the institution can rely on his taking an interest in the worker, and seeing that he obeys the rules.

The purchase of raw material causes the greatest difficulty; the blind man has not the means of buying much at a time, and must, consequently, pay highly for it; therefore the institution helps him by buying it at wholesale prices and letting him have it at the same price in small quantities. The number of his applications for materials shows the managers whether the man is industrious.

More than 200 blind support themselves in Saxony by means of the aid afforded by the fund and their own exertions. The fund amounted, in 1873, to 85,000 dollars, subscribed in all parts of the country."


Previous to the Franco-German War, Mr Liebreich, a celebrated oculist and practical friend of the blind, by order of the empress of the French, prepared a report in regard to the Institution Imperiale dcs jeunes Aveugles of Paris, in which he says that the institution—


" Is an establishment of the State, in which children of both sexes deprived of sight receive an intellectual, musical, and industrial training. Children are received at the age of 13 years. They remain in the institution 8 years, and are made professors, musicians, tuners of pianos, workmen and workwomen.

During the last ten years 110 male pupils have left the institution, concerning whom we have received satisfactory information. The workwomen, on the contrary, earn but very little ; among 168 blind, 108 have received a very good education, which ensures to them an easy and independent living ; 56 have received an elemen tary training, and have not been put entirely beyond the charge of public charity.

The annual expense for 200 pupils is very nearly 240,000 francs (of which 146,000 francs are given by the State), making an average of 1200 fr. (48) per pupil, the workman costing a little less, the artist a little more. This sum is not excessive for the education of a tuner, a professor, or an organist, but it certainly is for the education of a workman, who only receives an elementary training, and is not even qualified to earn his own living.

M. Gaudet, chief instructor of the institution, expresses disapproval of the simultaneous education of artists and workmen. He says, Idealizing from the first the great difference which exists between the future of an organist or a piano tuner on one side, and of a blind workman on the other, the apprentices regard themselves as sacrificed ; therefore they do all they can to become tuners, and thus often lose much time in fruitless efforts before they resign themselves to become workmen, and even then toil reluctantly. On quitting the establishment to follow their occupations, they are not habituated to assiduous toil ; returning to their indigent families they regret the comfortable life of the institution, and finally become discouraged.

Tuners begin ordinarily to work with piano manufacturers, arid earn easily 1500 francs per year. If a little later they succeed in obtaining a town connection, they have no difficulty in earning double that or more. Some have even succeeded in uniting manufacture with tuning. The organists, by obtaining places in churches and by giving music lessons, very soon earn a good livelihood.

In short, the tuners, organists, and teachers have, in spite of their infirmity, become independent men, exercising honourable and lucrative professions ; some have married and reared families, others have come to the aid of their indigent relatives.

Very different is the lot of the blind workmen, who by toiling without relaxation many more hours than sighted workmen, barely succeed in gaining a part of what they need to support themselves. By perfecting as far as possible the industrial training of the institution, a greater number of the male pupils might be enabled to earn 300 or 400 francs, but none far exceed this sum. The work women seldom earn more than 100 or 150 francs per year."


The institutions of America are not asylums, but in the truest sense of the word educational establishments, in which the blind, without regard to their future, receive a thorough education. The blind in the United States are socially far above those of any other country ; large numbers of them become eminent scholars and musicians, and even their blind workmen enjoy a degree of comfort unknown in England or on the Continent.

The results achieved by the Perkins Institution at

Boston, U.S., are particularly instructive. High-class musical training appears to have been commenced there about 13 years ago, previous to which time the results in this respect were far from being satisfactory. The report of 1SG7 states that music is now taught to all of both sexes

whose natural abilities make it probable that under proper