and distinctness of delivery is indispensable. When the children reach him from the Old Kent-road, Dr Elliott tries them orally. If, after the year's exhaustive trial to which they have already been subjected, he comes to the conclusion that the child is incapable of doing any good under that system, he puts it to a sign class. Many who are treated thus could, no doubt, be taught orally, if the teacher could give them continuous individual attention; but in a large institution this, as has been said, is impossible. Moreover, the time allowed is barely sufficient to enable everything desirable to be done with the most promising. Parents naturally are very anxious that their children should be taught to speak, and the joy of a mother and father who send their child to the Asylum a mute, and receive it back years later with a voice, and an eye which is a fair substitute for the ear, can well be imagined. Sometimes, however, all the patience, and ingenuity of man are incapable of teaching the child to articulate, and in this case, if the parents have set their heart on the oral system, the disappointment is terribly keen. One child I saw cannot get beyond a squeak which, heard in the dark, would be taken for that of a mouse. Elliott put her into a sign class, but the sorrow of the mother induced him to give the little one another trial. The experiment is more considerate for the mother than the child, who is, I should venture to say, undoubtedly, orally hopeless. A visit to the gymnasium, where the girls shown in the accompanying picture went through a variety of difficult exercises in a manner which frequently compelled my unheard applause, was particularly interesting. What a Spartan race English women would be if they were all trained to the muscular exercise which the deaf girls at Margate undergo! It is not surprising to hear that they give the visiting medical man of the Asylum very little to do.
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EVAN WILLIAMS (AGE 9). RHODA PIPPECK (AGE 10).
After dinner at one o'clock, the boys had some dumb-bell and club practice. They are well disciplined by a teacher who takes
