An invitation to take dinner with a friend in the State's prison was something new and exciting to a quiet little body like me, and I re-read Ruth Denham's kindly-worded note to that effect, and thought how odd it was that we should meet again in this way after ten years' separation and all the changes that had intervened in both our lives. We had parted last on the night of our grand closing-school party, after having been friends and fellow-pupils for five years. She was then fifteen, and the prettiest, brightest and cleverest girl at Lynnhope. I was younger, and felt distinguished by her friendship, and heart-broken at the idea of losing her, for she was going abroad with her family, while I remained to complete my studies at the institute.
I had plenty of letters the first year, but then her father died, and with him went his reputed fortune. A painful change occurred in the position of the Welfords in consequence, and Ruth became a teacher, as I heard, until she met and married a young man from the West, whither she returned with him immediately after the ceremony. She had written to me once after becoming Ruth Denham, and her letter was kind and cordial as her old self, but the correspondence thus renewed soon ceased. I was also an orphan, but a close attendant at the couch of my invalid aunt; and Ruth's new strange life was too crowded with pressing duties to permit her to write regularly to her girlhood's companion, whom she had not seen for years. My aunt had now recovered so far as to indulge a taste for travel. We were on our way by the great railroad to the Pacific coast, and we stopped at the small capital of one of the newest States to discover that Ruth Denham was a resident there, the wife of the lieutenant-governor, who was consequently the warden of the State prison. The note I held in my hand was in answer to one I had despatched to her an hour before by the hands of a Chinaman from the hotel, and it was as glad and affectionate as I could wish:
"My husband is quite ill with sciatica, which completely lames him, as well as causing him intense pain. I am his only attendant, or I would fly to you at once, my dearest Jenny. I am so sorry you leave by the midnight train for San Francisco to-morrow, but must be content to see you as much of the day as you can spare us, and hope for a longer visit on your return. We dine at four: may I not send the carriage for you as early as two o'clock?
"Your loving friend,
I had my aunt's permission to leave her, and was ready at the appointed hour to find the carriage there to the minute; and a very comfortable, easy conveyance it proved over one of the worst roads I ever traveled on.
The prison was about a mile from the outskirts of the straggling town, which boasted two or three fine State buildings, in strong contrast with its scattering and mostly mean and shambling dwellings. Some hot springs had been discovered near the site, and over them had been erected a wooden hotel and baths of the simplest order of architecture and on the barest possible plan of ornament or comfort. Just beyond this edifice was the prison, situated at the rise of one hill and under the shadow of another and more considerable one. It was built of a softish, light-colored stone dug from a neighboring quarry, as the driver told me, and looking even at a cursory glance too destructible and crumbling to secure such desperate and determined inmates.
"They used to keep 'em in a sort o' wooden shed," said my driver, alluding to the prisoners, "until they got this shebang fixed up. Pretty smart lot of chaps they were, for they built it themselves mostly, and made good time on it, too."
It was surrounded by a high wooden fence, within which a stone wall of the same material as the building was in course of construction.
"If it wasn't Sunday," said my companion as we drove through the guarded gate, "you could see 'em at work, for they're putting up their defences, and doing it first-rate, too."
I had only time for a glance at the inside of the enclosure. We were already at the principal entrance, which was a wide door opening into a hall, with a staircase leading up to the second floor. On the right hand was a strongly-grated iron door opening into the main corridor between the cells: the other side seemed to be devoted to offices and quarters for the guards. I saw knots of men about, but only the two at the entrance appeared to be armed, and they had that lounging, easy air, that belongs to security and the absence of thought. It was in every respect opposite to my preconceived idea of a penitentiary, and all recollection of its first design fled when I saw Ruth's cheery face, bright and handsome as ever, beaming on me from the first landing, and felt her warm, firm arms clasping me in an embrace of affectionate welcome. It was my friend's home, and nothing else, from that moment, and a very pretty, daintily-ordered home it was. She had five rooms on the second floor, with a kitchen below: this was her parlor in front, a bright, well-furnished room, tastefully ornamented with pictures, some of which I recognized as her own paintings in our school-days; and here was her dining-room to the left, with a small guest-chamber that she hoped I would occupy when I returned. The other rooms on the west of the parlor were hers and Nellie's—Oh, I had not seen Nellie, her five-year-old, nor her dear husband, who was so much better to-day, though he could not rise without difficulty; and would I therefore come and see him?
As Ruth gave me thus a passing glance at her household arrangements, I saw through the open door of an apartment back of the dining-room a light shower of plaster fall to the ground, marking the oilcloth that covered the floor, and for one instant sending out into the hall a puff of whitish dust.
