By Helen Keller
[EDITOR'S NOTE.--Helen Keller has been blind and deaf since the age of eighteen months, and for many years was also dumb. In "The Story of My Life," a marvellous (sic) book which no girl could read without gaining inspiration, Miss Keller has told how, one by one, she has overcome the obstacles to the ambition which she very early conceived of getting for herself education and culture, until, as a graduate of a university, she can now hold her own with girls who see and hear. By the unwearied patience of her beloved teacher-- Miss Sullivan--Helen learnt (sic) to speak, a marvellous (sic) accomplishment when one remembers that the use of the voice had to be explained to the poor deaf and sightless girl by means of a language expressed by the teacher's fingers tapping the palms of the pupil's hands. Helen now converses freely with a rich vocabulary (although there are occasional mistakes in pronunciation) she uses a typewriter, has mastered several languages, and does well in her college examinations, where no allowance is made for her physical limitations. To learn how brave, and even joyous Helen is, of her love of travel and of Nature, her delight in trees and flowers, of her friendships with famous folk, the Editor refers his readers to her book. The story of this girl's life is so wonderful that her friend Mark Twain might well say that the two most interesting personalities of the nineteenth century were Napoleon and Helen Keller. It is said of an exalted personage that he always keeps a portrait of this girl on his desk to remind him of the noble qualities with which she has faced a life of dreadful difficulty. Exactly what Miss Keller intends to take up as her life-work after she has graduated is practically the only point about herself which she has not fully explained in her book. Hence it was suggested to Miss Keller that she elucidate this oft-asked question. This article now makes her story complete.]