Adventures in Silence
Date: 2020-04-24T00:00:00+00:00
Keywords: Deafness

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Title: Adventures in Silence

Author: Herbert W. Collingwood

Release date: April 24, 2020 [eBook #61918]
Most recently updated: October 17, 2024

Language: English

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*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK ADVENTURES IN SILENCE ***

ADVENTURES IN
SILENCE

BY

HERBERT W. COLLINGWOOD

Distributed by

THE RURAL NEW YORKER
333 WEST 30th STREET
NEW YORK

Copyright, 1923

By HERBERT W. COLLINGWOOD

Printed in U. S. A.

TO E. W. C.
WHOSE    RARE    SYMPATHY    AND
SISTERLY  UNDERSTANDING  HAVE
HELPED ONE DEAF MAN THROUGH
THE SILENCE.

INTRODUCTION

There are in this country about 75,000 people who were never able to hear. There are also about half a million who have lost all or part of their hearing, and more than one million in addition who must use some contrivance to aid their ears. This army, nearly as large as the one sent overseas, is forced to live a strange and mysterious life, which most normal persons know nothing about, even though they come into daily contact with the outposts. The ordinary deaf man is usually regarded as a joke or a nuisance, according to the humor of his associates. This social condition is largely due to the fact that he has found no place in literature; he occupies an abnormal position because his story has never been fairly told. The lame, the halt and the blind have been driven or gently led into literature. Poem, essay and story have described their lives, their habits, their needs; as a result the average person of reasonable intelligence has a fair notion of what it is like to be crippled or blind. But no one tells what it is like to be deaf. No one seems to love a deaf man well enough to analyze his thought or to describe the remarkable world in which he must live apart, although he may be close enough to his companions to touch them and to see their every action. Very likely this is our own fault; perhaps we have no right to expect the public to do for us what we should do for ourselves. I have long felt that we are sadly handicapped socially through this failure to put our life and our strange adventures into literature—the deaf person must remain a joke or a tragedy until he has made the world see something of the finer side of his life in the silence. This is why I have attempted to record these “adventures.” I am aware that it is rather a crude pioneer performance. Beginnings are rarely impressive. Much as we respect the pioneer of years ago, very few of us would care to house and entertain him today. It is my hope that this volume will lead other deaf persons to record their experiences, so that we may present our case fully to the public. The great trouble is that we find it so easy to make a genuine “tale of woe” out of our experience; it is hardly possible to avoid this if we record honestly. Perhaps we “enjoy the thought of our affliction” so thoroughly that we do not realize that the reading public has no use for it. My own method of avoiding this has been to turn the manuscript over to my daughter and to walk away from it, leaving her entirely free to cut the “grouch” out of it with the happy instruments of youth and hope and music. With us the great adventure of life is to pass contentedly from the world of sound into the world of silence and there strive to prepare ourselves for the world of serenity which lies beyond.

H. W. COLLINGWOOD.

CONTENTS

| Page
Introduction | 3
Terrors that are Imaginary | 9
On the Road to Silence | 20
Head Noises and Subjective Audition | 38
Facing the Hard Situation | 52
A Heart for Any Fate | 73
Memories of Early Life | 87
Experimenting With the Deaf Man | 101
Companions in Trouble | 116
The Approach to Silence | 133
Mixing Word Meanings | 147
The Whispering Wire | 160
“No Music in Himself” | 178
Silence Not Always Golden | 194
Cases of Mistaken Identity | 210
All in a Lifetime | 223
“Such Tricks Hath Strong Imagination” | 239
“The Terror That Flieth By Night” | 256
“Grouch” or Gentleman | 274

ADVENTURES IN SILENCE

CHAPTER I
Terrors That Are Imaginary

The World of Silence Uncharted—Two Initial Incidents, Darkness in the Tunnel, and at Home—Imaginary Terrors of the Deaf—When John Harlow Thought He Was a Murderer.

For some years I have considered writing a book concerning the life of the deaf or the “hard of hearing.” It is hard to understand why our peculiar and interesting life in the silent world has not been more fully recorded. We read of adventures in strange lands, far away, yet here is a stranger country close by, with its mysteries and miseries uncharted. Having lived in this silent world for some years, I have often planned to make an effort to describe it. However, like many other writers, I could not get going. I was not able to start my story until two rather unusual incidents spurred me into action.

Those of you who know industrial New York understand how the vast army of commuters is rushed to the city each day and rushed home again at night. From New Jersey alone a crowd of men and women larger by far than the entire population of the State of Vermont is carried to the banks of the Hudson from a territory sixty miles in diameter. Once at the river bank there are two ways by which these commuters may reach the city. They may float over in the great ferryboats, or they may dive under the river in rapid trains driven through a tube far below the water. This submarine travel is the quicker and more popular way, and during the rush hours the great tunnel makes one think of a mighty tube of vaseline or tooth paste with a giant hand squeezing a thick stream of humanity out of the end.

I reach the Hudson over the Erie Railroad. At this point the underground tube makes a wide curve inland, and in order to get to the trains we must walk through a long concrete cave far underground. The other morning several trains arrived at the Erie station together, and their passengers were all dumped into this cave like grain poured into a long sack. There was a solid mass of humanity slowly making its way to the end. The city worker naturally adapts himself to a crowd. He at once becomes an organized part of it. Take a thousand countrymen, each from the wide elbow room of his farm, and throw them together in a mass and they would trample each other in a panic. The city crowd, as long as it can be kept good-natured, will march on in orderly fashion; but let it once be overcome by fear, and it will be more uncontrolled than the throngs of countrymen.

This cave is brilliantly lighted, and we were moving on in orderly procession, without thought of danger. We would move forward perhaps 50 feet and then halt for a moment—to move ahead once more. During one of these halts I looked about me. At my right was a group of giggling girls; at my left a white-faced, nervous man; behind, a lame man, and in front two great giants in blouse and overalls. I was close by the change booth. A slight, pale-faced young woman sat within; the piles of money in front of her. A husky, rough-looking man was offering a bill to be changed. I saw it all, and as I looked, in an instant the lights flashed out and left us in inky darkness.

I have been left in dark, lonely places where I groped about without touching a human being, but it was far more terrifying to stand in that closely packed crowd and to realize what would happen in case of a panic. I reached out my hand and could touch a dozen people, but I could hear no sound. Suppose these silly girls were to scream; suppose this man at my elbow were to yell “Fire!” as fools have often done in such crowds. Suppose that man at the booth reached in, strangled the girl and swept the money out. At any of these possible alarms that orderly crowd in the dark might change to a wild mob, smashing and trampling its way back to the entrance, as uncontrollable as the crazy herds of cattle I had seen in Western stampedes. The deaf man thinks quickly at such times, and in the black silence dangers are magnified. The deaf are usually peculiar in their mental make-up; most of them have developed the faculty of intuition into a sense, and they can quickly grasp many situations which the average man would hardly imagine.

But there was no scream or call of alarm. After what seemed to me half an hour of intense living, the lights flashed back and the big clock at the end of the cave, solemnly ticking the time away, showed us that we had been less than 50 seconds in darkness. With a good-natured laugh the crowd moved on. Those girls had had no thought of screaming. They were more interested in the group of young men behind them. That nervous man, whom I had thought trembling with fright, had been laughing at the joke. The rough-looking man, whom my fancy had painted as a possible murderer and thief, had been standing before that money like a faithful dog on guard. There had been danger of a panic, and I had sensed it, but most of my companions had thought of nothing except the joke of being held up for a moment. They were happier for their lack of imagination.