"Oh, that is one of the effects of our terribly dry climate," said Ruth, following my glance and noticing the dust: "every little while portions of our walls crumble and fall in like that. There is no doubt a sad litter in Mr. Foster the clerk's room, where that shower occurred: he has gone to the city for the day, however, and it can be cleared before his return. Here is my husband, Jenny."
In a recess by the parlor window, on a lounge, Mr. Denham was trying to disguise the necessity for keeping his tortured limb extended by an appearance of smiling ease. He was a handsome, frank-faced man, with a firm, fearless eye and a gentle, kindly mouth, and I could readily understand my friend's look of sweet content when I saw him and her child Nellie, who was hanging over her papa with the fond protecting air of a precocious nurse. I sat down quickly beside them to prevent my host's attempting to rise, and the hour that elapsed before dinner flew by in interesting conversation.
"I am so sorry I had to go for a little while," said Ruth, returning to announce that meal, "but my good Wang-Ho is sick to-day, and I had to help him a little."
"Where is Lester, Ruth?" asked her husband.
"Oh, he is kind and helpful as ever, but he does not understand making dessert, you know, Edward."
"That's true, and Miss Jane will excuse you, I am sure, for she and I have been reviewing the principal features of pioneer-life, and she professes herself rather in love with it than otherwise."
"It is all so fresh and enjoyable, despite its discomforts and inconveniences," I said; "and need I quote a stronger argument in its favor than yourself, my dear Ruth? You seem perfectly happy, and I really cannot see why you should not be so."
She had her golden-haired little girl in one arm, and she laid the other hand caressingly on her husband's shoulder, "There is none: I am happy," she said in a low, earnest tone; and then added laughingly, "or I shall be as soon as Edward gets well of sciatica and Wang-Ho recovers from his chills."
Mr. Denham begged us to go before him, and his wife led the way to the dining-room.
"Poor fellow!" she whispered, "he suffers horribly when he moves, and I tried to persuade him to have his dinner sent into the parlor, but in honor of your presence he will come, and he doesn't want us to see him wince and writhe under the effort."
Just as we entered the dining-room a young man came in by another door, carrying a tray with dishes. I had seen plenty of Chinamen, but this was not one, nor could I reconcile his appearance with the position of a servant. He was tall, well-made, and his face, though unnaturally pale, was decidedly good-looking. He wore a pair of coarse gray pantaloons with a remarkable stripe down one leg, but had on a beautifully clean and fine, white shirt fastened at the throat with a diamond button. The weather was warm, and he was without coat or vest, and had a sash of red knitted silk, such as Mexicans wear, round his middle.
Ruth took the dishes from him and placed them on the table. "Please tell Wang-Ho about the coffee, Lester," she said as he retired.
"Is that man a servant, Ruth?" I asked in an astonished whisper.
"No," she replied in the same low tone: "he is a murderer condemned for life."
Mr. Denham hobbled in and slid down upon a seat. I appreciated his gallant attention, but it was painful to see the effort it cost: besides, much as I had seen, and familiar as I was becoming with pioneer life, to be waited on at dinner by a young and handsome murderer condemned to prison for life was a sensation new and startling, and I was full of curiosity as to the nature of his crime and the peculiar administration of the Western penal code that made house-servants of convicts. Seeing my perturbation, Ruth evidently intended to relieve it by the explanatory remark of "He is a 'trusty,' Jenny dear," but really threw no light whatever on the subject.
It was a very nice dinner, served tastefully and with a home comfort about everything connected with the table that seemed most unlike a prison. Mr. Denham's intelligence and cheerfulness added to the delusion that I was enjoying the hospitalities of a cultivated Eastern home. He and his wife had kept themselves thoroughly familiar with all topics of general interest through the medium of periodicals, and had much to ask about the actual progress of improvements they had read of and the changes occurring among dear and familiar Eastern scenes.
Lester came in again with the empty tray, and quietly gathered the plates from the table preparatory to placing dessert. I wanted to look at him—indeed, a fascination I could not resist drew my eyes to his face like a magnet—yet, somehow, I dared not keep them there: the consciousness of meeting his glance, and feeling that I should then be ashamed of my curiosity, made them drop uneasily every time he turned; and once when I found his gaze rest on me an instant, I felt myself color violently under the quiet look of his steel-gray eyes.
One thing was very observable in the little group: the child Nellie was intensely fond of the man, and he himself seemed to entertain and constantly endeavor to express an exalted admiration for Mr. Denham. While the latter was speaking Lester's animated looks followed every word and gesture: he anticipated his unexpressed wishes, and watched to save him the trouble of moving or asking for anything.
