Elizabeth Gilbert and Her Work for the Blind Part 14

On 6th May 1858 she writes in the diary:

Joined for the first time in the daily prayer and reading at the Repository [the a.s.sociation was known by this name]. This was what I had often wished to do. Saw Mr. Dale, asked for his schoolroom for a lecture for the benefit of the a.s.sociation; he gave leave.

Told him what F. B. was doing about the _Times_. Took four [blind persons] for reading, and think they are getting on. Saw Mr. Bourke for the first time; had a long talk with him; think he will be more active than he has been in seeking out the blind and looking into their condition. Saw Levy Esqre. [not the manager], who showed me specimens of turning done by Mestre at Lausanne, who is blind, deaf, and dumb. Got Mr. Levy to promise to attend the meeting, on the 18th. Talked with Levy [manager] about the meeting. Corkcutting to be introduced before Walker's life-belt is made. Talked about furnis.h.i.+ng carpenter as the next trade taught, also about embossed printing; think much might be done towards improving it....

_8th May._--Looked over, corrected, and altered proof of report.

Dictated a note to Levy about it. Wrote to Mr. Cureton, asking if he could lend his church for Dr. Thompson to preach in, in July, if not earlier. Wrote to Mrs. Jones asking about Dr. Thorpe's chapel, also to Mr. Eyre, asking him to preach at Marylebone Church. Sent papers to both clergymen. Received from Mrs. Sithborp her guinea subscription. Entered letters of yesterday and to-day. Dictated some notes and thoughts for the Common Place Book. It is a great pleasure to get some of these thoughts actually expressed. It gives them, as it were, a shape and a body, besides, I can never do what I wish without this, as I should never have the necessary materials. Saw Mary Haines. Wrote to Miss Repton.... Read a letter in two systems.

This allusion to "what she wishes" refers to her desire to write a book upon the condition of the blind. She had this object before her for many years, and prepared for it by acc.u.mulating statistics and information from every available source. She read the lives of blind men, books written by blind men, took copious notes, or had them taken for her, sometimes by her younger brother, sometimes by a sister. She "thought out" every statement made, every suggestion offered, with regard to the blind. Her book would have been singularly valuable. Her sound judgment, her power of looking at all sides of a question, would have saved her from the danger of forgetting that, although there are 30,000 blind in the United Kingdom, there are some millions who have the gift of sight.

The book was never written, but her preparation for it made her a storehouse of information and of wise and tender thought, not only for the blind, but for all those who are afflicted and suffering.

17th May.... Saw Sir W. Reid, heard from him that a brush, with the Repository stamp, is left in the Museum at Malta; was very glad of this. Received from him 5. Heard he had seen Lord Cranbourne, and that Lord C. thought I was wrong in using and teaching T. M. L.

system. I talked to Sir W. Reid of the different systems, also asked him for the names of books upon the blind mentioned to him by Lord C. Wrote to Lady Mayne to ask if she could get St.

Michael's, Pimlico, lent.

Afternoon.--Went to Miss ----. Very little done there for the a.s.sociation. Saw Dr. Jelf there; heard he would come to the meeting next day.

The list of letters written and embossed and duly recorded in the Journal will be omitted. They are the inevitable drudgery of such a work as she was now engaged in. Explanations, pet.i.tions, acknowledgments, inquiries, information, requests for the loan of pulpits from which the claims of the a.s.sociation may be urged, of schoolrooms in which meetings can be held, all these things were part of her daily work. The sisters tell that Bessie could at this time emboss a letter upon her Foucault frame and dictate two others at the same time; always without mistake or omission.

On the 18th May 1858 the Annual a.s.sociation Meeting was held, and the First Annual Report presented.

We learn from the balance-sheet that the receipts during this, the first year of accurate and formal management, had been 1784:3:11.

Of this, subscriptions and donations amounted to 648 1 2 Balance in hand 25th April 1857 215 9 3 Sale of goods, etc. 920 13 6 ----------- 1784 3 11

There was a balance in hand at the end of the year of 118:15:1. The number of blind men and women who had been employed during the year at the Inst.i.tution, or in their own homes, was forty-three.

The sum required for payment of rent, officials, teachers, and supplementary wages to the blind, amounted to 744:10:4. The annual subscription paid by Bessie was at this time 75, and in addition there is a donation of 10 for broom-making, and 2 for advertising. But the sum that appears in the subscription list is only the smallest part of that which she devoted to the service of the blind. Her private charity amongst them was at all times far-reaching and unstinted. She had many pensioners in London, and pleasant stories of them abound. There was a poor blind woman called Mary H., elderly and very lonely, whose wonderful trust and patience called forth Bessie's admiration. She ultimately procured the placing of Mary's name on the list of recipients of the Queen's Gate Money, she taught her to read, and allowed her monthly a certain quant.i.ty of tea and sugar.

