familiar with some letters of the alphabet. As she was entering her third year, the family were smitten by the scarlet fever. Two older daughters died of the fever, and Laura was attacked by it For seven weeks she could not swallow solid food, and then both eyes and ears suppurated and her sight, hearing and sense of smell were totally destroyed. For a year she could not walk without support, and it was two years before she could sit up all day. When she was live years old, her health was once more perfect, and her mind, unaffected by her distressful affliction, began to crave food. She had forgotten the few words she knew when she was smitten. Her remaining sense, that of touch, grew very acute. Her mother taught her to sew, knit and braid. Communication with her was possible only by signs that could lie given by touch. She was an affectionate, hut self-willed, child. Dr. S. G. Howe, director of the Institution of the Blind in Boston, heard of her, and she was placed in his charge 9th October, 1837. Dr. Howe, assisted by Mrs. L. H. Morton, of Halifax, Mass., developed a special system of training that accomplished wonders. A manual alphabet was used, and Laura learned to read and write in sixteen months, having acquired a considerable vocabulary. Her intellect developed rapidly, and she learned mathematical operations to a limited extent. Her case attracted a great deal of attention, and the system of instruction developed by Dr. Howe in her case was applied successfully to other children similarly deprived of their senses. Laura had no conception of religion up to her twelfth year, as her instructors purposely refrained from giving her any ideas of God until she was old enough to take a correct idea. She could not, as has been asserted, distinguish color by feeling. Laura was visited by many prominent persons, among whom were Mrs. Lydia H. Sigourney and Charles Dickens. The " Notes on America " mention Mr. Dickens' visit. George Combe, of Scotland, visited Laura in 1842, and at his suggestion arrangements were made to keep a full record of everything connected with the remarkable girl. By dint of training she learned to speak many words. Her imagination developed more slowly than any other faculty, and her moral ideas were perceptibly different, in some phases, from those of ordinary persons. Her education is fully recorded in Mary Swift Lawson's "Life and Education of Laura Dewey Bridgman," published in 1881.
BRIGGS, Mrs. Mary Blatchley, born in Valparaiso, Ind., 1st January, 1846. She is of Scotch, English and Dutch descent. The father was a practicing physician and surgeon of prominence in the allopathic school. Mrs. Briggs' early school-days were spent in the public schools of Iowa. Later her education was continued in the young ladies' seminary in Council Bluffs, Iowa, receiving prizes for excellent scholarship. In the month of August, 1861, her family removed to Ouincy, III., where she resumed her studies and there enjoyed the advantages of the best schools until she was nineteen years old. In religious belief Mrs. Briggs is strictly a Presbyterian, was born "in the faith," and has always lived the radical life of a consistent Christian. Rev. F. S. Blayney, LL.D., the first pastor of the Second Presbyterian Church of Omaha, writes of Mrs. Briggs's practical and valuable aid during the long and severe trials from 1880 to 1886 in the struggle to found and build his church, she being one of the foremost workers for the society's welfare. She has always taken a vivid interest in public characters and the local and foreign politics discussed in the newspapers. She was married to John S. Briggs, 24th December, 1867, since which time they have resided in Omaha, Neb. Mr. Briggs was born in Ohio, but was reared in Iowa,
MARY BLATCHLEY BRIGGS.
removing to Nebraska in 1856. He is the son of the late Ansel Briggs, first governor of the State of Iowa. To Mr. anil Mr*. Brings three promising children have been born. Mrs. Briggs as filled many important public positions. During eleven years she served as assistant secretary, superintendent, reporter for the press, and manager of county. State and inter-state fairs. While on a visit to Idaho, she and her husband prepared a collection of minerals, stalactitic and calcareous deposits, which, at the suggestion of the officials of the Union Pacific Railroad, was sent to the Mechanics' Institute in Boston, Mass. Mrs. Briggs is interested in art and is secretary of the Western Art Association, which has three-hundred members. In literature she has won an assured position by her poems, one volume of which has been compiled and published. Mrs. Briggs was selected by Mrs. Potter Palmer as one of the six representative women of the West to serve on the executive committee of the Board of Lady Managers of the World's Columbian Commission for the Exposition in 1893. She was appointed a member of the bylaws judiciary committee and was elected an honorary and corresponding member of the woman's branch of the World's Congress Auxiliary, and served on several committees. She possesses an intimate knowledge of Nebraska, its history, its resources, its development and its people
BRINKERHOFF, Mme. Clara M., singer and musical educator, born in London, England, 8th September, 1828. She is the daughter of Mr. and Mrs. John A. Rolph. cultured people, who came to the United States when Clara was an infant. Her father was an artist, whose specialty was steel engraving. Her mother was an artistic, literary and musical woman, with a fine voice that
