th
of the smaller letters. The letters extending above or below the line are
gauged by the ridge. The right hand is followed close by the left, which
guards the written lines from a second tracing of the pencil, and marks
the spaces. By these methods correspondence is maintained between the
blind and their distant friends, and it is even possible for a blind
merchant to keep his own books if necessary.

In writing the common script the pencil is always used, the pen never.
Care has to be taken to keep the pencil pointed, or much care and labor
may be lost. An incident which Mr. Loughery, founder of the Maryland
Institution, used to relate of himself, shows how necessary it is to
observe great care in this matter. When a student he wrote a long, gossipy
letter to a friend, and in a short time was surprised, and for the time
greatly annoyed, at receiving a reply asking him if he had gone mad. It
enclosed his own letter, and on examination of it the two words "Dear Ed."
were found to be its sole contents. In his absorbed condition of mind he
had not noticed the breaking of his pencil, and had proceeded with his
writing, as the scratched paper, on which the traces of the wood of the
pencil were visible, but not legible, indicated.

The most interesting things seen in an Institution for the Blind are the
apparatus for teaching geography, philosophy and physiology. For
geography miniature continents, states, hemispheres, etc., are used, in
which, the political divisions, the physical conformation and
characteristics, the rivers, lakes, seas, etc., etc., are reproduced as
nearly as possible. The boundaries are described by rows of raised dots,
the capital cities by studs of peculiar shape, the larger cities by studs
different in size or shape, the rivers by grooves in the surface, deserts
by spaces being sanded on the surface, the lakes, seas, etc., by
depressions, and the islands by spots elevated above the seas' surface.
Mountain ranges are shown by raised models or miniature mountains, and
that volcanoes may be fully understood, separate models of these and of
other remarkable formations are used, that the student, by a thorough
manual examination, may get a correct knowledge of them. In nearly every
school I have visited there were maps, the sub-divisions of which
consisted of movable blocks. Supported like a table, these maps would be
studied by the pupils taking out the blocks and returning them to their
places as they