"No, no, Nellie, stay and finish your dinner: Lester is not quite ready for you yet." Her mother said this in reference to the child's eagerness to follow the trusty attendant from the room, and her neglect of her meal in consequence. "Nellie is in the habit of carrying up the sugar and cream for the coffee, and she thinks Lester cannot possibly get on if she does not assist," said Ruth in smiling explanation as Nellie hastened after him.
The next instant there was the mingled sound of a heavy fall or succession of falls outside, and one quick, stifled scream from the child.
"The dumb-waiter, quick! It has broken from its weights and scalded Nell with the hot coffee," cried Ruth, making a spring toward the door by which Lester had gone out.
Her husband, forgetting his lameness, was instantly at her side, but some force held the door against them both, and abandoning it after the first effort, the father turned hurriedly to the one leading into the hall. I sat nearest that, and in the excitement I had moved quickly aside, so that when it was flung violently open the moment before my host the governor of the prison reached it, I was thrust back against the wall, from which place, half dead with fright, I saw the hall crowded with convicts, the foremost of whom held a pistol directly toward Mr. Denham's head.
It snapped with a sharp report, and when the smoke cleared I found Mr. Denham had dodged the fire and was closed in a scuffle with the villain for the weapon. A dozen more seemed to spring on him from the threshold; I heard his wife's cry of agony; and then the door at the other side burst in, and Lester, with his gray eyes gleaming like a flame, bounded over the body of a bloody convict that fell from his grasp as he broke into the room. Quick as thought he caught up one of the heavy chairs in his hands, and bringing it down with desperate force on the heads of the governor's assailants, felled one, while the other staggered back and dropped his pistol. Mr. Denham caught it like a flash, and fired it in the face of a wretch who was aiming at Lester's heart. The convicts fell back, and over their bodies the governor and his aid sprang into the crowded hall.
"The child! the child! O God! my little daughter!" It was Ruth's voice in tones of such anguish and terror as I never before heard uttered by human voice.
She was looking from the window into the yard below, and there she beheld Nellie lifted up as a shield against the guns of the guards by a party of the escaping convicts. The little creature was deadly white and perfectly silent: her great blue eyes were wide and frozen with fright, and her little hands were clasped in entreating agony and stretched toward her mother.
"Stand behind me and shoot them down, governor," cried Lester, dealing steady blows with the now broken chair, and trying to make his own body a shield for Mr. Denham. The governor continued to fire on the convicts, who were pouring in a steady stream down the stairs from out of the room where I had seen the shower of dust, and through the ceiling of which, as it was afterward, proved, they had cut a hole, and so escaped from the upper corridor of the prison.
I tried to hold Ruth in my arms, for in her frenzy to reach her child she had flung up the window and endeavored to drop from it at the risk of her life. "They will not dare to hurt her: God will protect her innocent life," was all I could say, when a random ball from below struck the window-frame, and, glancing off, stunned without wounding the wretched mother. She fell, jarred by the shock, and I drew her as well as I could behind the door, on the other side of which lay the two bleeding prisoners who had tried to take her husband's life.
Groans, shouts, curses, yells and pistol-shots sounded in the hall and on the stairs; only the back of the chair remained in Lester's grasp, but heaps of men felled by its weight and crushed by their struggling fellows had tumbled down and been kicked over the broken balustrade to the hall below.
The guards had rallied from their surprise, and sparing the escaped for the sake of the precious shield they bore, turned their fire upon the escaping, cutting them off until the whole corridor below was blocked with wounded, dead and dying. One more man appeared at the clerk's door: he was a powerful fellow with a horse-pistol and a stone-hammer. Lester had staggered back from a flying iron bar aimed at his head by a villain he struck at without reaching, and who had bounded down the stairs to receive his death from the guard's musket at the door. The prisoner with the horse-pistol saw his advantage, and, cursing the governor in blasphemous rage, aimed at him as he fled. Recovering himself, Lester struck for his arm, but not soon enough to stop the fire: the charge reached its object, but not his heart, as it was meant to do. It glanced aside, and Mr. Denham's pistol dropped: his right arm fell maimed at his side; but the field was clear, and Lester, catching the fallen pistol, went down the stairs over the bodies in a series of flying leaps.
"Where's my wife?" exclaimed Mr. Denham, turning round dizzily and trying to steady his head with his uninjured hand. "Tell her I've gone for Nellie;" and he made an effort to rush after Lester, but, reaching the top of the stairs, dropped suddenly upon a convict's body stretched there by his own pistol. Then I saw by the reddish hole in his trousers just below the knee that he had been wounded before, though he did not know it, and was now streaming with blood.
"Where's Nell? where's Edward?" asked Ruth, sitting up with a ghastly face, and looking at me in a bewildered stare.
"All right, all safe, tell the lady," cried a clear, exulting voice from below: "here's sweet little Miss Nellie, without a scratch on her."
