Excerpt from An Inquiry Into the Musical Instruction of the Blind: In France, Spain, and America, in a Letter to Samuel Henry Sterry, Esq. (Chairman), And the Other Members of the Committee of the School for the Indigent BlindThe music is not only read to the younger pupils, but intoned by the masters, whilst many of them write down on paper, by means of the frame and style of Mon. Braille (the French dotted system), the notes they are to commit to memory. There is great care taken that part music shall form one chief subject of instruction, as the directors very wisely foresee that if the blind are taught to play out of class, they will only, in after life, become itinerant street-players, and crowd the town as beggars. There are many pupils who write ¿uently on the Braille system, though there seems a great objection to its free adop tion, in consequence of its arbitrary diameter and they only wait the arrival of writing machines from England, to commence work with our ordinary writing frame. No trade or other manual employment is taught amongst the males, and, indeed, it is feared that they would be little inclined to avail themselves of instruction in manual labour, if offered to them. It is, how ever, in contempla tion to establish a more permanent school, after our English models, when it is expected that the government and municipality will not only help it with funds, but will cause the pupils to be instructed in trades. At present, the Spanish government only affords the building, the town furnishing the necessary means to carry on the school.About the PublisherForgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.comThis book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully, any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.