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EXTRACTS FROM REPORT OF THE DIRECTOR The number of blind persons immediately connected with the establishment at the close of the last year was 163. There have entered since, 41; 31 have been discharged; so that the present number is 173. Of these, 157 are in the school department proper, and 16 in the work department. The first class includes 157 boys and girls; the second 16 men and women.

The general health has been good. No epidemic and no mortal disease have occurred. Most of those discharged bid fair to do well. Eight have been carefully trained in vocal and instrumental music and are earning their own livelihood.

Mention is made in the report of the trustees of the successful establishment in London, England, of a high school for the blind by Mr. F. J. Campbell, who, during eleven years, was our principal teacher of music, and my general assistant. He is entirely blind, and besides the valuable services which he rendered as teacher of music, he was of great use to the blind, as a living example of how much can be done by courage, energy and industry to compensate for the lack of sight.

When he communicated to me his plan for opening in England a high school for the blind, organized according to our American ideas of what such a school should be, rather than upon the model of the existing British schools, and asked my consent to his taking some of our most esteemed teachers to assist him, I could not refuse, because, beside my desire to aid him personally, I had a strong desire to see our system more widely diffused, and our ideas tested in a new field. I knew that Mr. Campbell would be more likely to succeed, and his establishment to take a high stand, with the assistance of trained teachers, of high moral character, than with such as he might pick up abroad.

Of course it gave to me, personally, much regret, and caused sorrow to all the inmates of the household, to part with such an assistant as Mr. Joel W. Smith, (a man of rare virtues, beloved and respected by all who know him; and to part with such teachers as the Misses Faulkner, Green and Howes; nevertheless, the sacrifice was cheerfully made in view of the great good which might result therefrom to the cause of the education of the blind.

If the enterprise succeeds, and the blind of Great Britain are benefited thereby, all those engaged in it will have the gratification of helping to pay back, in a small degree, the debt of obligation to the mother country for manifold services rendered by her to the cause of human beneficence.

Besides the loss of those valued teachers, the institution has lost the services of Mr. Daniel L. Bradford, who has served it faithfully in various capacities during more than thirty continuous years. But his impaired health prevented him from longer performing the active and trying duties of his place.

He has been a valuable assistant to me, and a useful officer of the institution. A mechanic of the old school, his knowledge of various mechanical branches was very useful in the alterations and improvements of the premises, and in the printing department.

During several years he has been steward. His watchfulness, industry and frugality have been felt in all the material interests of the establishment; and his kindness of heart has been more valuable still, because such qualities in a permanent officer pass into and help to form the character of the establishment. This institution has been Mr. Bradford's home, and the chief object of his thoughts and affections during the best years of his life. Such men as he build better than they know; and the good influences of his life and conversation will be felt in this institution long after his old familiar footstep and voice shall cease to be heard within its walls.

The most interesting event of the year was the Convention of Superintendents and Teachers of Institutions for the blind, held at this Institution.

Twenty establishments were represented by fifty-five superintendents and teachers.

It lasted three days, and called forth some interesting discussions of subjects connected with the education of the blind, and some new thoughts.

The presence of representatives from establishments of twenty States, some of which receive beneficiaries from adjoining States, show the general interest which is felt in the education of the blind, by the people of the United States; and the readiness of legislatures and people to pay liberally for promoting it; and of the rapid increase of the means of obtaining it. There was a general concurrence of opinion upon several important matters, although no vote was deemed necessary. Such as, that mental and instructive culture should underlie and form an important part of the course of education and training for all the blind, even those destined to mechanical pursuits. That the methods and processes of instruction in schools, and the various means used in education, should conform as nearly as possible to the most approved ones used with ordinary children and youth.

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That the multiplication of books in raised print, and the improvement of tangible apparatus of instruction, are of great importance.

That uniformity of type is desirable, but not essential.

BODILY TRAINING, COLD BATHING, &C.

All systems of education and instruction of youth which neglect the means of developing and increasing the general health, strength, and activity of the body, are faulty. But a system for the education and instruction of a class of youth marked by a special and abnormal condition of body, would be grossly faulty, if it neglected special means for counteracting, as far as possible, the effects of that condition.

Deaf mutes are an abnormal class; but their infirmity does not so much affect the healthy and normal development of the body as it does that of the mind. They are as strong, active and graceful as ordinary youth; hence they require physical training, as ordinary youth do, but no more.

But the infirmity of deafness prevents the development of natural speech, and the main purpose of the instruction of mutes is to find a substitute for that. On the other hand, the infirmity of blindness, while it does not primarily affect the normal development of the mental faculties, does affect and impair, very considerably, the development of bodily health, strength and activity. Hence the young blind almost universally lack the bodily vigor, activity and grace which distinguish all youth, even the deaf mutes.

As a class, they have all the mental faculties, the moral attributes, the social affections ready for development, and yearning for exercise; but they are comparatively puny in health, feeble in limb. It is plain to the eye that the standard of health and vigor among them is far below the average; and stubborn statistics show that they die comparatively young.