It was Lester's shout from the yard, and it rang through all the building.
"Do you hear, Ruth? do you hear?" I screamed, beside myself with joy and thankfulness. "He has saved your husband a dozen times, that hero, and now he brings back your child to you. Oh, what a noble fellow! how I envy him his feelings!"
He was in the room by this time with Nellie in his arms: he heard me and gave me just one look. I never saw him again, but I never shall forget it, for it revealed the long agony of a blighted life that moment struggling into hope again through expiation. He did not wait for Ruth's broken cry of gratitude, but was gone as soon as the child was in her arms.
"Come, boys," I heard him cry cheerily outside, "lend a hand to help the governor to his room: he's got a scratch or two, and the doctor's coming to dress them. He will be all right again before we can get things set straight round here."
Governor Denham's wounds were not so slight as Lester hoped, but they were not dangerous, and when, to prevent my aunt's alarm for my safety (for the news of "the break" spread rapidly through the town), I parted from my friends before nightfall and rode back to the hotel as I had come, I left three of the most excitedly grateful and happy people behind me I had ever seen.
"I suppose it is no use to urge it further, Ruth darling," said her husband as we parted, "but I really wish you would go to San Francisco with our friend and let Nellie have a chance to forget the shock she has endured. You need the change too, if you would ever think of yourself."
"It is because I do think of myself that I prefer to remain where I am happiest," said Ruth decidedly. "As for Nell, she is a pioneer child, and will soon be as merry and fearless as ever. But, Jenny dear, we owe you an apology for the novel dinner-party we have given you. When you come back it will seem like a frightful dream, and not a reality, we shall all be so quiet and orderly again." As we stood alone in the hall, from which every sign of the late terrible conflict had been removed save the bloodstains that had sunk into the stone beyond the power of a hasty washing to obliterate, Ruth said in a low whispering tone that was full of pent-up feeling, "I told you that Lester was a murderer condemned for life, Jenny, but there were extenuating circumstances in connection with his crime. That is not his name we call him by: I do not even know his real one, but I am convinced that he belongs to educated and reputable people, and that he suffers the keenest remorse for the wild life that led him so terribly astray. He became desperately attached to a Spanish girl, who was married as a child to a brutal fellow who deserted her, and she thought him dead. She and Lester were to be married, I believe, when the missing husband reappeared and tormented them both. The girl he treated shockingly, and it was in a fit of rage at his abuse of her that Lester killed him; but appearances were all against the deed, and he was convicted of murder in the second degree and sentenced for life. Edward is kind and discriminating, and he pitied him. Lester told his story freely, and my husband gained his lasting gratitude by taking care of the wretched girl and paying her passage in a vessel bound for her native town in Mexico. The only favor we could show him here was to separate him from the wretches in the common prison by making him a 'trusty' or prison-servant. He understood our motive in doing so, and was very thankful and most reliable. What we owe him to-day you know: he makes light of it, protesting that he only picked up Nell from the gulch where the escaped convicts had dropped her on their way to the hills; but he cannot lessen the debt: it is too great to be calculated even."
The subsequent report proved that twenty-eight prisoners had conspired to effect the break, and by secreting the tools they wrought with in their sleeves passed in on Saturday from the wall-building to cut an entrance through the ceiling of their own corridor into the loft above Mr. Foster's room, through which they dropped while the family were at dinner, choosing that hour so as to produce a surprise and secure the child, who always went below with Lester to help carry up the coffee. Of the whole number, five were killed outright and six wounded: twelve escaped uninjured, but were nearly all afterward retaken; and five repented their share in the movement or lacked courage to carry it out, and so remained in the prison. The most interesting item of the whole came to me at San Francisco in my friend's letter. It said: "We are looking forward with great delight to your visit, and planning every pleasure our sterile life can yield to make it enjoyable. But you will not see Lester: he is gone. His pardon, full and entire in view of his courage and fidelity, and the manly stand he took against the murderous plotters, came on Monday last, and at nightfall he left the prison to go by the stage to meet the midnight train. 'To Mexico!' were his last words to us. Heaven bless him, and grant him wisdom and courage to retrieve the past and open a fair bright future!"
[From Friederich Bodenstedt's Aus dem Nachlasse Mirza-Schaffys.]
Aloft the moon in heaven's dome.
Sultry the night, tempests foretelling:
For the last time before I roam
I see the surf in splendor swelling.
A ship glides by, a shadowy form,
Faint roseate lights around me sparkle,
A gathering mist precedes the storm,
And far-off forest tree-tops darkle.
The silver-crested waves are lashing
The pebbly shore tumultuously:
Absorbed I watch their ceaseless dashing,
Myself as still as bush or tree.
