Blindness

inability to see. Some children are blind from birth, others are blinded by accidents. Watchmakers not infrequently lose their eyesight from intense looking at small bits of wheelwork. Chemical fumes are injurious to the eyesight. Glassblowers and iron smelters frequently lose their sight, and in old age the humors of the eye are likely to dry up. The last United States census placed the number of the blind at 50,568.

The sense of hearing is likely to be developed in the blind to a high degree. Many become skillful piano tuners, teachers of music, and organists in churches. They are obliged to rely on their other senses, so that the sense of touch becomes very acute. It becomes so fine in some cases that they can detect counterfeit coin without hesitation. Many blind people find employment, also, in factories as makers of baskets, rope, twine, and matting. Special efforts have been made to educate the blind and to print books for their use. For a long time the plan of embossing or raising the surface of paper to imitate the shape of ordinary letters was followed. About a third of the blind become able to read raised print readily by following it across the page with the tips of the fingers.

Of late, the raised letter method has been abandoned, largely at least, in favor of a system of points pricked upward in the paper. Each sound has its particular point or points, which the finger can recognize more readily than the raised letter. The blind are able to write by pricking out their sentences on the wrong side of the paper. They take great satisfaction in exchanging letters of this sort. They keep their business accounts in the same manner. Typewriting machines have been made for the benefit of the blind with type that pricks holes in the paper.

The London library for the blind contains 8,000 volumes. An average volume in ordinary type makes from ten to fifteen bulky volumes in the Braille system. The Bible occupies thirty-five volumes. The library includes the most famous English novels, histories, and biographies.

In 1879 Congress set aside an appropriation of $250,000 to be invested in United States bonds, the income to be used annually in printing texts and miscellaneous books for the blind for free distribution to schools in the several states in proportion to their attendance. The catalogue of books thus available already includes the best literature, and standard works in every branch of science, history, and art. Ten thousand dollars a year is paid from this fund to the American Printing House for the Blind at Louisville, Kentucky, to be spent in point printing. A reading room for the blind has been set apart in the new Congressional Library at Washington. The United States postal service carries books to and fro free for the blind.

The Maryland School for the Blind has issued a dictionary of 40,000 words in eighteen volumes. The blind have two or three point print periodicals of their own, and quite an extensive musical library. In printing point or braille, as it is called, the copy is first pricked in a sheet of brass. Any number of sheets of paper may be pricked by pressing them on the sheet of brass. Point printing or braille is largely the invention of Louis Braille, an ingenious blind Frenchman. The first ten figures used to represent the first ten letters of the alphabet, also the ten figures or digits of arithmetic, are as follows:

Braille is written by placing a strip of perforated tin on the paper. The tin is divided into small checks or squares each containing six holes in the form of Each check is for a letter. The writer pricks holes through such perforations as will form the desired letter. The slip of tin is slid down the page as the work progresses. Braille writing is really a sort of stencil work consisting entirely of pin holes. Several copies may be pricked at the same time.