Sight to the Blind Part 2

Half a dozen young women from the prosperous Blue-Gra.s.s section, headed by Miss Katherine Pett.i.t and Miss May Stone, went up into the mountains, several days' journey from a railroad, and, pitching their tents, spent three successive summers holding singing, sewing, cooking and kindergarten cla.s.ses, giving entertainments, visiting homes, and generally establis.h.i.+ng friendly relations with the men, women, and children of three counties.

One of the many surprises was to find the mountains so thickly populated,--the regulation family boasting a dozen children,--and the most inadequate provision made by the State for the education of these young sons and daughters of heroes. For it is well known that much of this section was settled originally by men who received land-grants for their services in the Revolution, and who, with their families, disappeared into these fastnesses to emerge later only at their country's call,--the War of 1812, the Mexican, the Civil, and the Spanish Wars bringing them out in full force, to display astonis.h.i.+ng valor always.

Aware of this ancestry, the visiting women were not surprised to find much personal dignity, native intelligence, and gentleness of manner, even among men who conceived it their duty to "kill off"

family enemies, and women who had never had the first chance at "book-l'arning."

One of the three summers was spent on Troublesome Creek, at the small village of Hindman, the seat of Knott County. Here the "citizens" so appreciated the "quare, foreign women" as to be unwilling to let them depart. "Stay with us and do something for our young ones, that mostly run wild now, drinking and shooting,"

they said. "We will give you the land to build a school on."

Touched to the heart, seeing the great need, and asking nothing better than to spend their lives in such a service, Miss Stone and Miss Pett.i.t went "out into the world" that winter and gave talks in various cities, by spring raising enough money to start the desired Settlement School at Hindman.

During a dozen years this remarkable school has grown and prospered, until more than a hundred children now live in it, and two hundred more attend day-school.

While its academic work is excellent, special stress is laid upon the industrial courses, the aim being to fit the children for successful lives in their own beloved mountains. To this end the boys are taught agriculture, carpentry, wood and metal work, and the rudiments of mechanics; the girls cooking, home-nursing, sewing, laundry work, and weaving, these subjects being learned not only in cla.s.ses, but by doing the actual labor of school and farm.

Aside from educational work proper, various forms of social service are carried on,--district nursing, cla.s.ses in sanitation and hygiene, social clubs and entertainments for people of all ages, and a department of fireside industries, through which is created an outside market for the beautiful coverlets, blankets and homespun, woven by the mountain women, as well as for their attractive baskets.

When the children trained in our school go out to teach in the district schools, they take with them not only what they have learned in books, but our ideas as to practical living and social service also, each one becoming a center of influence in a new neighborhood.

A feature of the work that deserves special mention is the nursing and hospital department, the ministrations of our trained nurse.

Miss Butler, having done more, possibly, than any other one thing, not only to spread a knowledge of sanitation and preventive hygiene, but also to establish confidential and friendly relations with the people.

The foregoing story, "Sight to the Blind," gives some idea of this branch of the work, the scope of which has been much extended, however, during the three years since the story was written for _The Century Magazine_. In that period the half-dozen clinics held in the school hospital by Dr. Stucky of Lexington, and his co-workers, have brought direct surgical and other relief to the afflicted of four counties. To be present at one of these clinics is to live Bible days over again, and to see "the lame walk, the deaf hear, the blind receive their sight, and the poor have the good news preached to them."

And not only this,--these clinics have demonstrated that nearly one-half the people examined have trachoma or other serious eye diseases, and have been the means of awakening the Government to its responsibility in the matter, so that three government hospitals have already been started in the mountains for the treatment of trachoma.

So valuable, in many directions, has been the influence of the Settlement School, that tracts of land have been offered in a number of other mountain counties for similar schools; but so far only one, that at Pine Mountain in Harlan County, has been begun.

An intimate account of life within the Hindman School is given in a recently published book, "Mothering on Perilous," in which are set forth the joys--and some of the shocks--experienced by the writer in mothering the dozen little mountaineers who, in the early days, shared with her the small boys' cottage. The real name of the school creek is of course Troublesome, not Perilous.

Alas, nearly a thousand eager, lovable children are turned away yearly for lack of room and scholars.h.i.+ps. The school is supported by outside contributions, one hundred dollars taking a child through the year. What better use of money could possibly be made by patriotic persons and organizations than to open the doors of opportunity to these little Sons and Daughters of the Revolution?