At home I started to tell our people about it. The baby sat on my knee. She had my knife in her hand, paring an apple. Mother sat by the table sewing, and the children were scattered about the room. Suddenly the lights snapped out. I put up my hand just in time to catch the knife as the baby swung her arm at my face. And there we sat, waiting for the lights to return. There was no fear, for we knew each other. There was faith in that darkness; there could be no panic. I could hear no sound, yet the baby curled up close to me and all was well. Darkness is the worst handicap for the deaf. Give them light and they can generally manage; but, in the dark, without sound, they are helpless, and unless they are blessed with strong faith and philosophy, imagination comes and prints a series of terror pictures for them which you with your dependable hearing can hardly realize.

These incidents gave me my start by bringing to my mind the story of John Harlow, curiously typical of the imaginary terrors of the deaf and the folly of giving way to them. John Harlow was a New England man. He had all the imagination and all the narrow prejudice of his class; he had never traveled west of his own corner of the nation, and he was deaf. The man who carries this combination of qualities about with him is booked for trouble whenever he gets out among new types of people. Part of the Harlow property was invested in land lying in the mountains of Eastern Kentucky, and it became necessary for John to go there, to look up titles and investigate agents.

About all the average New Englander of that day knew of that mountain country was that it seemed to be the stage on which bloody family feuds were fought out. The Atlantic Monthly had printed stories by

Charles Egbert Craddock, and they were accepted as true pictures of mountain life. John Harlow should have known that the New Englanders and the mountaineers are alike the purest in real American blood, and that they must have many traits in common; but he went South with the firm conviction that life in the mountains must be one long tragedy of ambuscades and murders.

When a deaf man gets such ideas in mind, imagination prints them in red ink, because the deaf must brood over their fears and troubles. They cannot lighten the mind with music or aimless conversation. So when Harlow left the train at a little mountain hamlet he was not surprised to find his agent a tall, solemn-eyed man, with a long gray beard; a typical leader in the family feud, as the Boston man had pictured it. Harlow mounted the buckboard beside this silent mountaineer, and they drove off into the mountains just as the dusky shadows were beginning to creep down into the little nooks and valleys. As soon as this man found that John was deaf he drove on in silence, glancing at his companion now and then with that kindly awe with which simple people generally regard the deaf.

It was quite dark when they reached a small “cove” or opening in which stood a large house, with the usual farm buildings around it; the forest crept close to the barn at one point. It struck John that the buildings were arranged in the form of a fort, but what a chance had been left for the enemy to creep up through the woods and suddenly fall upon them! After supper John stood at the window watching the moon lift itself over the mountain and go climbing up the sky. There came to his mind the description of just such a moonrise, from one of Craddock’s stories, where a group of mountaineers came creeping over the hill to fall upon the home of their enemy. As he stood there he became aware that the whole family was making preparations for what seemed to him like defense. The women came and pulled down the curtains, and one of the boys went out and closed the heavy shutters. His host came and tried to explain, but Harlow was nervous, and it is hard to make the deaf hear at such times. All that he could catch were scattered words or parts of sentences. “We are waiting for them.” “They will be here by nine o’clock.” “There is a pistol for you.” “They have done us great damage.” “We must kill them tonight.”

Then the lights were put out, and even the great fire in the fireplace was dimmed; a rug was thrown over the crack under the door, and they all sat there—waiting. John Harlow, the deaf man, will never forget that scene. The little splinter of light from the fire revealed the stern old man and his three sons waiting, gun in hand, and the women sitting by the table, knitting mechanically in the dimness—all listening for the coming of the enemy. By the door lay two large dogs, alert and watchful. And Harlow, pulled from a comfortable place in Boston and suddenly made a part of this desperate family quarrel, did not even know what it was all about. He started twice to demand an explanation in the loud, harsh tones of the deaf, but the older man quickly waved him to silence.

How long they sat in that dim light Harlow cannot tell. He never thought to look at his watch. Suddenly the dogs lying by the door started up with low growls and bristling hair.

“Here they are,” said the old man; “now get ready.”

He thrust a pistol into John’s hand and took him by the arm as the boys silently opened the door and passed out with the dogs. John found himself following. In the moonlight they crept along the shadow of the buildings out to the point where the woods crawled in almost to the barn. There the old man crept off to one side. For the moment the moon was obscured by a passing cloud. Then its light burst upon them, and John from his hiding-place distinctly saw three forms crawling slowly across the grassy field to the back of the barn. In the clear moonlight he could distinguish three white faces, peering through the deep grass. They would move slowly forward a few feet, and then halt, apparently to listen. The deaf man in this strange, lonely place, thought he saw three desperate men making their way to the barn buildings. This very thing had been described in one of the stories he had read; three mountaineers had crawled slowly through the grass to set fire to the barn. And it came to John’s mind that these three white-faced fiends were creeping up to burn down this home and then shoot down its occupants by the light from the burning! The nearest crawler came slowly to within two rods of John and raised his head to look about him. As viewed in the moonlight it seemed a hideous face, hardly human in its aspect.

John Harlow was a man of peace, and he had been cursing himself for having been brought into this neighborhood quarrel. It was none of his business, he told himself, but the sight of this cowardly wretch crawling up like a snake to fire the buildings was too much for Boston reserve, and John raised his pistol, took aim at that hateful white face and pulled the trigger. The figure seemed to throw itself in the air at the shot, and then it lay quiet, the ghastly face still in the moonlight.

As John fired there came a sharp volley from the other buildings, and the two other shapes lay still. A cloud passed over the moon, and through the darkness, feeling himself a murderer, John found his way back to the house, where the women were waiting with eager faces. They lighted the lamps once more and the men came tramping back, to hang their guns on the wall. They were all in great spirits, and the old man came to John’s chair and with much shouting and waving his hands, made the deaf man understand.

“You made a great shot. Got him right between the eyes. We got them all laid out on the grass—come out and see them.”

But John did not want to see these dead men! He was a murderer. He had killed a man, perhaps an innocent stranger who had never done him wrong. It was frightful, but even the women insisted that he come, so with his eyes shut John permitted himself to be drawn out to the hateful spot where those dead bodies were lying.

“There’s the one you got!” roared a voice in his ear.

“You must be a dead shot—look at him; see how white he is!”

And Harlow opened his eyes, expecting to see a picture which could never be erased from memory. There were the dead bodies on the grass before him in the lantern light. There were three big skunks with more than the usual amount of white about their faces and backs!

Harlow gazed at them, and his paralyzed mind slowly came back to normal working order. And then the light came. He had not taken part in any family feud. No one had tried to kill him. The people of that section were as kindly neighbors as any he had ever had in Boston. For some weeks the skunks had been stealing chickens, and the family had organized this successful defense. It was not the white face of a man that John had seen in the tangled grass, but the white head and back of a skunk. He was not a murderer—he was only a skunk-killer!

Most deaf men go through these “adventures in silence.” Many of them are not particularly thrilling, but they are sometimes exciting enough to let the imagination run away with us. In what follows I shall try to make it clear that most of our fears are imaginary—thin ghosts, stuffed lions, scarecrows (or skunks!) which stand beside the road to frighten us. For the deaf should know from experience that the only safety in life is to go on, no matter what dangers croakers or cowards may predict just around the curve.

CHAPTER II
On the Road to Silence

The Nature of the Journey to the Silent Country—Substitutes for Perfect Silence—Sounds of Nature Companionable—The Direct Attack—“Just As I am”—Compensation in Idealized Memories—“Cut Out the Bitterness”—Reasons for Writing the Book—A Matter of Point of View, Concerning John Armstrong’s Possessions.

