TAM sure some of you are getting a little tired of our long talk about schools and teachers for the blind, and want to know if it is all work and no play for the poor children in whom many have shown much real interest.
As a rule blind children are more cheerful and easy to amuse than the deaf and dumb. I have known some who were almost as merry and fun-loving as any of my young readers.
“What were the favorite games at your school?" I said one day to a friend who, though she has never enjoyed the precious gift of sight, has tasted the sweetness of the love of Christ, and finding rest and peace in Him, found that through His grace it is quite possible for her life to be happy as well as useful.
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BLIND CHILDREN AT PLAY.
"I am so glad you know blind children like play," she replied, with a smile "Perhaps some of the seeing boys and girls you so often talk to by way of pen-and-ink would enjoy reading one or two short stories of my school-days.
“I was, as you know, nearly twelve years old when I was admitted as a pupil to the blind school, so small that no one ever guessed my age as more than seven or eight. There were about eighty girls at school with me, and you may be sure the large dormitories, with their long rows of little white beds as well as the busy schoolroom, were so new and strange to me that at first I often felt very sad and lonely, and sometimes I used to cry myself to sleep.
“But most of our teachers were kind and patient, and after a few weeks I began to grow more contented. I think I had been about three months at school when the girls began to talk a great deal about the following Monday. It would, they said, be a Bank Holiday, and on it all the girls who had relations and friends living in or near London would be allowed to spend the day with them.
“Some of my classmates told me how they expected their father or grown-up brother would call for them quite early in the day, and after giving them a ride by omnibus or train, take them to their homes; returning with them at an hour we, whose school rule was Early to bed and early to rise,' thought delightfully late.
“Oh, how I envied those happy girls! knowing as I did that no one would be likely to call for me. I am afraid my heart was very full of bitter and rebellious feelings when I awoke on the morning of the holiday, never guessing how much pleasure that day was to bring even for a lonely, almost friendless child like me.
“I was not the only one left at school. After our companions had gone, I found myself with five other little girls the only occupants of the deserted schoolroom. We tried to play, but the games did not go off well, and we were all getting very dull and silent when the sound of a well-known voice in the hall roused us up, as we whispered to each other, It is Mrs. N.'s voice; how we wonder why she came today, when most of the teachers and nearly all the girls are away.'
“But we were not left to wonder long, for the lady, who often visited the school, came into the room, accompanied by one of the teachers who said that as Mrs. N. had kindly invited us to spend the afternoon at her house, we might go at once and get ready for our visit.
“How delighted we were and, after thanking our kind friend, our uniform capes and bonnets were quickly put on, and we were soon ready to start.
“Mrs. N. lived in what seemed to us quite a large house. We were allowed to have tea out in the garden, as the day was fine and warm. I cannot tell you how much we enjoyed our cake and bread-and-butter, and as we drank our tea out of real cups, of course we thought it tasted much nicer than it would out of the thick stone mugs we daily used at school.
“After tea Mrs. N. took us on the lawn, and, after placing us in a row, told us that she wanted all the girls who knew what a daisy was like to hold up one hand. As I used to live in the country when quite a tiny child, and had often gathered daisies when taken by my sisters into the fields, I held up mine at once, so did two or three others. We were then told that quite a number of the pretty white flowers were growing on the lawn, and that we might gather as many as we could find.
“Later in the evening we stood round Mrs. N. and sang the hymns we had learned at school. I remember one quite well. It was:
'There is a green hill far away,
Outside a city wall;
And there the Lord was crucified
Who died to save us all.'
“As we sang, tears filled my eyes and a longing too deep for words came into my heart to know and please the Lord Jesus. Oh, how I wished I could be sure, quite sure, that He really loved me, that He had died for me. I thought if I could only know that I was saved, I should never feel lonely or unhappy any more.
A gentleman who knew and loved Christ was walking one day along a country road. He stood still for a moment to look at some lovely roses in a cottage garden. While doing so he noticed a boy about nine years of age busily engaged in flying a paper kite. Mr. F., as we will call him, loved children, so he began to talk to the boy; finding, much to his surprise, that the poor little fellow was quite blind, he said to him: “You cannot see your kite, my boy. How is it that you get so much pleasure from playing with it?
The boy replied, with a bright look, "Oh, sir, my father can see my kite, and he says it's a real beauty, and you know I can feel the string pull.”
And as Mr. F. went on his way he thanked God for the cheer and comfort the words of the blind boy had been to him, And faith is the power by which those who have been thus brought to God are enabled to walk through this world as those who are not of it, but as those ought who already belong to the place where Christ now is.
Do we really want to know what the Spirit of that home is? What sort of ways will suit the place to which, if we really believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, we belong?
The Holy Spirit is able and willing to teach the youngest and weakest of Christ's little ones how to please and follow Him, for we have the Lord's own words in the Gospel of John, "He shall glorify me: for he shall receive of mine, and shall show it unto you." (John 16:1414He shall glorify me: for he shall receive of mine, and shall show it unto you. (John 16:14).)