Within arise fond memories
Of moonlight evenings long since vanished,
Once full of life as waves and breeze,
From this familiar shore now banished.
Hushed in the grove is the birds' song,
Spring's blossoms tempests caused to perish;
Yet what through eye and ear did throng
The heart for evermore will cherish.
While I was a teacher in the Illinois Institution for the Deaf and Dumb the following letters were written by some of the pupils. The first was written the day after Thanksgiving, and ran thus:
"DEAR MOTHER: We had Thanks be unto God, no school yesterday, Turkey mince-pies, and many other kinds of fruits."
The day after Christmas a boy wrote: "We had Glory to God in the highest, no school yesterday, and a fine time." What he really meant to say was, that they had a motto in evergreens of "Glory to God in the Highest," and they had also a holiday.
This motto, by the way, got up by the pupils themselves, was striking. It was placed over one of the dining-room doors, and the ceiling being very low it was necessarily put just under it. A single glance sufficed to show the utter impossibility of getting the "Glory" any higher.
The younger pupils write in almost every letter, "There are —— pupils in this institution, —— boys and —— girls. All of the pupils are well, but some are sick." This is English pretty badly broken.
These letters serve to illustrate a remark which Principal Peet of the New York institution made to me not long ago: "The great difficulty in instructing deaf mutes is in teaching them the English language." In this, of course, he had reference to the deaf mutes of our own country, and his statement appears, on its face, paradoxical. That American children should learn at least to read the English language, even when they cannot speak it, seems quite a matter of course. The fact is, however, different. The first disadvantage under which the deaf mute labors is the limited extent to which his mental powers have been developed. This deficiency is attributable to two causes—his deprivation of the immense amount of information to be gained by the sense of hearing, and his want of language. Before an infant, one possessed of all its faculties, has acquired at least an understanding of articulate language, it has but vague and feeble ideas. No clear, distinct conception is shaped in its mind. "Ideas," says M. Marcel in his essay on the Study of Languages, "are not innate: they must be received before they can be communicated. This is so true that native curiosity impels us to listen long before we can speak.... Impression ... must therefore precede expression." Real thought, therefore, it will be seen, grows with the child's acquisition of language—an acquisition which is obtained in the earlier years entirely through the organ of hearing. This principal avenue to the mind is closed to the deaf mute. It is evident, therefore, that, lacking these two fundamental sources of all knowledge, his mental growth is incredibly slower than that of the hearing child. All that can be learned by means of the other senses is, however, learned rapidly, these being quickened and stimulated by the absence of one. Hence, the deaf-mute child of eight or ten years of age often appears as bright and intelligent as his more favored playmate. The latter, however, has a store of knowledge and a fund of thought wholly unknown to the deaf mute.
But it is the want of written language, and the obstacles in the way of its acquirement, which constitute the chief disability of the deaf mute in the attempt to gain an education. If you set a child of seven years of age to learn Greek, requiring him to receive and express his ideas wholly in that language, you would not hope for any very clear expression of those ideas with less than a year's instruction, nor would you expect him to appreciate the delicate beauties of the Odyssey in that length of time. The progress of the deaf mute in any language, even the most simply constructed, is greatly slower than that of the hearing child. The latter is assisted at every step by his previous knowledge of his vernacular. The former does not think in words, as you have done from your earliest recollection. Undertake to do your thinking in a foreign tongue, of which you have but a limited knowledge: the attempt is discouraging. The deaf mute thinks in signs. This, his only vehicle of thought, is a hindrance instead of a help in learning written language, there being no analogy whatever between the two methods of expressing ideas.
With these tremendous odds against him the deaf-mute child is set to the task of acquiring a knowledge of written language. His ideas (in signs) shape themselves in this wise: "Horses, two, run fast." Of course he does not think these words. The idea of a horse, its shape and color, is probably imaged in his mind, or if the horse be not present to his sight, the sign which he uses for that animal comes into his thought. He next touches or grasps or holds up two of his fingers, which he uses on all occasions to express number. Then the idea of running by means of its sign, and lastly that of speed, suggest themselves, the last two, however, being probably closely connected, as in our own minds.