One day when she came for her reading lesson Mary said:

"Oh, miss, I had such a strange dream last night!"

"Well, Mary, what was it?"

"Why, miss, I dreamt you were dead."

"Did you, Mary? and what did you think about it?"

"The first thing I thought, miss, was, what shall I do for my tea and sugar!"

The honesty and simplicity of this answer delighted Bessie, and she frequently spoke of Mary's dream.

The saying of another pupil also pleased her. She taught a blind boy at Chichester to read, and when he came for his lessons the boy used to ask innumerable questions. One day she remarked upon this, and he frankly exclaimed:

"Oh yes, marm, so I do, I always likes to know up to the top brick of the chimney."

Brush-making, first introduced by Bessie and taught by Farrow, had proved a successful and remunerative occupation for the blind.

Encouraged by this success, the making of ba.s.s brooms was now added to the work carried on in the Euston Road. The coa.r.s.e fibre used for this purpose has to be dipped in boiling pitch, and then inserted and fixed into holes in the wooden back of the broom. By an ingenious contrivance of the teacher, the hand of the blind man follows a little bridge across the boiling pitch, reaches a guide, at which he stops and dips his bristles into the shallow pan. He then withdraws his hand along the same bridge, kneads the pitch, and fixes the fibre in its hole. Several men sit round a table, and are thus enabled to work without risk of a burn at a trade which requires no skill.

The blind carpenter Farrow, who had made the fittings for the Holborn cellar, had been from that time permanently employed in the Inst.i.tution.

In 1858 he was the teacher of thirteen blind men and women who were learning a trade. Levy had visited Norwich and Bath during the year 1858. In the latter city a Blind Home was formed for the employment of women instructed in the Bath Blind School. This was done in consequence of a Report of Bessie's inst.i.tution which had been sent to the Committee at Bath. The School for the Indigent Blind, St. George's Fields, Southwark, had also opened departments for instructing and employing the adult blind, but we have no sheaf of old letters to give the history of this further development.

The Committee of the a.s.sociation might well look back with pleasure, and forward with hope. They well knew on whom the success of the work mainly depended; and in spite of Bessie's objection to the introduction of her name, the following paragraph closes the Annual Report issued in May 1858:

Your Committee feel that their report would be very imperfect if they did not allude to the great services which have been rendered to this society, during the last year, by Miss Gilbert, the foundress of the a.s.sociation. Whenever pecuniary embarra.s.sment has threatened the efficiency of the Inst.i.tution, her active zeal has soon replenished the funds; and when the a.s.sociation has been unable to relieve the most distressing cases that have been pressed on their notice, the sufferers have found her ever ready to afford them timely help; and that, too, in a way which has shown such sympathising interest in their privations, as well as so much consideration for their feelings, that the value of the aid thus afforded can be fully appreciated only by those who have received it.

CHAPTER XIII

THE FEAR OF G.o.d AND NO OTHER

"Whatsoever thy hand findeth to do, do it with thy might."

Bessie's early education and happy home life counted for much in her work on behalf of the blind. She knew the advantage of being thrown on her own resources, of learning the ways of a house and the paths of a garden. She knew also that the happiness of the blind depends chiefly on companions.h.i.+p. "A deaf person," she used to say, "is very cheerful alone, much more cheerful than in society. It is social life that brings out his privation. But a blind man in a room alone is indeed solitary, and you see him at his best in society. It is social life which diminishes his disabilities."

Whilst she acquiesced, therefore, in Levy's wish that the work of the Inst.i.tution should be exclusively carried on by blind persons, she was anxious that they should not be set apart and kept apart from other workmen.

Her diary for 1858 contains the following pa.s.sage:

Spoke to Levy about the workpeople in the Repository not having intercourse enough with those who see, and thought of the possibility of their belonging to Mr. Maurice's Working Men's College; I think that might be just the thing. L. asked what I thought about their attending a Bible Cla.s.s by any of Mr. Dale's curates. I said I should like it, provided the mistake was not made of talking to them upon religion as if it must be a sort of last resource to the blind, to make up for the want of other things. L.

understood what I meant, and said he was glad I had mentioned it.

Any display of the blind with the object of calling attention to their affliction, and extorting money on account of it, was extremely painful to Bessie. She had too much reverence and tenderness for her fellow-sufferers to make a show of them, and she would not accept help if it involved any lowering of the tone she hoped to establish in the workshop. Blind men and women were to be taught that they could do an honest day's work and earn their own living.

An entry in the diary shows that she had to educate more than her workpeople before her views were adopted.

L. spoke to me about a suggestion for employing blind beggars to carry boards to advertise the a.s.sociation. Told him I strongly objected, and why.

The workpeople also frequently caused her anxiety.

Felt and compared brushes from W. with those made at Repository.

Our make is the best.