We shall conclude this article with a few historical remarks.
If the authorities to whom we have found reference, i dative to this point, be correct, a Spanish Benedictine monk, of the convent of Sabagun in Spain, named Pe dro tie l'once, who died in 1584, is the first person who is recorded to liar" instructed the Deaf and Dumb, timid taught them to speak. Ambrosio Morales, the con temporary and friend of this Pedro the Ponce, in a work on the Antiquities of Spain, which scents to have been ',Ilium about 1583, speaks of him thus: " Pedro de Ponce has taught the Deaf and Dumb to speak with singular perfection. lie is the inventor of that art. He has already taught, in this manner, two brothers and a sister of the Constable ; and is at present occupied in instructing a son of the Governor of Arragon, wi), like the preceding, has been Deaf and Dumb from birth. What is most surprising in this art, is, that his pupils, notitithstanding their deafness, speak, write, and rea son very well. I have a paper belonging to one of them, Don Pedro de Velasco, the brother of the Con stable, in which he tells me, that it is to Father Ponce he is indebted for being able to speak." (Quoted by Don Emmanuel Xunez de Taboada, in a note to p.
•/ I'rrf. to .4natomir et Physiologic du Sysamc .Acrveux en General, par F. J. Gail et G. Spurn ,clot, vol. i. 4to, Parrs 1810.) Valles, also a contemporary and friend of De Ponce's, in a work entitled, De Sacra Phi losophia, published about 1588, has this expression re specting him : " Petrus Pontius, Monachus Sancti Be nedicti, antic us melts, qui, res intrabilis I limos surdos docebat In confirmation of these testimonies, Don Emmanuel Nunez, a Spaniard, mentions that, he has read in tile register of deaths of the Benedictine Convent of San Salvador de Una, where Pedro de Ponce passed the greater part of his life, the following note: " Obelormivit iu domino, frater Petrus de Ponce, hujus domus benefactor, qui, hues virtutcs, (lux io 'no maxime fuerunt, ih alai; prxcipue Iluruit, ate cele berrimus tuto tithe fuit ,tabitus, scilicet, Logy( DOCE%DI. Obiit anno 159 t, incise Augusto." quoted above, p. xi.) The same person states, too, that other Spanish authors, such as Lepez and Castaniza, some of them contemporaries of De Ponce's, also speak of hint in the highest terms, and assure us that he not only taught his pupils to speak, but instructed them in every science which it is possible to teach to those who enjoy all the senses.
In the anonymous translation into English of the Abbe de ('Epee's Method of Educating the Deaf and Dumb,' (8vo. London 1801,) the translator, in a prelace, makes the following remark : Of former instructors, he who seems to have obtained greatest notice was Bonet, a priest, Secretary to the Constable of Castile, whose younger brother had lost the sense of hearing when two years old. The difficulty of procuring instruction for him much distress in the family, Bonet, qua lified for the province of tuition by great knowledge and uncommon learning, undertook the care of his edu cation; in which he succeeded beyond every hope. The system which he formed on the occasion was printed at Madrid in 1620, under the title of Reduction de las Le tras, y ?Irtc para ensenar a hablar los Mudos, dedicated to Philip III. and accompanied, according to the custom of the age, with encomiums in verse and prose, from poets and philosophers. The author is said to have been afterwards in the service of the Prince of Carignan, and to have continued many years to teach persons to whom the misfortune of Deafness made his lessons needful." Nunez, however, to whom we have already referred, maintains, that Juan Paulo Bonnet must have derived his knowledge and his method regarding this subject, entirely front De Ponce ; for Bonnet was secretary to the Constable at the very time De Ponce was employ ed in teaching the Constable's two brothers and sister. (Work quoted above, p. xli.) There is, therefore, some obscurity connected with the history of this work, which it will not now, per haps, be easy to remove. We have neither seen the Treatise itself, nor any account of its contents; but we presume it has considerable merit, as we observe that it was much consulted by De l'Epee, when he first began to teach his pupils to speak.