abet in one day, but I was not a child and had a
mind sharpened by experience. By constant exercise the sense of feeling
becomes so acute that very slight differences of form are readily
detected, and reading by the touch becomes an easily mastered art. Having
thus the key of knowledge the subsequent progress of the student is in his
own hands, and, to the credit of the afflicted, it must be said it is
generally very rapid, one reason for which is that loss of sight shuts off
one fruitful source of distraction, and the mind is more easily
concentrated. Another reason is that the necessity for education is
generally appreciated, and the student is eager to acquire it.

The form and use of figures is taught in a similar manner, but the
teaching of arithmetic is largely mental, on account of the difficulty of
producing raised figures with sufficient rapidity, and the study of higher
mathematics is pursued even more strictly from oral teaching.

The art of writing, which, to those not acquainted with the educating of
the blind, is considered the most difficult task, becomes comparatively
easy. It is a two-fold art, including the art of writing for blind readers
and the ordinary Roman script. Of the "blind writing" there are several
systems, but in this I shall be content to describe but two--the pin type
and the "New York Point System." The first consists of movable types, the
letters on which are formed of pin points, and with which the writer
impresses the paper one letter at a time, producing the letter raised on
the opposite side of the paper, which, on being reversed, may be read with
eye or fingers. The point system is the arrangement and combination of six
dots on two lines. Those on the upper line are numbered 1, 3 and 5, and
those on the lower 2, 4 and 6. These are made within spaces about
three-sixteenths of an inch square each, by a styles which resembles a
small, dull awl or centre punch. To prevent the dots being confused the
writer uses a writing board, to which the paper is clamped by a metallic
guide-rule perforated with two or more rows of these squares. The pupils
make these punctured letters with great precision and rapidity, and
frequently conduct their correspondence with their friends by that means,
giving them the alphabet and key by which to learn to read them.

The writing of ordinary script is performed with more difficulty. A
grooved pasteboard is used for the purpose, the grooves being of the wid