I think life has given me a certificate which qualifies me to act as guide and interpreter on the journey to the Silent Land. For forty years I have been traveling along the road to silence. I have seen some unfortunate people who were suddenly deprived of their hearing, as it seemed without warning. Fate did not give them even a chance to prepare for the death of sound. It was as if some cruel hand had suddenly dragged them into a prison, a form of living death through which the poor bewildered wretches must wander aimlessly until they could in some feeble way adjust themselves to the new conditions which we shall find in the world of silence. Happily my journey was not made in that way. I have wandered slowly and gently along the road, each year coming a little nearer to silence, yet working on so easily and unobtrusively that the way has not seemed hard and rough. I know every step of the road, and I can point out the landmarks as we pass along. You may be compelled to travel over the same route alone some day. Perhaps your feet are upon it even now, unknown to you. Take my advice and notice the milestones as you pass them.

Let’s not hurry. Let our journey be like one of those happy family wanderings in the old farm days, long before the age of gasoline. On a Sunday afternoon we would all start walking, on past the back of the farm. Father, mother and the baby, all would go. We could stop to drink from the spring, to rest under the pines, to stand on the hill looking off over the valleys. The beauty of the walk was that time was no object; our destination was nowhere in particular, and we always reached it. No one hears of those family trips in these days. We “go” now. The family, smaller than of old, will crowd into a car and go rushing about the country in an effort to cover as many miles as possible, and to do as little sight-seeing as may be during the rush. Now, we shall not hurry, and there will be no great objection to our leaving the road now and then to gather flowers or bright stones, or to watch a bird or a squirrel. We shall need all the pleasant memories we can think of when we arrive.

Very likely you have before now entered into a “solitude where none intrude,” and have thought yourself entirely alone in the silence. But you had not reached the real end of the road. You missed some of the familiar sounds of your everyday life, but there were substitutes. There was always the low growl of the ocean, the murmur of the wind among the trees, the cheerful ripple of the brook, the song of the birds, or some of the many sweet sounds of nature. It was not the silence which we know, nor were the voices which came to you harsh or distorted. They were clear and true, even though they were strange to you.

I did not realize how largely the habits of our life are bound up in sound until some years ago we hired a city woman to come and work in our farmhouse. We live in a lonely place. This woman spent one night with us. In the morning she came with terror in her eyes and begged to be taken back to New York.

“It’s so still here; I can’t sleep!”

It was true. Her ears had become so accustomed to the harsh noises of the city that every nerve and faculty had been tuned to them. The quiet of the country was as irksome to her as the constant city noises are annoying to the countryman, just from his silent hills. Perhaps you have awakened suddenly in the night in some quiet country place, let us say in the loneliness of Winter in the hill country. You looked from the window across the glittering snow to the dark pines which seemed to prison the farm and house. You fancied that you had finally reached the world of silence, and you were seized by a nameless terror as you imagined what would happen to you if sight were suddenly withdrawn. Then you heard the timbers of the house creak with the cold, the friendly wind sighed through the trees and around the corner of the house. There came faint chords of weird music as from an æolian harp when it passed over some wire fence. Or perhaps there came to you the faint step of some prowling animal. Then the terror vanished before these sounds of the night. For this is not the world which I ask you to enter with me. We are bound for the world of the deaf. I tell you in advance that it is a dull, drab world, without music or pleasant conversation, into which none of the natural tones of the human voice or the multitudinous sounds of nature can come. You must leave them all behind, and you will never realize how much they have meant to you until they are out of your reach. Could you readjust your life for a new adventure in this strange world?

The deaf man must carry this world of silence about with him always, and it leads him into strange performances. I know a deaf man who went to a church service. He could hear nothing of the sermon, but he felt something of the glory of worship, and when the congregation stood up to sing my deaf friend felt that here was where he could help.

“Just as I am, without one plea,” announced the preacher, and the deaf man’s wife found the place in the hymn book. He sang along with the rest and thoroughly enjoyed it. However, one of the penalties of the Silent Country is that its inhabitants can rarely keep in step with the crowd. My friend did not realize that at the end of each verse the organist was expected to play a short interlude before the next verse started. There has never seemed to me to be any reason for these ornamental musical flourishes; they merely keep us from getting on with our singing.

The deaf man knew nothing of all this. He was there to finish the singing of that hymn. It is a habit of the deaf to go straight to the end, since there is no reason why they should stop to listen. So he started in on the second verse as all the rest were marking time through that useless interlude, and he sang a solo:

“Just as I am, and waiting not!”

He sang with all his power, he was in good voice and his heart was full of the glory of the service. He was never a singer at best, and the voice of a deaf person is never musical. This hard, metallic voice cut into that interlude much like the snarl of a buzz saw. His wife tried to stop him, but he could not quite get the idea, and he sang on. It is rather a curious commentary on the slavery to habit which most intelligent human beings willingly assume that this one earnest man, just as little out of step, nearly destroyed the inspiration of that church service. The unconscious solo would have taken all the worship from the hearts of that congregation had it not been for the quick-witted organist.

Some human beings have risen to the mental capacity of animals in understanding and conveying a form of unspoken language. It may be “instinct,” “intuition,” or what you will, but in some way they are able to convey their meaning without words. I have found many such people in the world of silence. The organist possessed this power. Before the deaf man had sung five words she had stopped playing her interlude, had caught the time of what he was singing, and was signaling the choir to join her. By the time they reached the end of the second line at “one dark spot” the entire congregation was singing as though nothing had happened. The minister, too, sensed the situation, for at the end of the verse, before the deaf man could make another start, he said:

“Let us pray.” And the incident was happily closed.

As I look about me in the world of silence and see some of the sad blunders of my fellows, I feel that in their poor way they illustrate something of the life tragedy which often engulfs the reformer. The deaf man does not know or has forgotten that those who are blessed with good hearing do not and cannot go straight to the mark. Much of their time is wasted on useless “interludes” or ornamental flourishes which mean nothing in work or worship. This man at the church, while his heart was full, could only think of getting that hymn through, earnestly, lovingly, and without loss of time. He may have had more true worship in his heart than any other member of the congregation, but he dropped just a little out of form, and he quickly became a ridiculous nuisance. The truth is, if you did but know it, that some of your clumsy efforts to keep step with so-called fashionable people make you far more ridiculous than those of us who fall out of step. Nature never intended your big feet for dancing, but, because others dance, you must try it.

Your reformer broods over his mission until it becomes a part of his life, a habit which he cannot break. He reaches a position where he cannot compromise, sidestep or wait patiently. He goes ahead and never waits for “interludes,” which most of us must put in between efforts at “reform.” The rest of the world cannot follow him. He becomes a “crank,” a “nut,” or an “old stick,” because he cannot stop with the crowd and play with the theory of reform, but must push on with all his soul. It seems to us who look out upon the aimless procession moving before us that an average man feels that he cannot “succeed” unless he stops at command and plays the petty games of society; he has sold himself into the slavery of habit and fashion, though he knows how poor and trivial they may be. This is bad enough, but it is worse to see scores of people fastening the handcuffs on their children. Now and then the organist has visions which show her what to do, and she swings the great congregation to the deaf man’s lead. Unhappily there are few such organists.

