Vermont phÅ“nix. [volume] (Brattleboro, Vt.) 1834-1955, 1902-04-18

When One is Deaf.

L
the suggestion that they are growing
deaf. | did so. Indeed. it was sew
eral months after others began to re-
mark upon my deafness before | could
realize my altered status with the
world. and then, not from what people
told me or even from my inability to
hear them, but from certain trifling
but suggestive incidents. | sat read
ing one morning, when all at once |
missed the objectionable tick of the
clock. My first thought was that 1t
had stopped. | looked up; the pos
ition of the hands suggested no loss
of time. looked more closely the
pendulum was swinging as usual
looked out upon the town-clock in
near steepe; the two marked the hour
alike or nearly so. The truth came
home almost as a blow that staggered
me: it was | that had stopped. 1t
was. however, in contact with outward
nature that the scope of my loss was
most wildly borne in upon me. One
morning | was early out of doors 1t
was late in May. and the birds ON the
lawn and in tree and bush were hold
ing carnival. For a little time
watched them when all at once 1t
occurred to me that did not hear them.
Could it be that they were not sing
ing? A robin alighted on the lawn
little distance away. He lifted up
his beak: | was quite sure | saw
familiar movement of his throat, but
no note came to me. | turned into
my home rejecting, 81 shall never
hear the birds again as | have heard
them" Another day | was standing
beside a little river near my home.
It flowed in its usual curves. it rippled
over stones as was its wont: but to me
it was silent river. 1t glided past
me, but spoke not, nor ever after
would speak to me. At another time
| was standing in a pine grove in the
season of the year
when tie pine losses its cones"
swaying tn branches, but
The sons of it's waterfall tones"
The cones, indeed, were lying around
me. | looked up: the breeze was
was not borne down to me. At yet
another tine | drew up my curtain
early one morning, and was surprised
to find it raining heavily. From
childhood the sound of falling rain
had been peculiarly pleasant to me;
but now | discovered that the
"Drip-drop. ,-ip-drop. over the caves.
| And drip-dro over the sycamore leaves.
was no long for me.
Thus throl gh a few simple incidents
was my changed estate made plain to
me There vas still for me the thun-
| der's crash, the tempests roar, the
cataracts Plunge: but. aside from
| these and TIE like heavier noises.
must henceforth live in a soundless
world. Iamember reading about
this time Krmmacher's dialogue be
tween Adam and Eloah, his attendant
angel, and seeing in 1t suggestion
OF myself. though taken in the reverse
1t is the evening of the first day. and
the young Alan notes with anxiety
the deepening twilight. In some
things he was not as well instructed as
|. At any rate. as shown in the pleas
ant story. he lid not know that a sen
sation the less does not mean reality
eXtinguished. SO he asks of his
angel if the Young creation will go
swallowed up IN Old Night. | had nc
suspicion that sound would go, swal
lowed up in Oh Silence. | had not g
passing doubi but that TO other ears
the birds warlled and the river laugh
ed and the rail-drops battered and the
pine trees molned: ii was | that haC
gone.
write thus Of myself well assured
that | tell in Substance the experience
of the great multitude of my fellow
sufferers. Nov | would not magnify
this experience unduly: there are sor
rows everywhere in comparison witt
which il is entitled TO no mention
Yet he is strangely wanting in sensi
bility who can take ii home with cheer
full spirit. He need not be rebellious
but he can hardy be less than pensiv,
and regretful. To the ordinary sound!
of nature he Is dead. In his worlC
leaves cannot ustle or doves coo o.
insects hum. Tree. air, bird, river
which before would converse with hin
in any solitude, now speak to no pur
pose. Before him the vast dram.
goes on. but it IS only acted. a his
trionic, but no voice is there.
The significance of this loss inten
SITES as we contemplate it more TIL,
pleasure of sounl in nature, because >
its very cons'aucy, is hardly I,
be appreciated until ii is lost w
fail to note it because it is so normal
liz uSuai NoAi'iA4oti dtioH VI utdlHts
goes no further than the disadvantag
it occasions in the necessary commun
ications of life; lust as of blindness
! it makes impossible the direction O
ones hands in their tasks, of one
feet in their walk. These practica
disadvantages are indeed serious an
: obtrusive, but in either case the meas
ure of deprivation reaches far beyon
them Beyond the use of eyes in dis
= tinguishing objects is the simple jo
of light. and we give no due estimat
of the blind mans grefs till we tax
I reckoning of this From "Deafnes
and Cheerfulness. by Rev. A. w. Jack
SON.