April 18th. To the Lunch Club at Edith Wendell’s. Mrs. Roland Lincoln told us about the sad condition of the pauper asylums. We drew up and signed a letter to Mayor Matthews, asking for a hospital to be built on Rainsford Island for the paupers. It is a puzzling matter. It is not possible to make their state an enviable one and yet it is terrible to think of the helpless mass, the dregs of the city left alone, outside the pale of humanity. I asked Mrs. Lincoln if any one ever thought of them. She said, “No one goes there but the priest!” Cruel that Protestantism is not more imbued with the spirit that made a Father Damien! April 20th. The reception at the Kindergarten for the Blind. A lovely day, a great crowd of people. Helen Keller the main attraction, as in the old days at the Perkins Institution, Laura Bridgman. She is a most extraordinary child. I think Anagnos has made a mistake in choosing Miss Sullivan for her teacher. Miss S. is well prepared in one way, having herself been educated at the Perkins Institution and having known Laura Bridgman and become familiar with Papa’s methods, but she has not the right feeling, remembering the beautiful modesty of Laura’s behavior, compared to the almost hoydenish ways of this child. Helen recited some verses of Dr. Holmes’. Her voice, Mr. Dwight said, was like that of a Pythoness. It was to me the loneliest sound I have ever heard, like waves breaking on the coast of some lonely desert island. The work of raising the fund for the New Kindergarten building goes bravely on. Twenty thousand dollars is already subscribed. Michael wants fifty thousand and I believe he will get it. At the instance of Michael Anagnos, my sister Florence Hall and I now set about writing the story of my father’s greatest achievement, the education of Laura Bridgman, a many times told tale, first by S. G. H. in his reports of the Perkins Institution, then by Charles Dickens in the “American Notes”, later by scores of writers in many tongues. “All history that survives must be rewritten every twenty years for each fresh generation,” Anagnos insisted. This work brought me nearer my father as a teacher than ever before. The hours spent copying his letters from the ancient files of the Institution and deciphering Laura’s faintly penciled diary taught me much about both of them. M. A. deW. Howe, our kinsman, helped sift the chaff from the wheat in the mass of material that confronted us; my husband brought his craft to our aid, making careful drawings to illustrate the book. April 22nd. Richard Mansfield gave a matinee performance of “Beau Brummel” at the Globe Theater for the benefit of the Kindergarten for the Blind, an admirable performance.