It is strange, indeed, when you come to consider it, that two worlds, separated only by sound, lie side by side and yet so far apart. You cannot understand our life, and perhaps at times you shudder at the thought of how narrow our lives have been made. We who have known sound and lost it have learned to find substitutes, and we often wonder that you narrow your own lives by making such trivial and ignoble use of sound as we see you doing. Fate has narrowed our lives, and we have been forced to broaden them by seeking the larger thoughts. You, it often seems to us, straiten your own lives by dwelling with the smaller things of existence.

The deaf have one advantage at least. They have explored the pleasant roads and the dark alleys of both worlds. If they are of true heart, in doing so they have gained at least a glimpse of that other dim, mysterious country which lies hidden beyond us all. To the blind, the deaf, or to those who carry bravely the cross of some deep trouble, there will surely come vision and promise which never appear to those who are denied the privilege of passing through life under the shadow of a great affliction. But these visions do not come to those who pass on with downcast eyes, permitting their affliction to bear them down. They are reserved for those who defy fate and march through the dark places with smiling faces and uplifted eyes.

Someone has said that the deaf man is half dead, because he is unable to separate in his life the living memory or sound from the deadness of the silence.

“I must walk softly all my days in the bitterness of my soul.”

That was the old prophet’s dismal view of life, and how often have I heard hopeless sufferers, half insane with the jangle of head noises, quote that passage.

“Cut out the bitterness, and I’ll walk softly with you,” was the comment of one brave soul who would not subscribe to the whole doctrine. I have had two deaf men quote that and tell me that their condition reminded them of what they had read of prison life in the Russian mines. Formerly, in some of these mines, men were chained together at their work below ground. Sometimes, when one member of the hideous partnership died, the survivor did not have his chains removed for days! One of my friends told me that he felt as though his life was passed dragging about wherever he went the dead body of sound, and what it had meant to his former life. Unless he could keep his mind fully occupied there would rise up before him the dim picture of the prisoner dragging his dead partner through the horrors of their underground prison. The other man who made the comparison had a happier view of life. He told me that he had read all he could find on the subject, and that when these men were released from their hateful prison and brought up into the sunlight, they seemed to know much about the great mystery into which we all must enter. So he felt that he was not carrying the dead around with him, but rather the living, for the spirit of the old life, the best of it in memory and inspiration, remained with him. So we deaf are like you of the sound-world in that some of us sink under our afflictions, while to others of us they are stepping-stones.

I have come to think that of all the human faculties, sound is the most closely associated with life. The blind man may say that light means more than sound; I do not know how the question can be fairly argued, but I think in most cases deafness removes us further from the real joy of living. You will notice that the blind are usually more cheerful than the deaf. But at any rate, all the seriously afflicted have lost something of life and are not on terms of full equality with those who are normal. Their compensations must come largely from another world.

Most people pass through life associating only with the living, and thus give but little thought to any world beside their own. The great majority of the people to whom I have talked about the other life are

Christians, more or less interested in church or charitable work, yet they have no conception of what lies beyond. Many of them dimly imagine a dark valley or a black hole in the wall through which they will grope their way, hopeful that at some corner they may come upon the light. The law of compensation must give those of us who have lost an essential of human life a greater insight into that other shadowy existence. For us who have entered the silence there must somewhere be substitutes for music and for the charm of the human voice. Most of the deaf who formerly heard carry with them memories of music or kindly words, legacies from the world of sound. These are treasured in the brain, and as the years go by they become more and more ideal. Just as the chemist may by continued analysis find new treasures in substances which others have discarded, the man whose ears are sealed may find new beauties in an old song, or in some word lightly spoken, which you in your wild riot of sound have never discovered. And perhaps out of this long-continued analysis there may come fragments of a new language, a vision which may give one a closer view or a keener knowledge of worlds beyond. Who knows? Again, one may not only add the beauty of brightness to the past, but one may, if he will, summon the very imps of darkness out of the shadows for their hateful work of destroying faith and hope in the human heart. The Kingdom of Heaven or the prison of hell will be built as one may decide—and his tool is the brain.

“For as a man thinketh in his heart, so is he!”

It is my conviction that this proverb was written by a deaf man, who had thoroughly explored the world of silence!

While the inhabitants of every locality are usually anxious to increase their population, I am very frank to say that some of the recruits wished upon us are not a full credit to our community. The world in which we must live is naturally gloomy, where canned sunshine must be used about as canned fruit is carried into the northern snows. It is no help to have our ranks filled with discontented, unhappy beings who spend the years which might be made the best of their lives in bemoaning their fate and reminding the rest of us of our affliction. What we are trying to do is to forget it as far as we can. The deaf man does not want the world’s pity. That is the most distasteful thing you can hand him, even though it be wrapped in gold. For the expressed pity of our friends only leads to self-pity, and that, sooner or later, will pit the face of the soul like a case of moral smallpox. The most depressing thing I have to encounter is the well-meant pity of friends and acquaintances. I know from their faces that they are shuddering at the thought of my affliction, and I see them discussing it, as they look at me! Why can they not stop cultivating my trouble? All we ask is a fair chance to make a self-respecting living and to be treated as human beings. This compassion makes me feel that I am being analyzed and separated like an anatomical specimen; there will come to me out of the distant past of sound the bitter words of a great actor, who said as Shylock:

“I am a Jew. Hath not a Jew eyes? Hath not a Jew hands, organs, dimensions, senses, affections, passions?”

I was brought up among deaf people. They seemed rather amusing to me, and I could not imagine any condition which could put me in their place. I now see that I should have profited by a study of their life and habits. I could have been better prepared to live the life of a prisoner in the silent world. Would I have struggled for greater power and wealth? No, for they are not, after all, greater essentials here than in your world. Were I to go over the road again, I should fill my mind and soul with music, and should strive with every possible sacrifice to fill out my life with enduring friendships, the kind that come with youth. It seems to be practically impossible for the deaf man to gain that friendship which is stronger than any other human tie. My aurist once told me that at least sixty per cent of the people we meet in everyday life have lost part of their hearing. They cannot be called deaf, but the hearing is imperfect and deafness is progressive. Many of you who read this may be slowly traveling toward our world, without really knowing it. There are in the country today about sixty thousand deaf and dumb persons. If we include these, my estimate is that there are at least half a million persons who have little or no hearing, while over one million are obliged to use some kind of a device for the ears. So we may safely claim that our world is likely to become more thickly settled in the future, and we may well prepare to number the streets and put up signboards.

And I will admit another reason for telling you about this quiet country. It concerns our own people, for whom I speak. I would gladly do what I can to make life easier for the deaf. Their lot is usually made harder through the failure of others to understand the affliction, and to realize what it means to live in the silence. In my own case I can make no complaint. I am confident that society has treated me better than I deserve, given me more than I have returned. I have been blessed with family and friends who have made my affliction far easier than it might have been. I realize that it is not easy for the ordinary person to be patient and fair with the deaf. We may so easily become nuisances. I presume that there is no harder test of a woman’s character and ability than for her to serve as the wife of a deaf man, to endure his moods and oddities and suspicions with gentleness and patience and loving help. A woman may well hesitate to enter such a life unless the man is of very superior character.

Now and then I meet deaf people who complain bitterly at the treatment which society metes out to them. In most cases I think they are wrong, for we must all admit squarely the foundation fact of our affliction, which is that we may very easily become a trouble and a nuisance socially. We represent perhaps two per cent of the nation’s population, and we can hardly expect the other ninety-eight per cent always to understand us. I have had people move away from me as though they expected me to bite them. Some sensitive souls might feel that they were thus associated with mad dogs, but it is better to see the humor of it. For my part, I have come to realize that I am barred from terms of social equality with those who live in the kingdom of sound. I have come to be prepared for a certain amount of impatience and annoyance. I am often myself impatient with those dull souls who depend so entirely upon their ears that they have failed to cultivate the instinct or the intuition which enables us to grasp a situation at a glance. But I do ask for our people a fair hearing, if I may put it that way. While we are deprived of many of your opportunities and possibilities, we think we have developed something which you lack, perhaps unconsciously. We can turn our experience over to you if you will be patient.