Observe, here, that the order in which the thoughts arrange themselves is different from the manner of those who think by means of words. The main idea is "horse," and he gives it the preference, as the older and more simply constructed languages always did. It is reserved for our cultured and perfected language to describe an object before telling what that object is. Who will say that it is according to philosophical principles that we say, "A fine large red apple," instead of "An apple, fine, red, large"? A deaf-mute boy tells me that he saw two dogs fighting yesterday. He explains it in signs in this manner: "Dogs, two, fight; first, second ear bit, blood much. Second ran, hid; saw yesterday, I." Thus the fact is arranged in his mind. Let him attempt to translate—for it is nothing but translation—this simple statement into English. The perplexity which first seizes the hapless school-boy over his "Gallia est omnis divisa in partes tres" is nothing to it. Like him, he must go hunting, as if for a needle in a haystack, for the word to put first. It is the last idea in his sign-sentence. Then he slowly learns to pick out the words and arrange them in English order—an order, as I said before, not founded on philosophical principles, but in most instances wholly arbitrary. This is by no means an easy task. Years of training do not ensure him against ludicrous lapses. A fair percentage of the whole number educated learn to construct sentences with tolerable accuracy; a smaller percentage of these acquire fluency, precision and, in some rare instances, grace of expression; but a large proportion never become good English scholars.
The method of beginning their instruction is by means of simple familiar objects, or, where these cannot be obtained, illustrations of them. A picture of a horse is placed, at one end of the teacher's blackboard. Instantly two fingers of each hand go up to the top of each little head. If it were a picture of an animal with longer ears, each would make an ass of himself. So far so good, only they do not know the name of this animal, familiar as they are with him. The teacher writes the name under the picture. The article "A" is also written, which, though it puzzles them, they must take on trust. It cannot be explained at this stage. The teacher then holds up an ear of corn. Of course they know that very well, and make the sign for it, shelling the fore finger. It is then laid upon the opposite end of the blackboard, and its name written under it. A short pause, with a glance first at the horse and then at the corn, soon brings out the sign for "eats," which is written in its proper place, and the sentence is complete. The little "ignorants," as they are dubbed by the older pupils, are then plunged head and ears into the task of learning to form the written characters as well as the construction of sentences. It is setting foot in an unexplored wilderness. No ray of light penetrates the darkness of that wilderness save the tiny torch just placed in their hands.
Mr. Isaac Lewis Peet, principal of the New York institution, before referred to in this paper, has lately been preparing a textbook for the use of deaf-mute instructors, which promises to be of great value. It reduces the whole of the earlier stages of instruction to a perfected system, by which each part of speech, with the various moods and tenses of the verbs, the different cases of nouns, etc., is brought out in successive stages entirely by means of sentences. A few illustrations will suffice to show the scope of the work, which promises to be of much value also in the ordinary school-room, for which it is likewise designed by the author. An object, such as a pitcher, is placed on the teacher's desk. A pupil is required to come forward and touch it. The teacher then asks the question, writing it upon the blackboard or spelling it upon his fingers, "What did John do?" Answer, "He touched the pitcher." A change from a boy to a girl brings out another pronoun; a change of objects, another noun; a change of actions, another verb.
In this way, by gradual, systematic stages, the language is taught by actual and constant use, the teacher doing away entirely with signs in the school-room. This is an end constantly aimed at in deaf-mute instruction, as it forces the pupils to use language instead of signs to express their thoughts. By constant effort at first, and constant practice, words gradually take the place of signs in their modes of thought, though not perhaps entirely.
Objective ideas are readily acquired by deaf mutes, their perceptive faculties being usually keen and quick. Abstract subjects are less readily apprehended, and sometimes cause great surprise. One Sunday morning Dr. Gillett, principal of the Illinois institution, had for the Scripture lesson in the chapel the "Resurrection." When he had made it plain and simple for the comprehension of the new pupils, some of the ideas, brought out by the lesson caused great astonishment, and even consternation among them. The little fellows shook their heads in utter skepticism at the thought of themselves dying.
"I'm not going to die," said one. "Sick people die: I'm well and strong;" standing on his feet and shaking his arms in attestation of the fact.
"But you will be sick some time," said Dr. G., "and you will have to die."
But they did not believe him in the least. The next morning one little fellow met the principal and said, "You said yesterday I was going to die: well, here I am, and I ain't dead yet."
On Monday morning, when they assembled in school, they were still full of the new ideas. "Dr. Gillett had said they all had to die: would they, truly?" they asked me. I could only confirm the statement. Whereupon they all began drawing graves, tombstones, weeping willows, and all such funereal paraphernalia upon the blackboards. It was a solemn scene, save for my own irrepressible laughter, which they thought very unaccountable when they learned that I must suffer a like fate. I explained as cheerfully as I could the delights of going to heaven, whereupon one boy burst into tears, saying he did not want to go to heaven: he would rather go home and see his mother.
One asked if we should go to heaven in the cars. I said I had been told that we should go through the air, perhaps fly there. A little girl immediately held up a wood-cut of a vulture, saying, "Ugly thing! I don't want to be one." A boy whose new skates lay spoiling for the ice in his trunk asked if he could skate there. Not having quite the faith of the author of Gates Ajar, I could not answer "Yes" unhesitatingly. A girl asked if fishes went to heaven. I answered "No." "Where, then?" I replied that we ate the fishes, but was greatly troubled afterward lest she should confound me with the question, "What becomes of the snakes?"
