Ealing College receives only the children

of parents who can afford to pay a first- class price for hrst-class attention and (rst- class results. How fare the afflicted when their lot 1s cast less pleasantly ? the thousands of children of descrving, as well as of pauper, parents brought into the world deprived; so to of their cars? The 1stitution re- terrcd to at the beginning of this paper as the only public one in existence at the beginning of this century is the Asylum im the Duli and Dumb founded just one

poor but

hundred years ago, in Bermondsey, and subsequently removed to the Old Kent-

road, where it has now a splendid home.

[n the course of this year the centenary of

the Asylum will be publicly celebrated, and much will,no doubt, be published descriptive

of 1ts gre cat and g()()cl work. The mstitu- ‘lon was from the first a success, and since its commencement 2,000 deal and dumb children have been received and educated by it, some 2,000 having been apprenticed to at a cost of about AL 18,200, A3 the Asylum grew, 1t was deemed iw Lo establish a b,andl the scaside, and 1f the philanthropists who inaugurated it with halt a dozen inmates m 1792 could sce the outcome of their work m two imposing institutions—once in the Old Kent-road, the other at the south-east corner of Margate, they would have cause to fecl that then lives had not been spent in vain. The children, who are born of poor parents— grooms, gardeners, carpenters, carmen, working men of all kinds, arc sent for a year to the Old Kent- road, and arc then drafted to Margate, mn addition to receiving the best education which a large school can supply, they receive also the health which 1s to be found on the North Kent coast, 1fzmyvhu c. The Asylum 1s 1n charge of D1. Elliott, to whose skill as a photographer we arc indebted for several of our picturcs. Dr. Elliott was one of the distinguished body of men whoat first tound it difficult to belicve that there was any thing in teaching by the oral system worth the time and trouble it involves, Experience has convinced him, as it has convinced others, that he was wrong, and, within the limits rigidly — prescribed by opportunity and nature, he supports the education of the deaf on the German system. ‘l'here arc at Margate 300 children, of whom all except ucrhty arc being tr ained to speak and to lip read. Fresh from Ealing as I was, I appre-

ciated instantly the difhiculties which beset

Dr. Flliott. At

What of

where the children are

FEDUCATED. 251 “aling cach child can receive individual attention. At the Mar- cate Asylum and similar institutions they are of necessity taught in classes of perhaps a dozen. Thé wonder is that under such circumstances they cver learn to articulate or to lip read at all. They do, however, and some of the results arc quite remarkable. Several children to whom I spoke under- stood what | said without apparent difhiculty, and some had wvoices so pleasant that 1 wondered whether,if the children had becn blessed with the organ of sound, they would not have made most excellent singers. Exigencics of space forbid me to go fully into all I saw and heard and did 10 a seven hours' visit to the institution, during which, under Dr. EKlliotUs guidance, 1 plawd the part of amatcur examiner cmd inspector of the deat and dumb. First I went over the whole place to geta general impression, and then s spent a considerable time with various classes. The great difficulty with the dumb is language. Signs indicating mere facts and Lhcv adopt n'ltumll, and arc not difficult to understand. [.anguage, however, whether they are to be taught to speak or not, they must have, if they are to u)mmumuu, mtglhmbl the hearing world. Dr. Elliott, by signs, asked a thld whose parents are both deaf and dumb. whether she had a brother deat and dumb, and 1f he went to school. Her answer m dumb motion was, * One-—school not vet— Londen.” Interpreted, this meant, I have 4 brother who has not yet gone to school. He s London.” To develop language, the silently taught children are made to write fully a description of the actions of the teacher ; the oral pupils, of course, lcarn language by specch. Dr. Elliott points to his hat, places 1t on his head, and tells a class of girls to write. Two make the mistake of saying that “he placed the hat 7z his head, and it is not the simplest thing in the to them the difference between * in* and “on.” The junitororal classes arce both sides of the classes s taught by signs. The notse they make moment: ml suggests that it must be very distracting for thc teachers and pupils in the intervening room. One forgets that neither teacher nor pupil by the sign system hears a sound, and that in the nndxt of the din they are in gquict. The best cachers of the deaf by signs arc the deaf, 1 sllou]d say, just as the best leaders and teachers of the blind are blind. For the oral classes, of coursc, a teacher with cars