In a class of youth at an academy or college, a large proportion are healthy, ruddy, hardy, and boiling over with animal spirits; while here and there is sure to be one whose erect and graceful form, beaming countenance, elastic flesh, clean limbs and springy tread, liken him to young Apollo, straining for action in the field of life.

Among more than a thousand blind youth whom I have known, I cannot recollect more than three of the first class; not one of the second.

It can hardly be otherwise; how can they, darklings, stand erect; move freely and swiftly; feel the fire and flash of youth, and strain for action in the battle of life? The pluckiest of ancient warriors, stricken blind, could only sit mourning in his tent and say, "Give me to see, I ask no more."

But the worst of all is, that the natural effects of their sore infirmity are made tenfold greater by fond, foolish indulgence. Of all spoiled children, the worst and most persistently spoiled, are blind children. The most persistently spoiled, because while others may escape from the emasculating effect of fondling, when their tender years and dependent conditions no longer call out indulgent affection, the blind do not escape them, because their sore affliction, and their helplessness, makes the same appeal to compassion and affection which mere childhood always does. Ordinary children are required to do everything for themselves which they can possibly do; and blind children require this discipline even more than ordinary children; but the reverse is the case, and everything is done for them. Timid affection even restrains the locomotion which they yearn for; so that they are kept in babyhood and childhood as long as they can be. Almost all the boys and girls sent to this Institution show the sad effect of unwise indulgence. It has stunted them physically, mentally and morally. As compared with others, they are pale and puny; stooping in gait, timid of tread, and lacking in pluck.

It is said of idiots, that they have so little of the human desire for action, that they shrink even from the effort to think.

It is not so with the blind, at least of those presented here for admission; their natural bodily powers, their capacities, desires, resolutions, courage and yearnings for action, have not only not been well developed, but rather discouraged by their home training.

They generally bear the marks of languid circulation of blood, and this causes languid condition of all the bodily functions; and consequently of the whole system. They are not up to concert pitch with other youth.

The first thing needed was the correction of their low Condition of health and strength, as far as could be by correcting the habits engendered by their infirmity. Inaction, or feeble action of the muscular system, seemed the immediate cause of the general languor and feebleness of all the bodily functions. Freshly aerated blood is no more necessary to color the cheeks and lips, than it is to stimulate the brain to carry on healthy and vigorous thinking.

To bring up the blind, then, to their highest attainable standard of mental power, one must begin with bringing them up to the highest attainable standard of bodily health and activity. It was in this view that I initiated a system of bodily training which certainly was a novel one, at least in that class of persons. The means were, first, free and frequent gymnastics in the open air; second, the use of cold water within doors, not only with a view to cleanliness, but to its effect upon the arterial and general circulation.

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The pupils were required to go from school-room or music-room during the last quarter of every hour to the gymnasium, or into the open air; to take daily walks; to go through a severe drill in the gymnasium; to bathe daily in the sea, &c. They were taught to swim, and to row a boat.

They generally entered into these exercises with enthusiasm, which was so high at one time, that a class of girls learned to row a boat.

A complaint was made by some tender and timid persons, many years ago, that I endangered the life and limb of my pupils by the exercise in the gymnasium; similar to the complaint made last winter about my endangering their health by cold bathing, differing in the motive, however, as personal spite and itch for notoriety differ from real kindness.

Mr. George Combe, the eminent author of the "Constitution of Man," was then travelling in the United States. His attention was drawn to this matter, and his keen, philosophical eye took in the whole bearings of the matter at once.

In his "Tour in the United States," Vol. 1, p. 228, after describing the Pennsylvania and other Institutions for the Blind, he says: --

"Further, Dr. Howe's pupils increase the extent and variety of the exercises which they are enabled to take, by climbing up poles, jumping over beams, and performing other athletic feats. Here it is believed to be dangerous to do such acts, and the pupils always keep on the ground.

"It appears to us that Dr. Howe has a bold, active, enterprising mind, and to a certain extent he impresses his own character on the minds of his pupils.

"He enlarges the practical boundaries of their capacities by encouraging them to believe in the greatness of their natural extent."

This was the gist of the whole matter. "I sought to enlarge the practicable capacities of the blind as a class by encouraging them to believe in the greatness of their natural extent."

It seemed to me that when I had brought a puny, timid blind boy from lolling on the sofa, or exercising in a rocking chair, to plunge boldly into the sea, to swim manfully, to row a boat, and to do a hundred things unthought of at home, I had practically enlarged the boundaries of his capacities.

There was a certain risk in all this, as there must be in all physical training. Some boys may be ruptured in gymnastic exercises; may be drowned while learning to swim; may be killed in learning to ride; may break a leg kicking football; may walk, run, row to excess; but shall we give up teaching manly exercises for fear of such possible consequences?

Cold bathing formed merely an adjunct to my system of physical training, which required plentiful but simple diet, exercise in the open air, gymnastics within doors. But circumstances require that special notice be taken of that adjunct. A man's personality must necessarily be carried into his works; and my faith in the virtue of cold water has doubtless had something to do with its general use here.