In addition to the ordinary one-hand alphabet, the only one commonly used by deaf mutes, there are five others. One of these is the two-hand alphabet, sometimes used by hearing children at school. It is clumsy and inconvenient, however. A second is made by the arms alone. Still a third is formed by means of the body and arms also, in various positions, to represent the different letters, and is used in signaling at a distance. It is not often learned by deaf mutes, however. A fourth is made entirely with the feet. But the most curious of all is the facial or expression alphabet. Various emotions and passions expressed on the face represent, by means of their initial letters, the letters of the alphabet. Thus, A is indicated by an expression of avarice, B by boldness, C by curiosity, D by devotion, etc. This alphabet is sometimes so admirably rendered that words can easily be spelled by means of it by the spectators.
Deaf mutes also excel in pantomime. A large amount of gesture and pantomime is naturally employed in their conversation, and it thus becomes easy to train them to perform pantomimic plays. I have seen one young man, a deaf mute, whose narration in this manner of a hunter who made a pair of buckskin breeches, hung them up during the summer, drew them on when the rainy season came on, and found a hornet's nest within, was interpreted amid roars of laughter. Thus told, it was far more vivid than words could have possibly made it, and infinitely more amusing.
The sign-language, growing slowly from natural signs—i.e., signs representing the shape, quality or use of objects, or the action expressed by verbs—has at length become a perfected system. This language is the same throughout Europe and America, so that deaf mutes from any country of Christendom who have acquired the regular system can readily communicate with each other, however diverse their nationality. Being formed from analogy, many of the signs are exceedingly expressive. Thus, the sign for "headache" is made by darting the two forefingers toward each other just in front of the forehead. The sign for "summer" is drawing the curved forefinger across the brow, as if wiping off the sweat. "Heat," or rather "hotness," is expressed by blowing with open mouth into the hand, and then shaking it suddenly as if burned. "Flame" and "fire" are represented by a quivering, upward motion of all the fingers. The memory of the ancient ruffled shirt of our forefathers is perpetuated in the sign for "genteel," "gentility" or "fine." It is the whole open hand, with fingers pointing upward, shaken in front of the breast. "Gentleman" and "lady" are expressed by the signs for "man" (the hat-brim) and "woman" (the bonnet-string), followed by the ruffled-shirt sign. The sign for "Jesus" is doubtless the most tender and touching in the whole language. It is made by touching the palm of each hand in succession with the middle finger of the other. This represents the print of the nails. The name "Jesus" itself does not convey so pathetic and expressive a meaning as does this sign.
Hearing persons who understand the sign-language sometimes find it exceedingly convenient as a means of communicating when they wish to be private, I remember an amusing incident occurring at a festival which I attended while teaching in the Illinois institution. Another teacher and myself sat apart, surrounded by entire strangers. Near by stood a lady in a gorgeous green silk dress, with many gaudy accessories. My companion remarked in signs to me upon her striking costume. I replied in like manner, expressing my appreciation of so magnificent a proportion of apple-green silk. There was a great deal of lady, but a great deal more of dress.
"See them dummies, Jake," she remarked to her husband at her side, whose dazzling expanse of bright-figured velvet waistcoat and massive gold chain was in admirable keeping with his wife's attire. It was a landscape, begging the word, after Turner's own heart. "Them's two dummies from the asylum, I know," she continued. "Let's watch 'em make signs." And she gazed upon us from the serene heights of green sward with an amused, patronizing smile.
We dared not laugh. Dummies we had been dubbed, and dummies we must remain to the end of the scene. Were ever mortals in such a fix? We talked them over well, however, while suffering tortures from our pent-up emotions.
"That there one's rayther good-looking," ventured the proprietor of the velvet and gold.
"Not so mighty, either," said his wife, bridling. "Face is too chalky-like, and the other one is too fat." This was near being the death of us both, as the two critics together would have turned the scale at near five hundred. Consternation seized us just then, however, as we saw a fellow-teacher approaching us who would be sure to address us in spoken language and reveal us as two cheats. Hastily retreating from the scene, we made our way to an anteroom, where it was not considered a sin to laugh.
