art of teaching." The Emperor Joseph bestowed a still more flattering notice upon these labours. After witnessing the success of the Abbé de l'Epée, he resolved to found in his own dominions an institution so necessary to the wants of his subjects. During two hours and a half, the qualifications. attainable by the deaf and dumb, when their powers have been properly developed, were attentively regarded by the Emperor, who had in his thoughts a young lady of high birth at Vienna in this deplorable state, whose parents wished to give her a Christian education. On being consulted as to the measures to be taken for this end, the Abbé offered either to educate the young lady gratuitously, if she were brought to Paris; or to instruct any intelligent person, who might be sent to him, in the method to be pursued. The Emperor accepted the latter proposal, as it opened the prospect of permanent relief for others of his subjects who might be in the same affecting circumstances. On his return to Vienna, he addressed a highly flattering letter to M. de l'Epée by the Abbé Storch, the person whom he selected for introducing the education of deafmutes into his dominions. The Abbé Storch is spoken of by the Abbé de l'Epée as "filled with the purest sacerdotal spirit, and amply endowed with every talent his mission could require." A royal institution for deaf-mutes was founded at Vienna, which was the first national establishment ever erected for the deaf and dumb.

A subject of painful and anxious interest occupied the thoughts of the Abbé de l'Epée during his declining years. He had solicited from government an endowment to perpetuate his institution after his own death, but he obtained only promises. However, he knew that his art would exist in Vienna if it should be forgotten at Paris, and this gave him

some consolation. When the Emperor Joseph visited his institution he expressed his astonishment, that a man so deserving had not obtained at least an abbey, whose revenues he might apply to the wants of the deaf and dumb. He offered to ask one for him, or even to give him one in his own dominions. "I am already old," said M. de l'Epée : "if your majesty wishes well to the deaf and dumb, it is not on my head, already bending to the tomb, that the benefit must fall, it is on the work itself."

M. de l'Epée found, however, some feeling hearts in France. Many masters, taught by him, carried the fruits of his instructions into different cities in that kingdom, as well as into foreign countries.

At Bordeaux an establishment had been formed by the archbishop, M. de Cicé, which owed its celebrity to its instructor, the Abbé Sicard, a young priest who had been sent to learn the theory and the practice of the method employed by the illustrious teacher at Paris. It is said by De Gerando, that "the pupil soon became acquainted with his master's views, and seized them with enthusiasm." He was eminently calculated to see their value. Gifted with a vivid and fertile imagination, he had a singular ability in clothing abstract notions in sensible forms; he had a particular talent for that pantomime which is the proper language of the deaf-mute, and which the Abbé de l'Epée had proposed to carry to a high degree of development in his system of methodic signs: endowed with an enterprising and flexible mind, he would search for and discover new and various modes of expressing and explaining ideas and precepts. He appeared to possess a kind of natural talent for communicating with deaf-mutes. This was the man who was destined to succeed M. de l'Epée. His talents and his virtues proved him to be worthy of receiving that inheritance of

glory and of beneficence.

His successes filled his

A

master with joy, who, in the overflowing of his hopes, said to him one day, "Mon ami, j'ai trouvé le verre, c'est à vous d'en faire les lunettes." testimony as honourable to the as to the talent of the other. possession of his master's ideas; loped and extended them by his own clear and analytical mind.

modesty of the one, Sicard was in full amply has he deve

If the Abbé de l'Epée was not the first inventor of a system for teaching the deaf and dumb, he was the first who benefited society by any extensive application of the discovery. We hesitate not to assert that he was an inventor of great merit, particularly as regards those details which made the discovery of service to those for whose instruction it was designed. Previous to his time, it had been discussed rather as a possible, than as an extensively practicable, art; and the few persons who had been previously instructed must be viewed more as the results of experiments to test philosophical principles, than as pupils regularly and systematically taught.

The Abbé de l'Epée died December 23, 1789. The Abbé Fauchet, preacher to the king, pronounced his funeral oration; but next to his mute eulogists in all countries, M. de Bébian and M. Bouilly have been the means of making known his fame and his merits to the world. From their writings much of the present Memoir is derived. M. de Seine, a deaf-mute pupil of the Abbé de l'Epée wrote the following distich, to be placed under the bust of his benevolent teacher :

i

"Il révèle à la fois secrets merveilleux,

De parler par les mains, d'entendre par les yeux."

BENJAMIN FRANKLIN was born at Boston in New England, January 6, 1706. His father was a nonconformist, who had emigrated in 1682, and followed the trade of a tallow-chandler. Benjamin was one of the youngest of fourteen children, and, being intended for the ministry, was sent for a year to the Boston Grammar School; after which, poverty compelled his father to remove him, at ten years old, to assist in his business. The boy disliked this occupation so much, that he was bound apprentice to an elder brother, who was just established at Boston as a printer. Though but twelve years of age, he soon learnt all his brother could teach him; but the harsh treatment he met with, which he says first inspired him with a hatred for tyranny, made him resolve to emancipate himself on the first opportunity. All his leisure time was spent in reading; and having exhausted his small stock of books, he re

sorted to a singular expedient to supply himself with more. Having been attracted by a treatise on the advantages of a vegetable diet, he determined to adopt it, and offered to provide for himself, on condition of receiving half the weekly sum expended on his board. His brother willingly consented; and by living entirely on vegetables he contrived to save half his pittance to gratify his voracious appetite for reading. He continued the practice for several years, and attributes to it his habitual temperance and indifference to the delicacies of the table.

Some time before this the elder Franklin had set up a newspaper, the second ever published in America, which eventually gave Benjamin a pretext for breaking through the trammels of his apprenticeship. In consequence of some remarks which gave offence to the provincial authorities, the former was imprisoned under a warrant from the Speaker of the Assembly; and his discharge was accompanied with an order, that "James Franklin should no longer print the New England Courant " In this dilemma the brothers agreed that it should be printed for the future in Benjamin's name; and to avoid the censure that might fall on the elder as printing it by his apprentice, the old indenture was cancelled, and a new one signed which was to be kept secret; but fresh disputes arising, Benjamin took advantage of the transaction to assert his freedom, presuming that his brother would not dare to produce the secret articles. Expostulation was vain; but the brother took care to spread such reports as prevented him from getting employment at Boston. He determined therefore to go elsewhere; and, having sold his books to raise a little money, he set off without the knowledge of his friends, and wandered by way of New York to Philadelphia, where he found himself at seventeen with a single dollar in his pocket, friend