Do not fear that I shall corner you to make you listen to a tale of woe. The truth is that I often feel, in all sincerity, exceedingly sorry for you poor unfortunates who must listen to all the small talk and the skim-milk of conversation.

“I saw a smith stand with his hammer—thus,
The whilst his iron did on the anvil cool,
With open mouth swallowing a tailor’s news!”

It is so long since I have been able to chatter and play with words that I forget what people talk about. Some of them at least seem to have talked their tongues loose from their brains. I often ask intelligent people after this chatter what it was all about, and whether their brains were really working as they babbled on. Not one in ten can give any good reason for the conversation or remember twenty words of it. Do you wonder that we of the silence, seeing this waste of words, pick up our strong and enduring book and wander away with the great undying characters of history, rather thankful that we are not as other men, condemned to waste good time on such trivial exercise of ears and tongues?

That is the way we like to think about it, but there is a worm in this philosophy after all. I have reasoned things out in this way fifty times; the logic seems perfect, and yet my mind works back from my book to the story of John Armstrong and his New England farm.

John was a seedling, rooted in one of those Vermont hill farms. The Psalmist tells of a man who is like “a tree planted by the rivers of water”; such a tree puts its roots down until it becomes well-nigh impossible to pull them out of the earth. There had been a mortgage howling at the Armstrong door for generations. Not much beside family pride can be grown on these hillsides, and John would have spent his life cultivating it to the end, if his lungs hadn’t given out. The country doctor put it to him straight; it was stay on the hills and die, or go to the Western desert and probably live. In some way the love of life proved strongest. John bequeathed his share of the family pride to brother Henry and went to Arizona. There he lost the use of one lung, but filled his pockets with money. He secured a great tract of desert land, and one day the engineers turned the course of a mountain stream and spread it over John’s land. At home in Vermont the little streams tumbled down hill, played with a few mill wheels, gave drink to a few cows and sheep, and played on until they reached the river, to be finally lost in the ocean. In Arizona the river caused the desert to bloom with Alfalfa, and wheat, and orchards, thus turning the sand to gold.

And one day John stood on the mountain with his friends and looked over the glowing country, all his—wealth uncounted. All his! Worth an entire county of Vermont, so his friends told him.

“You should be a happy man,” they said, “with all that wealth and power taken from the sand. A happy man—what more can you ask?”

“I know it,” said John. “I know it—and yet, in spite of it all, right face to face with all this wealth, I’d give the whole darned country for just one week in that Vermont pasture in June!”

And so, unmolested in my world of silence, free from chatter and small talk, able to concentrate my mind on strong books, I look across to the idle gossipers and know just how John Armstrong felt. I would give up all this restful calm if I could only hear my boy play his violin, if I could only hear little Rose when she comes to say good-night, if I could only hear that bird which they say is singing to her young in yonder tree.

CHAPTER III
Head Noises and Subjective Audition.

Head Noises—The Quality Probably Depends on the Memory of Sounds Heard in Youth—The Sea and the Church Bells—“Voices” and Subjective Audition—Insanity and the Unseen—The Rich Dream-Life of the Deaf.

Deafness is not even complete silence, for we must frequently listen to head noises, which vary from gentle whispering to wild roars or hideous bellowing. There is little other physical discomfort usually, though some exceptional cases are associated with headache or neuralgia. There is, however, an annoying pressure upon the ears, which is greatly increased by excitement, depression or extreme fatigue. Unseen hands appear to be pressing in at either side of the head. The actual noises are peculiar to the individual in both quantity and quality; there are cases of the “boiler-maker’s disease,” where the head is filled with a hammering which keeps time with the pulse. I have known people to be amazed at the “uncontrolled fury” of the deaf when their anger is fully aroused—perhaps by something which seems trivial enough. They do not realize how a sudden quickening of the heart action may start a great army of furies to shouting and smashing in the deaf man’s brain!

Again, the roaring and the pounding will start without warning, and then as suddenly fade to a dim murmur. It appears to diminish when the victim can concentrate his mind upon some cheerful subject, so I take it to be more of a mental or nervous disorder—not essentially physical. Many times I have observed that these noises become more violent and malignant whenever the mind is led into melancholy channels. They appear to be modified and softened in dreams, so I am thankful that I have been able to train myself into the ability to lie down and sleep when the clamor becomes unendurable. I meet people who pride themselves on their ability to go without sleep, and I shudder to think of their fate should they ever be marooned in the silence, since they appear to regard extra hours of sleep as a form of gross negligence at least! These night-owls tell me that they are the “pep” of society—its greatest need. I am not so sure of their mission. As I see it, the world has already too much “pep” for its own good. We need more “salt.”

You have doubtless noticed deaf people who go about with a weary, half-frightened expression, and have wondered why they have failed to “brace up” and accept their lot with philosophy. You do not realize how these discordant sounds and malignant voices are driving these deaf people through life as a haunted man is lashed along the avenues of eternal doom. Of course his will frequently becomes broken down, and his capacity for consistent and continuous labor is practically destroyed. Do you know that if you were forced to remain for several hours in a roaring factory you would come back to your friends showing the same symptoms of voice and manner which you notice in the deaf?

In my own case these noises have not been greatly troublesome, since I have persistently refused to listen to them. It is not unlikely that they are largely imaginary—although you are free to experiment by taking a double dose of quinine, which should give you a fair imitation of what many deaf people live with. The chief noise trouble that I have had is a sort of low roaring or murmuring, at times rising to an angry bellow, and then again dying to a low muttering. The deaf usually remember common noises heard in their youth, although I fancy that as the years go on our memory of sound changes with them. My private demonstration reminds me of the old sound of the ocean, pounding on the shores of the seaport town in New England where I was born. It seems to me now that the ocean was never quiet, except at low tide, and even then there came a low growl from the bar far out at the harbor entrance. I can remember lying awake at night as a child, listening to the pounding of the surf or the lap of the waves against the wharf. With a gentle east wind there was a low, musical murmur, but when the wind rose and worked to the north it seemed to me like a giant smashing at the beach, or like a magnified version of the Autumn flails pounding on barn floors far back among the hills. It seems to me now that I can hear and distinguish all those variations of sound in the noises within my head; I have often wondered if such memories ever come to those who have perfect hearing.

Poets and dreamers have enlarged upon the romantic quality of “the sad sea waves.” I once knew a woman who wrote very successful songs about the “shining sea,” though she never saw the ocean in her life. Those who live in the interior, far from the ocean, with never a view of any large body of water, are easily led to believe that the sounds of the sea are delightful companions. I often wish I could share my part of the performance with them! I would gladly exchange my constant sound companion for ten minutes of wind among the trees. Bryant says:

“There is society, where none intrude,

By the deep sea, and music in its roar.”

True; but Bryant was not deaf. No doubt as a child he held a sea shell to his ear and listened to its murmuring with delight. But he could lay it aside when it became tiresome! One speaks from quite another point of view when incased for life within the shell. I think I know just how the Apostle John felt when, looking out from every direction from his weary island, he saw only the blue, rolling water. He wrote as part of his conception of heaven:

“There shall be no more sea!”