The instruction of deaf mutes in articulate speech has of late years attracted considerable attention in both Europe and America. In some of the European schools, in the Clark Institute at Northampton, Massachusetts, and in a few of our State institutions it is brought to great perfection. There are also special schools for this system of teaching in most of our large cities. The majority of pupils in these schools converse with ease, and understand readily what is said to them by means of the motion of the lips. The Clark Institute at Northampton, already referred to, under the conduct of Miss Harriet Rogers, is the largest and most widely known of the schools for this special method of instruction in this country. This is not a State institution, but one endowed by the munificence of a private gentleman, and consequently subject to none of the restrictions imposed on the public institutions. Of course, only the most promising pupils are sent there, and from these a careful selection is made, by which means the highest possible success is ensured. Some of the State institutions, however, burdened as they are with a large and unassorted mass of pupils, have made most encouraging progress in this direction. Of these, one of the most successful is the Illinois institution. In its last published report the correspondence between the principal and the parents of those pupils who have been taught by this method is given, showing the utmost satisfaction at the progress made and results attained.
Deaf mutes are divided into two classes—viz., entire mutes and semi-mutes. The first comprises those who either have been born deaf or have become so at so early an age as to have retained no knowledge of articulate speech. The second class embraces those who have lost their hearing after attaining such an age as still to be able to talk. Speech is more easily and perfectly learned if the pupil has learned to read before the loss of hearing. A knowledge of the sounds and powers of the letters enables him to acquire the pronunciation of new words with much greater facility than would be otherwise possible, giving him a foundation on which to build his acquisition of spoken language. To this last class, semi-mutes, articulation is invaluable, enabling them to pursue their education with less difficulty, and also to retain their power of communication with the outside world. In regard to entire mutes, the utility of the accomplishment is seriously questioned by some experienced educators. The fact must be admitted that, while a much larger number of entire mutes can be taught to converse intelligently and agreeably than would be imagined by those unacquainted with the results obtained, the great mass of the deaf and dumb must still be instructed wholly by means of written language. In most instances, to ensure success, instruction should be begun at a very much earlier age than it is possible to receive them into school, and constantly practiced by all who hold communication with the pupil, doing away entirely with the habit of using signs. It also requires pupils of bright, quick mind, keen perceptive faculties, and an amount of intelligence and perseverance on the part of the parents not found in the average parent of deaf mutes; for it is well known that a very large proportion of deaf mutes come from the poorer and more illiterate classes. This is mainly attributable to the fact that by far the larger number lose their hearing in infancy or early childhood through disease—scarlet fever, measles and diphtheria being probably the most frequent causes of deafness. Among those able to give skillful nursing and to obtain good medical aid the number of cases resulting in deafness is reduced to a minimum. Accidents, too, causing deafness, occur more frequently among those unable to give their children proper care. Congenital deafness is also probably greater among the laboring classes, and is undoubtedly due to similar causes.
The methods used in the teaching of articulation form a subject of much interest. The system has materially changed within the past few years. The first step to be taken is to convey a knowledge of the powers of the consonants and sounds of the vowels. Formerly, this was done by what was called the "imitation method." The letter H was usually the point of attack, the aspirate being the simplest of all the powers of the letters. The teacher, holding up the hand of the pupil, makes the aspirate by breathing upon his palm. This is soon imitated, and thus a starting-point is gained. The feeling produced upon the hand is the method of giving him an idea of the powers of the consonants. A later and better system is that called "visible speech." This is a system of symbols representing positions of the mouth and tongue and all the organs of speech, and if the pupil does what the symbols direct he cannot help giving the powers of the letters correctly. By this method a more distinct and perfect articulation is gained, with one-half the labor of the other method. As fast as the powers of the letters are learned, the spelling of words is undertaken. Many words are pronounced perfectly after a few trials: others, however, often defy the most strenuous and persevering effort.
Entire mutes who undertake articulation are like hearing children endeavoring to keep up the full curriculum of a modern school and pursue the study of music in addition: the ordinary studies demand all the energies of the child. Articulation consumes much time and strength. Exceptional cases are of course to be found which are indeed a triumph of culture, but the great mass of the deaf and dumb must always be content with written language.
Articulation is also exceedingly trying to the unused or long-disused throat and lungs. In this the teachers are likewise sufferers. The tax upon the vocal organs is necessarily much greater than that in ordinary speaking schools. But the disuse of the vocal organs in articulate speech does not indicate that they are wholly unused. A lady visiting an institution for the deaf and dumb a few years ago poetically called the pupils the "children of silence." Considering the tremendous volume of noise they are able to keep up with both feet and throat, the title is amusingly inappropriate. A deaf-and-dumb institution is the noisiest place in the world.
In summing up the results usually attained, let no discontented taxpayer grumble at the large outlays annually made in behalf of the deaf and dumb. If they learned absolutely nothing in the school-room, the intelligence they gain by contact with each other, by the lectures in signs, by intercourse with teachers, and the regular and systematic physical habits acquired, are of untold value. Add to this a tolerable acquaintance with the common English branches, such as reading, writing, arithmetic—one of their most useful acquirements—geography and history, and we have an amount of education which is of incalculable value.