f feeling. _The ends of the fingers_, resting
upon the raised letters, thus constitute, in part, _the eyes of the
blind_. This, although apparently difficult, becomes comparatively easy
when the blind person possesses the _sense of hearing_, and is thus
enabled to become acquainted with spoken language. On the contrary, the
_deaf_, and consequently _dumb_, are unable to acquire a knowledge of
spoken language so as to use it with any degree of success. In their
education, hence, the _language of signs_, which can be addressed to the
eye, is substituted for spoken language. In communicating with one
another, by means of the _manual alphabet_, they substitute positions
of the hand, which they can both make and see, for letters and words,
which they can neither pronounce nor hear.

To be deprived of either sight or hearing was formerly regarded as an
almost insuperable obstacle in the way of education. Persons deprived of
both these senses have heretofore been considered by high legal
authorities,[23] as well as by public opinion, as occupying, of
necessity, a state of irresponsible and irrecoverable idiocy. By the
education of the remaining senses, however, this formidable and
heretofore insuperable barrier has been overleaped, or, rather, the
obstacle has been met and overcome. The experiment has been successfully
tried, once and again, in our own country. The deaf and blind mute has
not only acquired a knowledge of reading and writing, and of the common
branches of education, but has been enabled successfully to prosecute
the study of natural philosophy, of mental science, and of geometry. The
accomplishment of all this has resulted from the successful cultivation
of the sense of touch or of feeling. The raised letter of the blind has
been used for written language, and the manual language of the mute,
taken by the _finger-eyes_ of the blind, has been successfully
substituted for spoken language.

[23] A man is not an idiot if he hath any glimmering of reason, so that
he can tell his parents, his age, or the like matters. But a man who is
born deaf, dumb, and blind, is looked upon by the law as in the same
state with an idiot, he being supposed incapable of any understanding,
as wanting all the senses which furnish the human mind with
ideas.--_Blackstone's Commentaries_, vol. i., p. 304.

Laura's mind dwelt in darkness and silence. In order, therefore, to
communicate to her a knowledge of the arbitrary