I agree with him fully, and yet I know people whose conception of heaven includes Byron’s apostrophe to the ocean. How can we all be satisfied?

Other curious sounds come to us as we sit in the silence. Some are interesting, a few are strange or delightful. I frequently seem to hear church bells gently chiming, just as they did years ago when the sound came over the hills of the little country town where I was a boy. The sound now seems to start far away, dim in the distance; gradually it comes nearer, until the tones seem to fall upon the ear with full power. They are always musical, never discordant; they go as suddenly and as unexpectedly as they come. And where do they come from? Can it be that dormant brain cells suddenly arouse to life and unload their charge of gentle memories? Or it may be—but you are not interested in what the deaf man comes to think of strange messengers who enter the silent world. You would not believe me were I to tell you all we think and feel about them.

When I asked my aurist about this he wanted to know if any particular incidents of my childhood were connected with the ringing of bells. I could remember two. It was the custom, years ago, for the sexton of the Unitarian Church to come and strike the bell when any member of the community died. There was one stroke for each year of their age. That was the method of carrying the news. The sexton did not pull the rope, but climbed into the belfry and pulled the tongue of the bell with a string. It was my duty to count the strokes, and thus convey the news to my deaf aunt. In that community we knew each other so well that this tolling the age gave us as much about it as one would now get over the telephone. And then the bell on the Orthodox Church over in the next valley! That always rang on Sunday, before our bell did, and I heard it softly and musically as the sound floated over us. I had been taught to believe that the Orthodox people had a very hard and cruel religion, and I used to wonder how their bell could carry such soft music. When I spoke of this the aurist smiled understandingly and said it fully explained why these musical sounds now come back to my weary brain.

Actual voices come to us at times. I have had words or sentences shouted lustily in my ears. In several cases while sitting alone at night reading or writing this conversation of the unseen has seemed so clear and natural that I have stopped and glanced about the room, or even moved about the house, half expecting to find some visitor. As a rule the sentences are incoherent, and are not closely connected with everyday life; they sometimes refer to things which have preyed upon my mind in previous days. Deaf friends have told me of direct and important warnings and suggestions they have received in this way, but I have known nothing of the sort. It does seem to me, however, that this shouting and incoherent talking usually refers to matters which I have deeply considered at times of depression, fatigue or strong excitement. I consider that, as in the case of the bells, it may mean the sudden stirring of brain cells which have stored up strongly expressed thoughts, and are in some way able to give them audible rendition to the deaf.

My aurist offers an ingenious explanation. He says that I can hear my own voice, and undoubtedly it is at some times clearer than at others. I may unconsciously “think out loud”; that is, go through the interesting performance of talking to myself without knowing that I am doing it. Perhaps if he were deaf himself he would not be quite so sure of his theory—nothing is so convincing as a fact. I remember that at one time my dentist was trying to persuade me that I ought to have a plate.

“But that is merely your theory,” I said. “You tell me that you can make a plate which will enable me to eat and talk in a natural manner. How do I know? I think a dentist, to be entirely successful, should be able to prove such statements from his own experience.”

For answer he gravely took a good-sized plate out of his own mouth. I had no idea that he had one! I have often wished that some of our skilled aurists might graft their theory of head noises upon practical experience.

Scientists and psychologists refer to these noises as subjective audition. I shall attempt no scientific discussion of the matter, as this book is intended to be a record of personal or related experience. All students of deafness seem to agree that we can hear sounds, definite noises and even words that are purely subjective. Certainly in some forms of insanity the victims hear voices commanding them to do this or that. I have known several persons apparently sane in all other matters who insist that unseen friends talk to them and give advice.

Some years ago I was permitted to make a careful study of members of a small religious community which was established near my farm. Its members were ordinary country people, for the most part of rather low mentality and narrow thought, yet with a curiously shrewd power of intuition. They were fanatics, and among other practices or “self-denials” they refused to eat anything which had to do with animal life. Thus they limited their diet to grain, vegetables and fruit. One man, who called himself “John the Baptist,” found this restriction a rigorous punishment, for he “liked to eat up hearty!” He wrestled in spirit for weeks, and finally told me that he had received an unanswerable argument straight from the Lord. In a moment of depression he had heard a voice from Heaven saying very distinctly:

“John, look at that big black horse!”

“I can see him right now!”

“Look at him! He is big and strong and can pull a plow all alone. Does he eat meat? No, he lives on grain and hay—the grass of the field! Now if that big horse can keep up his strength without meat, you can do the same, John!”

And John fully believed that he had held direct conversation with the Lord. No man could shake his faith in that. Undoubtedly it was a case of that subjective audition similar to what the deaf experience. John heard the conversation, or at least imagined that the words were spoken; they followed or grew out of his thought.

I myself have had enough experience along this line to make me very charitable with those who give accounts of this sort of thing. It is a question, however, as to just how much of the unseen one can hear and not be considered insane! While some of the deaf lack the imagination to carry out this strange experience, others realize that the public draws no distinct boundary between “oddity” and insanity, and are wary of repeating all the strange messages which come to them. I think it is beyond question that primitive people, Indians, isolated mountaineers or ignorant folk living in lonely places have this subjective side of their hearing greatly developed. This I believe to be also true of educated thinkers who are largely influenced by imagination. It seems perfectly evident to me that some persons of peculiar psychic power may really develop abilities unknown to those who possess the ordinary five senses. As I have stated elsewhere in this book, I predict that the study of this strange power is to develop during the next century, and that the afflicted are to lead in its investigation.

Speaking of head noises and imaginary voices, I have an idea that there are deaf men who took these things too seriously and came to think that such noises appear to all. This led to a condition which made it something of a trial to live with them. They have been railroaded off to some “sanitarium” or asylum, even though they may be entirely sane. I have met deaf men who realize all this, and therefore, as they express it, they “will not tell all they know.” I am convinced that for this reason much that might be valuable to the psychologist is lost to the world.

Another strangely interesting point in this connection is that the deaf hear perfectly in dreams. Even considering dream psychology, this is to me the most curious phenomenon of the condition. In dreams I seem to meet my friends just as in waking hours, and I hear their conversation, even to a whisper. I also hear music, but it is entirely of the old style which I heard as a young man, before my hearing failed. Unfortunately (or otherwise) the modern “jazz” and rag-time tunes mean nothing to me; I have never heard a note of them. In dreams I hear grand operas and songs of the Civil War and the following decade; these last are plaintive melodies for the most part, for New England, when I was a young man, was full of “war orphans,” who largely dictated the music of the period. But even in sleep, listening as easily as anyone to this old music or to the voices of friends, the thought comes to me constantly that I am really deaf, and that all this riot of music and conversation is abnormal. The psychological explanation that here is a dream struggle between a great desire and the fact which thwarts it in real life sounds plausible enough, but the deaf man still must ponder on the profound mystery of his dream-life. I do not know just how common this dream music or sleep conversation may be among the deaf. I am told that some deaf people rarely, if ever, have this experience, while others tell very remarkable stories of what comes to them in sleep. It must be understood that I am merely giving my own personal experience, without trying to record the general habit of the deaf.

Physicians relate some curious experiences in this line. In one case a deaf and dumb man, utterly incapable of hearing when awake, was made to hear music and conversation when asleep. On the other hand, a deaf man who could hear music and conversation in dreams could not be awakened even by loud noises close to his ear. He showed a mechanical response to the vibration by a slight flicker of the eyelids, but protested that he heard nothing of the racket. In most cases of hysterical deafness arising from nervous trouble or shell shock during the war the patient seemed to have forgotten how to listen. If he could be made to listen intently he usually made some gain in hearing. Mind control or the use of some hypnotic influence is actually helpful in many cases.

