Bell has given instruction in several of the schools, and has prepared teachers for others.

The early instruction of the deaf, and the establishment of new schools in Massachusetts and New York, have led to a large increase in the number of deaf scholars in those States since 1865: in Massachusetts, from 111 to 199; in New York, from 400 to about 650.

It is very generally believed that the system of instruction in the Clarke Institution is modelled upon that of the German schools. It is therefore due to Miss Rogers to say that, when our school was started, she knew only the fact that, in Germany, the deaf were taught by articulation. She visited several European schools in 1871, studied the methods pursued, and adopted such ideas as she thought of value to our Institution.

The results attained at the Clarke Institution, as shown by the graduating class in July last, exceeded our most sanguine expectations. The compositions attached to this Report will show the command of language and power of thought; the drawings hung on the walls of the hall, showed the skill of the teachers, and the great proficiency of the pupils. Those present at the commencement exercises, who heard their reading of selections, will testify to the distinctness of the articulation, the feeling of the speakers, and great excellence of the exercises, while their general proficiency must have satisfied every one that the instruction in articulation had not been at the expense of any other study.

GARDINER G. HUBBARD, President.

TERMS OF ADMISSION.

This Institution is especially adapted for the education of semi-deaf and semi-mute pupils, but others may be admitted. It provides for the pupil's tuition, board, lodging, washing, fuel and lights, superintendence of health, conduct, manners and morals.

The charges are three hundred and fifty dollars a year; for tuition alone, eighty dollars; payable semi-annually, in advance, the first week of each term. No deduction, except for absences on account of sickness. Extra charges will be made for actual expenses incurred during sickness. No pupil will be allowed to withdraw before the end of the second term in July, without weighty reasons, to be approved by the School Committee. The contract is for the entire school year, and is not terminated by the winter vacation.

The State of Massachusetts appropriates annually funds for the education of its deaf-mutes. Children aided by these funds must remain members of the school until dismissed by the proper authorities. The Institution, also, appropriates the income from its funds for the aid of beneficiaries from Massachusetts, according to their need. Forms of application for the State aid will be furnished by the Secretary of the Commonwealth, or by the Institution.

There are two terms in the year, of twenty weeks each, the first commencing on the third Wednesday of September, with a vacation of four weeks in winter; the second commencing on the first Wednesday of March,

with a summer vacation of eight weeks. Pupils cannot spend the vacations at school. It is desirable to have all applications for admission for the succeeding year made as early as June. The year begins on the third Wednesday of September. None will be admitted at any other time, unless they are fully qualified to enter classes already formed, and on payment of the full tuition for the term in which they enter.

The pupils must bring good and sufficient clothing for both summer and winter, and be furnished with a list of the various articles, each one of which should be marked; and also with paper, envelops and stamps. A small sum of money, not less than five dollars, should be deposited with the principal, each term, for incidental expenses.

Applications and letters for information must be addressed to Miss H. B. Rogers, Principal of the Clarke Institution for Deaf-Mutes, Northampton, Massachusetts, with a stamp for return postage. All payments should be made to the treasurer, Lafayette Maltby, Northampton.

Pupils must be at least five years old on entering the Institution, and must bring a certificate of vaccination, and a list of the diseases they have had. The Institution is not an asylum, but a school of learning; and none can be admitted or retained who have not the ordinary growth and vigor of mind and body, and good moral habits.

Visitors from Northampton are admitted Thursday afternoons. Strangers at all times, excepting Wednesday and Saturday afternoons, and Sundays.

PERKINS INSTITUTION.

[From the Trustees' Report of 1874.]

NATURE AND OBJECTS OF THE INSTITUTION.

The object of the Institution is to give to children and youth who have not sight enough to be instructed by the methods used in our common schools, a knowledge of the ordinary branches of education through the senses of touch and hearing; by means of oral instruction; by books, maps, etc., in tangible type: in a word, to be what a common school is to ordinary children. Besides this, to give such instruction to all, in vocal and instrumental music, as will be an accomplishment, and a source of pleasure to themselves and to others. Then, to give special instruction to those who possess talent and taste for music, and a special fitness for teaching music, or for playing the organ, or tuning pianos, to the end that they may be fitted to teach some branch of music as a profession.

All those who have not, by their organization, any talent or taste for music, receive only a general instruction in the elementary branches of it, as a part of their school course; but devote some time of each day to learning a trade in the workshop, and to acquiring a knowledge of some simple handicraft, by which they may earn a livelihood.

This object has been steadily pursued during forty-two years, at considerable cost, but with a gratifying measure of success. It aims at nothing which is merely ornamental, and is regarded as an accomplishment; but at training the pupils to consider work as their vocation, and preparing them to follow it seriously.

The best proof of the actual excellence of any establishment of this kind is the result, as shown by the condition of those who have been educated in it, and by the degree of their success in life.

