The next day the Rev. Mr. Blagden accompanied us to see the Massachusetts Asylum for the Blind. Here we were introduced to Laura Bridgman, who since she was about two years of age has been deaf, dumb, and blind. Her senses of taste and smell are also impaired. She is 18 years of age, and has been in the institution ten years. Every avenue of communication with the soul was closed--but one. The sense of touch remained; and by means of that they have contrived to reach the mind, to inform it, to instruct it, to refine and elevate it. We found her exactly corresponding to the beautiful description given of her by Dr. Howe, who is at the head of the institution. That description has so often been published in England that I will not transcribe it. Her figure is genteel, slender, and well-proportioned. She appears to be lively, sensitive, and benevolent. The place where the bright blue eyes once sparkled that are now quenched in darkness is covered with a piece of green ribbon. Conversation with her is carried on by means of the "speaker's" rapid fingering on her right hand. It was in this manner that we were introduced. She shook hands with us very affectionately, --taking hold of both hands of Mrs. Davies, and feeling all about her head, her dress, and her arms. In doing so she felt the wedding-ring, and wanted to know by means of her interpreter--her governess--why the English ladies wore a ring on that finger. (The American ladies do not observe the custom.) On my wife telling her it was to show they were married, she seemed very much amused and astonished. Here it was very interesting to observe the progress of a thought from ourselves to the governess, and from her to that "little, white, whispering, loving, listening" hand that received and communicated all ideas, until the brightened countenance and the lovely smile showed it had reached the soul. She felt a deep sympathy for Ireland, and wished to know what the English were doing for the starving inhabitants. We told her; and soon after we saw by the public papers that, subsequently to our visit, she had done some needle-work, which was sold, and the proceeds appropriated at her request to purchase a barrel of flour for that unhappy land. "How," exclaims Elihu Burritt, "she plied at morning, noon, and night, those fingers! wonderful fingers! It seemed that the very finger of God had touched them with miraculous susceptibilities of fellowship with the spirit world and that around her. She put them upon the face of His written word, and felt them thrilled to her heart with the pulsation of His great thoughts of love to man. And then she _felt_ for other's woe. Poor child! God bless her richly! She reached out her short arms to feel after some more unhappy than she in the condition of this life; some whose fingers' ends had not read such sweet paragraphs of heaven's mercy as hers had done; some who had not seen, heard, and felt what her