I feel confident that this subjective hearing and these strange voices are responsible for the reverence or fear with which the Indians and other ignorant people usually regard the deaf. It is not unlikely that the famous “voices” which inspired Joan of Arc resulted from a form of subjective audition. Seers or “mediums” probably have developed this quality until it gains for them the respect and awe of their constituents; this would account for their great influence with primitive peoples. I have even had evidence of a remarkable attitude of wonderment toward myself on the part of strange people among whom I have traveled.

I take it that all this subjective audition arises from thoughts and emotions filed away by memory somewhere in the mind. Business men run through their dusty files and find letters or documents that were put there years ago and forgotten. Here at last they are brought to recollection, and the memories associated with them start a train of ideas which may affect the mind like a joyous parade or a funeral procession. The deaf, lacking the healing or diverting influence of sound, live nearer to this subconscious stratum of memories and can more easily call them up; in time of worry or great fatigue they can more easily come to us. Much of the curious foolishness of intoxicated persons results from this rising of the subconscious.

I have no doubt that the original deaf man, far back in history, when men lived in caves without light or fire, was considered a gifted and highly favored individual. I think it likely that the voices and strange noises which come to us through subjective audition were considered by these primitive people as communications from the strange, mysterious powers which changed light into darkness, and brought cold, hunger and storm. Probably the original deaf man was given the warmest corner in the cave and the first choice of food, in order to propitiate the spirit which communicated with him. The modern deaf man, however, can take little pride in the good fortunes of his original representative, for he is made aware every day that his fellows no longer class him as a necessity in the world’s economy, unless perchance he is able to lend them money or cater to their necessities.

It has been clearly shown that the play of our emotions has a physical influence on the body. The working of such emotions as fear, anger or worry is destructive; joy or quiet pleasure helps to build up rather than to break down. The happier emotions are nearly always influenced or guided by sound—music, or gentle tones of the voice. Thus we may see how the deaf, deprived of this healing or harmonizing influence, except in dreams, may easily become fearsome and morbid. Once a woman loathed dishwashing with a hatred too bitter for this world. She was obliged to do it, and she was able to largely overcome her emotion of disgust by playing selections from the operas on the victrola while at her work. That music influenced the counter emotions of joy and beauty until they overcame the loathing. Her hands were in the dishwater, but her mind was in glory—and then what did her hands matter? We can all remember similar cases where music has filled the soul with a great joy and has lifted the body out of menial tasks or humiliation. But music is not for the deaf; we are shut away from it, and can find no substitute. We must work out our mental troubles as best we can.

CHAPTER IV
Facing the Hard Situation

The Beginnings of Deafness—The Cows in the Corn—Re-adjustments—The “House of the Deaf”—Spirits of the Past on Our Side—The Course in Philosophy—The Reverence of the Ignorant Herder—The Slave and the King.

Every deaf man will tell you that for months or years he was able to convince himself that there was no real danger of losing his hearing. Then, suddenly made evident by some small happening, Fate stood solidly in the road pointing a stern finger—and there was no denying the verdict: “You are on the road to silence!” How foolish and dangerous to fight off the disagreeable thought when most cases of deafness could be cured or greatly helped if taken in time! It is safe to say that if the first symptoms of defective hearing were as uncomfortable as a cinder in the eye, or as painful as an ordinary stomach-ache, the great majority of cases would be remedied before the affliction could lead its victims into the silent world. But deafness usually creeps in without pain or special warning; if it is caused by a disease of the inner ear there are probably few outward symptoms, and it will not be considered serious. Then suddenly it will demonstrate its strangle-hold upon life, and cannot be shaken off; it is like a tiger creeping stealthily through grass and brush for a spring upon the careless watcher by the campfire.

I first looked into the dim shadows of the silent country one night in Colorado. Our people had broken up a piece of raw prairie land, ditched water to it and planted corn. It was a new crop for the locality, but we succeeded in getting a good growth for cattle feed. In those days there were few fences, except the horizon and the sky, and cattle wandered everywhere, so as the corn developed we took turns guarding it. One night a small bunch of fat cattle on their way to market was herded about a mile from our cornfield. Feed was scarce on the range, and these steers were hungry. We could see them raise their heads and smell the corn. We knew they would stampede if they could break away. I was on guard; my duty was to ride my pony up and down on the side of the field nearest the herd.

Those who know the plains which roll away from the foothills of Northern Colorado will remember the brilliant starlit nights. The dry plains stretch away in rolling waves of brown to the east, while to the west the mountains lift their snow-caps far up into the sparkle of the starlight. It is a land of mystery. Any man who has ever lived there has felt at times that he would give all he possessed to be back there with the shapes that live in the starlight. Great dark shadows slip over the plains. You see them slowly moving and you wonder at them. How can they shift as they do when there are no clouds? That night, far over the prairie, I could see the fires which the herders had built; two or three horsemen were slowly circling about the bunched cattle.

It seemed entirely safe, and at one corner of the field I got off the pony and let him feed as I walked along the corn. The night was still, and I could hear nothing, but suddenly my little horse threw up his head, snorted and pulled at his picket pin. I fancied he sensed some sneaking coyote, until out of a shadow near the field I saw half a dozen black forms with white gleaming horns, running for the corn. Part of the herd had broken away, and as I mounted the snorting pony the sickening thought flashed in upon me that I could no longer hear them. Before we could turn back the herd forty or fifty steers had entered the corn. They went aimlessly, smashing and crashing their way through the stalks, and with the other riders I went in after them, but I could hardly hear them. I remember that in order to make sure I held my fingers to my right ear to shut out sound. In the shadow of the corn I ran directly into a steer! He was tearing his way along, but I did not know he was there until my hands touched him. Then for the first time I knew whither I was bound. Probably there is nothing quite so chilling to the heart, unless it be the sudden knowledge that some dear friend must soon walk down the road with death.

Deaf people who read this will recall incidents connected with the first real discovery of their affliction; up to that time they have been able to throw the trouble out of mind with more or less confidence. They could argue that it was due to a cold, or to some little trouble that would soon adjust itself; they were slightly annoyed, but soon forgot it. Then—perhaps they cannot keep up with the conversation; they seem suddenly to lose the noises which are a part of daily normal life. Neither their work nor their play can go on without a complete readjustment of their methods of communicating with others. Suppose society refuses to do more for them than they have ever done for the afflicted? Many a man has been made to realize how small a moral balance he has to draw upon when at last he knows that for the rest of his life he must depend largely upon the charity or indulgence of those with whom he associates. For this is really our condition in the silent world. A person of dominating power may push through life thinking himself a master, but we must live with the humiliation of realizing that our friends cannot regard us as normal. It is a staggering blow to the man or woman of fixed ambition, or of that warm personality which demands human sympathy and kindly companionship. The old life must be broken up.

My first thought was to seek “medical advice.” That is what we are always told to do. The air about the deaf man is usually vibrant with advice, and frequently the less attention he pays to it the better off he is. The local doctor in the nearest town was an expert with pills, powders and blisters, but he went no farther. Like many country doctors of that time, he was little more than an expert nurse, though if you had told him this he could have shaken a diploma in your face. I went to see him one evening after milking. He had a kerosene lamp with a tin reflector with which he illumed my ears; his report was that the trouble was caused by wax growing on the ear drum. If I would come in by daylight he would scrape it off with a small knife. There was nothing to be alarmed about; I would outgrow it. As a precaution he would advise me to blister the ears—or that part of the skull immediately behind them—and——

“My charge is two dollars!”

