The evening times. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1895-1902, 1896-01-18
STRANGE SENSES OF A BOY
New York Lad Whose Sight Hearing, and
Feeling Are Silguiafly Developed
He Can Distinguish the Color of an
Object by Touching 1t and
Faints from a Pin Prick.
New York World.

a remarkable case OF human sensitive
hess is that OF Clarence barton. fifteen
years Old, son of sturdy country parents
who lives some five miles northeast of
koiman village, and twelve miles Ca 81 of this
city.
His senses of feeling. hearing, smelling
tastiDEaDd seeing a re nia nv e!ousiy developed.
a pin scratch Will cause him to faint away
from pain. A half dozen sour grapes or Il
sour apple or an orange that is not positively
fresh If eaten 10y the boy viii render bin per-
ceptibiy intoxicated: his sight is so re-
markabiy keen that he tan at once distin-
gush separate characteristics and pccul-
iarities lii similar objects which an ordi-
nary observer would utterly fail to discover.
His sense OF smell isso acute that If vessels
ofwater from ACKNOWLEDGMENT springs in the
Deighborluod are submitted to him he can
immediately tell by smelling each in turn
what spring IL was brought from, tell which
is the most strongly impregnated with iron,
which with magnesia, which with alum.
etc. although to the common individual
there is 10 perceptible difference. even in
the taste OF the waters: his sense OF hear
ing is most acute. and, while not particu-
larry nervous. as one might suppose so deli
cately organized Il child would he, there are
some seemingly trivial things which are al
most ubbearabIe to his sensitive ears.
The tick of watch, the buzzing of a
bee. the paiter OF raindropS, and the
squeaking of door upon rusty hinges,
are among these annoyances. Load or
sudden noises. as of guns, blasting, &c,
he does not mind. His sense of taste is
no less acute than his other senses. Food
has to lie especially seasoned for him,
and is prepared in vessels which must be
scrupalousiy free from the faintest trace
of anything but the substance or article
which it is intended each vessel is to be
particularly used for.
Thus, each article of food has TO lie sepa
rateiy prepared in a vessel in which moth
ing else has been previously cooked or pre-
pared.
Adams is the railroad station nearest to
Rodman village. A mile or so west OF
Adams is the large seed farm and barns of
T.V. MaXon. Last fall MIR. MaXon harvested;
less than a peck each OF three different new
varieties or wrinkled peas, grown from
samples sent to him from England a year
ago last spring.
These peas, to the common observer, are
exactly alike in appearance-that is to
say. a handful of one kind is so like the
other two kinds that one would at once
say they are all from the same kind of
vines.
However, when growing in the fields
there is 4 wide difference in these varie
ties, which the veriest blockhead would
have no difficulty in discerning. Mr..
Maxon is an expert seed grower, and
very slight differences in similar seeds
are quickly noted by him; hut when,
through the carelessness of laundering
farm hand, who thought them all the
same kind. these new varieties of peas
were hopelessly mixed in a bag, Maxou
could no more distinguish, pick out or
assert one kind from another than If he
had never. seen pea.
He was in quandary. The seeds were
almost yalueleSS unless assorted. Maxon
knew the Barton boys father, and, meeting
him at Adams one day, told him how his
new peas were hopelessly mixed. Barton
said he thought his boy could sort them
out.
Maxon became interested at once, and
said that If the boy could do il, which