There have been taught and trained in this Institution, 865, and graduated, 535, blind persons. Of these, 470 are known to be now alive; and probably there are more, though not so many as survive of graduates of ordinary schools. The actual condition of 406 of these is known, and may be expressed approximately as follows: 230 are earning a respectable livelihood; and 52 more are eking out their wants with what assistance their relatives or neighbors, or the town, may give them. Of the former, 92 are engaged either in teaching music successfully, or in tuning pianos and selling musical instruments, and are earning various sums from 200 to 2,500 dollars per annum. The remaining 138 follow various occupations, and are earning a comfortable livelihood, averaging from 180 to 700 or 800 dollars a year. Of this self-supporting class, 72 are married and maintain or take care of families; and many are laying up money for a rainy day; while

several are living on the income of their savings. As a whole, they maintain a more respectable position than the blind of most countries do. The example of so many blind persons living without accepting alms, but upon their own earnings, disabuses people's minds of the prejudice that blindness and pauperism are about the same thing, and that blind men and women are necessarily idle, and dependent upon charity in one form or another.

The effect of the labors of the score of institutions for the blind in the United States, has been to elevate the class in the good opinion of the community, and to increase their own self-respect.

HISTORICAL SKETCH OF THE FINANCES.

Some corporators may desire to know the past, present and prospective condition of the finances of the establishment; and therefore the following sketch, historical and otherwise, is given here.

In the year 1827-28 several gentlemen in Boston became interested in the matter of educating the blind, and formed themselves into a society. They raised a small sum by subscription to begin a school. They expended this in gathering knowledge of all that had been done in Europe in the matter of systematic instruction of the blind. After much discussion, and some rude experiments, they became convinced of the practicability of establishing a school which would be useful to the blind, and lighten their dark path in life.

None, however, expressed belief in the feasibility of accomplishing even a tenth part of the good which has since been realized.

This little society petitioned the legislature of Massachusetts for an Act of incorporation, which was granted in 1829, under the name, “An Act to incorporate the New England Asylum for the Blind," this name having been afterwards changed to that of the "New England Institution for the Education of the Blind," and again to its present one. This Act provided for the appointment of a board of visitors, composed of the governor, lieutenant-governor, president of the senate, speaker of the house of representatives, and the chaplains of the two houses. This board was authorized to appoint four persons to act as trustees in behalf of the State, with eight others elected annually by the corporation. It was afterwards abolished, and its powers and duties devolved upon the governor and council, as a more convenient arrangement.

Soon after the primary organization was complete, the trustees petitioned the legislature to bestow something in the shape of pecuniary supplies, to nourish and rear up the bantling which it had helped into the world. The legislature had, during several years, made an appropriation of $6,500, as a fund for paying for the education of deaf-mutes belonging to Massachusetts, at the American Asylum for Mutes at Hartford, Conn.; but as there were not applicants enough to exhaust the fund, the legislature voted to appropriate the unexpended balance to the new institution for the blind. As soon as this became a law, and the new institution went into operation, applicants for admission increased rapidly; more funds were needed, and the legislature generously came to its aid, by an outright annual appropriation of $6,000, upon condition that the governor should have the right to recommend twenty blind children of indigent parents, inhabitants of Massachu

setts, as beneficiaries of the State, whom the Institution was bound to receive and educate gratuitously. The number of beneficiaries so sent, and whom the Institution was required to receive gratuitously, gradually increased as the amount of the annual grant was raised, until, it having reached the sum of $30,000, the Institution practically covenanted to receive, and does receive, ALL blind children belonging to the State, who are suitable subjects, and recommended by the governor. So that, virtually, all blind children belonging to Massachusetts have a legal right to instruction at the cost of the State. Thus an expensive course of instruction is as free to blind children, in a special institution, as instruction in common schools is to seeing ones. But, moreover, and in order to equalize, as much as may be, the condition of the parents of blind children with that of the parents of seeing children, all of whom have a public school close by their homes, the State provides a central institution, and boards such blind children, gratis. Thus the State endeavors to lessen the burden which parents of blind children have to bear, by providing a central school at which they can be educated without more expense to them than their more fortunate neighbors have to bear, and without the sense of receiving charity. This wise and beneficent arrangement works happily; and the State pupils in our Institution are not considered as charity scholars, any more than those who attend common schools are considered as such. This is a great point gained; for, besides providing free instruction, it does, in some degree, prevent the untoward and humiliating effect which a sense of dependence upon charity is apt to produce upon the blind.

The State, moreover, is relieved from anxiety about the use of its money, for it has four representatives in the Board of Trustees, and can supervise its expenditure.

PRINTING FOR THE BLIND.

Our printing-office was the pioneer in the work of printing books for the blind in the United States; and it still works, with occasional stops for lack of funds. The amount of printed matter which has been issued from it is greater than that published at any other institution.

There is a constant demand for additional books; and if the work of printing is temporarily suspended, it ought to be renewed as soon as funds can be properly appropriated to it. Occasionally, some beneficent person or society supplies the means of printing some particular work, for distribution among indigent blind persons. The last was an edition of "Selections from the Writings of Emanuel Swedenborg," costing $1,116.50, and paid for from the fund which a benevolent blind lady (Mrs. Lydia S. Rotch) left to the "New Jerusalem Society."

Funds are much needed for printing more books, both of an educational and a literary character. Many blind persons who have learned to read, now live scattered over the country, but are unable to have access to the few collections of books, which are to be found in large cities only.

The Trustees recommend this form of practical beneficence to those who have funds to dispose of, and who wish to witness a speedy return of good therefrom.

Whoever will furnish means, may have the gratification of conferring