Speech is so common, eyesight so precious, that he who would appeal for charity needs no better warrant than that he is dumb or blind. In an age when words are multiplied and golden silence is seldom found, the very fact that lips can give no utterance is so unusual that their mute assertion of misfortune is seldom questioned. There is nothing so pitiful in all the world as an asylum for the blind. There is nothing which so draws one to share the burdens of another as the appeal of him in whom the wells of speech are all dried up. We sympathize with illness, we grieve at the misfortune which visits our friends, we mourn with them when bereavement comes, but all these things are in the course of nature. They are sad, but they may be expected. But then a figure in health rises and asks for charity in the hushed language of the mute, philanthropy halts and humanity gives alms. But if the dumb can evoke assistance, assuring of sincerity and disarming doubt, how hushed is the questioning when the blind apply! How much stronger than speech or silence are the sightless eyes that stare unblinking at a darkened world! How sad is the fate of that man who was buried by demons when God cried out, "Let there be light"! But not every man is mute who stretches out his hand in silence. Laziness is such an awfully demoralizing vice that some who choose to beg a living and decline work are even base enough to feign a misfortune they ought to fear. Fellows who find the winter pinching and the ranks of vagabonds full to repletion arm themselves with a slate and pencil and haunt the public with appeals for help on the untrue claim that they are dumb. One of the most persistent beggars of this kind makes the rounds of residence districts with a printed card on which is stated the bearer's desire to reach his home in some distant city--the destination varies from time to time--together with a long-primer endorsement by a group of names which no one knows. The fraud always asks for some slight money offering--nothing can be too small--with which to assist him in the purchase of a ticket.