emancipated humanity. The
lightning flash which illuminated the heaven of the poets and
philosophers fell also on the fetters of the slave, and showed them to
the thinking world as a disgrace no longer to be tolerated by civilized
peoples.

I recall my first years of life in Boston as nearly touched by the sense
of the unresolved discords which existed in its society. My husband was
much concerned in some of the changes of front which took place at this
time. An ardent friend both of Horace Mann and of Charles Sumner, he
shared the educational views of the first and the political convictions
of the second. In the year 1845, having been elected to serve on the
Boston School Board, Dr. Howe instituted so drastic a research into the
condition of the public schools as to draw upon himself much
animadversion and some ill-will. Horace Mann, on the other hand,
characterized this work as "one which only Sam Howe or an angel could
have done."

Dr. Howe and Mr. Mann, during their travels in Europe, had become much
interested in the system of training, new at that time, by which
deaf-mutes were enabled to use vocal speech, and to read on the lips the
words of those who addressed them. Soon after his return from Europe,
Mr. Mann published a report in which he dwelt much on the great benefit
of this new departure in the education of deaf-mutes, and advocated the
introduction of the system into our own schools. Dr. Howe expressed the
same views, and the two gentlemen were held up to the public as
disturbers of its peace. My husband disapproved of the use of signs,
which, up to that time, had figured largely in the instruction of
American deaf-mutes, and in their intercourse with each other. He felt
that the use of language was an important condition of definite thought,
and hailed the new powers conferred by the European system as a
liberation of its pupils from the greatest of their disabilities, the
privation of direct intercourse with their fellow creatures. His advice,
privately sought and given, induced a number of parents to undertake
themselves the education of their deaf children, or, at least, to have
that education conducted at home, and under their own supervision. In
after years such parents and children were forward in expressing their
gratitude for the advice given and followed. The Horace Mann school in
Boston, and the Clarke school in Northampton, attest the perseverance of
the advocates of the new method of instruc