Cleanliness is a high virtue; uncleanliness is sin.

I hold that no living human body wearing clothes, can be strictly clean, unless every part of it is washed every day. A corpse that has ceased to throw effete excretions upon the surface, may be washed once and forever.

The effete excretions thrown upon the skin of every living person at every moment, should be removed once a day, at least by water; especially from those persons in whom the circulation is languid, and the bodily functions are not performed vigorously and healthfully. In such persons the effete excretions are not only dead matter, but nasty matter. It is decidedly so with lunatics as a class, and with idiots; and to a certain extent with all those whose condition induces bodily inaction, as blindness, imprisonment, &c.; also in those who take very little bodily exercise. The bodily system of a healthy and robustuous person in full exercise, repels vigorously unwholesome agencies and he is less sinful, therefore, going unwashed, than is a feeble and sickly person,

The argument that unwashed men and women are well enough, and live as long as other people, has not the slightest weight with one who believes that it is by such sins as uncleanliness that death enters into the world, and still extorts from mankind the tribute of more than half the years of its heritage, and who firmly believes that by repentance and religious obedience to natural laws, our length of days may be doubled; and what is more important, that they may be passed without any bodily sickness and suffering.

But daily cold bathing was adopted into my system of physical training, not wholly with a view to cleanliness, but as a powerful hygienic, and even moral agency.

It was to help quicken the languid circulation so common among the blind, and to give tone and vigor to the body. It was to help strengthen the will, and give moral hardihood.

Being in the prime of life, I led the way myself in sea-bathing, as in other bodily exercises.

We had a bathing-house on the seashore, with a stove inside, and took a plunge every morning until late in the season. I remember keeping it up myself, for several seasons, until after Christmas; though I did not exact it of the pupils.

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I trained my own children to the cold morning bath. I have persisted in the habit myself, tempering the water as I grow older; and I attribute to this practice, in part, the preservation of more bodily vigor at threescore and ten, than my original constitution seemed to warrant the hope of.

As for the charges which have been made of cruelty in the enforcement of my rules about morning baths, they are too absurd to be noticed.

That children so indulged at home as blind children usually are, should shrink from cold water upon the skin is natural enough.

But the imaginary scenes of suffering in our bath-room which have been depicted, are mere bugbears, held up to the public for selfish purposes.

The water is never "icy cold." The rule is to have it drawn from the Cochituate pipes, in the afternoon, and stand over night, to acquire the temperature of the room. After the plunge the boy enters immediately into a room made very hot by a stove; and there applies vigorous friction. The attendant is directed that if a boy does not have a healthy reaction, that is, a glow upon his skin, the water is to be tempered; if still he has no reaction, he is to be excused. During last winter, about 10 to 15 per cent. of the pupils were excused habitually.

I maintain, therefore, that the system was wise, and the practice productive of good effects, physically and morally.

There were certain faults in the administration that I am happy to say will be corrected as soon the high pressure service is introduced into South Boston; this is promised in this month.

I have long regretted that the boys had to go down to the basement for their baths, but it seemed necessary.

The high service will carry the water to our third, perhaps fourth story, and I have taken measures to have bath rooms near to the sleeping rooms.

We shall also obviate, in a great degree at least, the second valid objection which has been urged against our practice; to wit, that of having more than one bathe in the same water.

I shall continue to take especial care, moreover, that the attendant shall be a sufficiently intelligent and reliable person to prevent any pupil taking a cold bath while under any temporary indisposition which should forbid its use.

I shall not, however, pay any greater attention to certificates of medical men, to the effect that A or B's constitution forbids use of cold bathing.

Such certificates are easily obtained by any fond mother who thinks her boy ought to be spared the shock of washing his hands in cold water, and have it daintily warmed for him. She might, indeed, get doctors to certify that a little wine at dinner would strengthen his system.

Having remedied, as far as possible, all defects in the administration of the cold baths, I shall continue to administer them unless prohibited by a vote of your Board; and shall recommend the practice to my successor as one of the most important features in our system of physical training, and well calculated to invigorate both the bodily and mental health of our pupils.

The allusions which I have made to our bodily training will explain its general character. It has been carried out with more or less rigor, according as I have been seconded by assistants who had more or less faith in it. There was a time, for instance, when most our boys and many of the girls, could swim well; could pull an oar, and showed considerable muscular vigor in gymnastic exercises; and then again, such exercises fall into comparative neglect. While I had the great advantage of the assistance of Mr. F. J. Campbell, himself totally blind, our system of physical training was carried to high perfection. He believed in it; and always lived up bravely to his belief.

He taught me useful lessons as to the capacity of the blind. I remember, after having had a talk with him about the duty of training our pupils to perform all sorts of work which it was possible for them to do, and to do the full share of domestic work, he persuaded a class of his boys to volunteer to wash and scrub the floors; and they did it long enough to show that they could do it well.

He introduced some exercises which can be maintained persistently only by those who possess great natural pluck and personal magnetism.