LUCY FURMAN HINDMAN SETTLEMENT SCHOOL, October, 1914.

BY THE SAME AUTHOR

Mothering on Perilous

This book tells in lively fas.h.i.+on of the experiences of a young woman who, to escape from grief and loneliness, goes to work in a settlement school in the heart of the Kentucky mountains.

There she instantaneously "acquires a family" of a dozen small boys and henceforth finds her life "crammed with human interest." The ludicrously funny and sometimes pathetic doings of the little, untamed feudists, moons.h.i.+ners, and hero wors.h.i.+ppers, form the subject-matter of the tale.

The story centers about one of the boys who has an "active war" in his family and whose martial adventures with those of his grown-up brother give a strong appeal to the narrative and furnish an exciting climax.

"Good luck to this admirably written narrative, a model of direct and simple humor and very sincere human understanding."--_The Bellman_.

"Certainly no romance of the Kentucky mountains ever told more that was amusing, or picturesque, or tragic than her chronicle does."--_N. Y. Post_.

"Her style is graceful and clear, and her fascinating narrative cannot fail to widen the horizon of her readers in more ways than one."--_N. Y. Times_.

"A charming story and it is well told."--_Christian Advocate_.

"A story full of humor and pathos."--_Chicago Evening Post_.

"The book forms a valuable link between an interesting and isolated people and the reading public."--_San Francisco Chronicle_.

NEW MACMILLAN FICTION

Sat.u.r.day's Child

By KATHLEEN NORRIS, Author of "Mother," "The Treasure," etc. With frontispiece in colors by F. Graham Cootes.

"Friday's child is loving and giving, Sat.u.r.day's child must work for her living."

The t.i.tle of Mrs. Norris' new novel at once indicates its theme. It is the life story of a girl who has her own way to make in the world. The various experiences through which she pa.s.ses, the various viewpoints which she holds until she comes finally to realize that service for others is the only thins that counts, are told with that same intimate knowledge of character, that healthy optimism and the belief in the ultimate goodness of mankind that have distinguished all of this author's writing. The book is intensely alive with human emotions. The reader is bound to sympathize with Mrs. Norris' people because they seem like _real_ people and because they are actuated by motives which one is able to understand. _Sat.u.r.day's Child_ is Mrs. Norris' longest work. Into it has gone the very best of her creative talent. It is a volume which the many admirers of _Mother_ will gladly accept.

The Game of Life and Death: Stories of the Sea

By LINCOLN COLCORD, Author of "The Drifting Diamond," etc. With frontispiece.

Upon the appearance of Mr. Colcord's _The Drifting Diamond_, critics throughout the country had a great deal to say on the pictures of the sea which it contained. Mr. Colcord was compared to Conrad, to Stevenson, and to others who have written of the sea with much success. It is gratifying, therefore, that in this book the briny deep furnishes the background--in some instances the plot itself--for each one of its eleven tales. Coupled with his own intimate knowledge and appreciation of the oceans and the life that is lived on them--a knowledge and appreciation born in him through a long line of seafaring ancestry and fostered by his own love for the sea--he has a powerful style of writing. Vividness is perhaps its distinguis.h.i.+ng characteristic, though fluency and a peculiar feeling for words also mark it.

The Mutiny of the Elsinore

By JACK LONDON, Author of "The Sea Wolf," "The Call of the Wild,"

etc. With frontispiece in colors by Anton Fischer.

Everyone who remembers _The Sea Wolf_ with pleasure will enjoy this vigorous narrative of a voyage from New York around Cape Horn in a large sailing vessel. _The Mutiny of the Elsinore_ is the same kind of tale as its famous predecessor, and by those who have read it, it is p.r.o.nounced even more stirring. Mr. London is here writing of scenes and types of people with which he is very familiar, the sea and s.h.i.+ps and those who live in s.h.i.+ps. In addition to the adventure element, of which there is an abundance of the usual London kind, a most satisfying kind it is, too, there is a thread of romance involving a wealthy, tired young man who takes the trip on the _Elsinore_ and the captain's daughter. The play of incident, on the one hand the s.h.i.+p's amazing crew and on the other the lovers, gives a story in which the interest never lags and which demonstrates anew what a master of his art Mr. London is.

Neighbors: Life Stories of the Other Half

By JACOB A. RIIS, Author of "How the Other Half Lives," etc. With ill.u.s.trations by W. T. Benda.