Since then several famous aurists have peered into my nose and ears; they told me the truth, and charged more than this doctor did for his wild guess.

Later I shall describe some of the local treatments to which my poor ears have been subjected. It would make a volume in itself were I to tell all, and it would record the experience of most country people who go down the silent road. Frequently the city man may obtain expert advice from aurists who fully understand that they are dealing with an interior nerve or brain disease. Most of us who were “brought up” in the country fell into the hands of physicians who appeared to think deafness is what they call a “mechanical disease,” much like the sprain of the knee or wrist. That country doctor saw only the wax on the ear drum, when the real trouble was far inside. So we are blistered and oiled and irrigated—and the real seat of the trouble is not reached. Of course I should have found some one competent to treat my case. That is easily said, but the great majority of young men in my day were without capital, quite incapable of taking advice, and they labored under the conviction that any public admission of serious disease would be considered a weakness that was like a stigma.

I have been singularly unsuccessful in obtaining original impressions from deaf people in trying to learn from them just what were their sensations when it became evident, past all argument, that they were to walk softly through ever-increasing silence. It would seem that they rarely have great imagination; perhaps silence, and a lack of the stimulant of sound, destroys that faculty. Psychology estimates that of all the senses hearing has the greatest influence over the emotions and the morals. I fancy that the violent effort to readjust life habits to a new existence bewilders most of us, so that the mind is incapable of working in exactly the old way. Apparently many of the deaf fall into a morbid, hopelessly despondent frame of mind, which does not permit any reasonable and useful research into the habits and landmarks which characterize a strange country. I know how useless it is to tell the ordinary deaf man that it is a rare privilege to know and to study the ideas which special messengers bring to us in the silent world. I know that what I tell him is true, yet I am forced to agree with him when he says that he would give it all for the privilege of hearing a hand-organ playing on a street corner. Still, it is a part of the game for us to believe that in many ways the deaf are the favored of the Lord.

As far as my own experience goes, I know that I went about for some time in a daze. In spite of the verdict of the country doctor I realized that my hearing was surely failing, and I remember that I began to take stock of my mental and physical assets for the great game of life that was opening up before me. When a man does that fairly he will realize how industry and skill are changing all lines of life. When I was a boy playing ball we always put the poorest, most awkward player in right field. That was the jumping-off place in baseball. As the game is now played right field offers opportunity for the best player of the nine.

After standing off and looking at myself fairly I was forced to conclude that I was not fitted to enter the silent world with any great hope of making more than the most ordinary living there. Try it yourself. Cast up your personal account, giving a fair valuation to the things you can do really well, and then tell me what sort of a living you could make for your family if tomorrow you found yourself totally blind or totally deaf. Like many young men I had received no special training for any life enterprise; I knew no trade and had no particular “knack” at tools or machinery. I had attended a country school and one term of high school, but had never been taught the true foundation principles of any of my subjects. I had read many books without direction or good judgment, with no definite end in view. The sum total of my life assets seemed to be that I was an expert milker and could take care of cattle; the most promising position for me that of a rather inferior hired man. Thousands of men have gone through life with a poorer outfit, but they have had, in addition, the boon of perfect hearing; how great an advantage this is no one can know until he must face the world without it.

Every healthy young man looks forward to the time when he may build four strong walls about his life. These walls are home, wife, a piece of land and power. In the flush of youth we feel that if we build this square and live inside we may laugh at adversity and say in our hearts, “The world is mine!” But this becomes a troubled dream when one comes to understand that he must crawl through life crippled—with one great faculty on crutches.

It is rather curious how at such a time the mind grasps at meanings hardly considered before, and makes new and rapid applications from things which formerly seemed of no consequence. I remember picking up at this time a school reader which one of the children was studying. My eye fell on the old familiar poem—how many of us have performed a parrot-like recitation of it in the little old schoolhouse!

“Oh, solitude! where are the charms

Which sages have seen in thy face?

Better dwell in the midst of alarms

Than reign in this horrible place.

I am out of humanity’s reach,
I must finish my journey alone;
Never hear the sweet music of speech,
I start at the sound of my own!”

I had read this many times before without getting its full power. Now I saw that I was drifting with other deaf men out of reach of the “soft music of speech.” Suppose that I were to end my days on a desert island of complete silence! The idea haunted me for days, and I thought it out to the end. At last it came to me that Robinson Crusoe and Alexander Selkirk were but examples of brave spirits who could not be conquered by ordinary conditions. Other men have been marooned or swept ashore upon deserted or unknown islands—men of feeble will, without stern personal power. They made a struggle to hold on to civilization, but finally gave up, surrendered to natural forces, and either perished or reverted to barbarism. They, “heirs of all the ages,” renounced the progress of their race and went back nearer to the brute. Crusoe and Selkirk were made of sterner stuff. They were not to be beaten; out of the crudest materials they made home and companions and retained self-respect and much of the sweetness of life. Each made his own house in a new world, fashioned it by sheer force of will and faith. I made up my mind that I would do likewise. I would build my own house in the silent world and would make it a house of cheer.

But who will help the deaf man to build his house? Where can he find the material? I meet deaf people who complain bitterly because the people with whom they work and live do not treat them with full understanding and consideration. Let us be honest, and remember how little we ever went out of our way to stand by the deaf before our own affliction put us out of the social game! No doubt we laughed with the others at the queer blunders of deaf people, or let them see our annoyance when communication with them became a trouble. The chances are that we will receive fairer treatment from our associates than we ourselves gave to the afflicted in our best days. As for me, I vote the world a kindly place; people treat me reasonably. They are not cruel, but many of them are busy or selfish, and I fully realize that it is no pleasure for the average man or woman to attempt communication with the deaf. I do not blame them for avoiding it. And even when they use us well, from the very nature of the situation which separates us they can help but little in the building of these isolated houses of the silent world.

But I have lived to learn a strange thing. The silent world is peopled with the ghosts and shadows of men and women who have lived in other ages. Somehow they seem to feel that they would like to relive their lives, and repeat their message to humanity; but only the blind, the deaf and those otherwise afflicted seem to be able to meet them fully. The great undying souls who have made or modified history and human thought live in books, pictures and memories, but only in the world of silence can they give full comfort and power. For we come to know them so intimately that we learn how each one of them went about his great work carrying a cross of some kind—and the bond of sympathy to the afflicted grows stronger. You with light physical crosses perhaps think that you take full inspiration from Milton. Have you ever thought how much clearer his message can be to the blind or the deaf? Here, then, is our help and our hope. Our ears are not dull to the reverberating echoes of the past, and we can reach back for the best worldly solace—the experience and advice of those who have fought the good fight, and won.

It would be nonsense for anyone to claim that he goes through this preparatory course in philosophy with patience or good temper. He misses too much. The future is too uncertain. The dread of losing the rest of his hearing and the thought of the blight which this would mean to his future will at times drive the deaf man to desperation. At times he is almost willing to take the advice of Job’s wife—

“Dost thou still retain thine integrity? Curse God and die!”

And some of us never gain the faith and philosophy which make life in the silence endurable. Others acquire them slowly by a burning process which scars, but in the end gives them new strength. I remember two incidents which influenced me during the first days of my realization of what was ahead. They are of distinctly opposite character.

One day the regular herder was sick and I took his place. He was a “lunger,” a victim of tuberculosis, who had waited too long before coming to Colorado. At one time I worked with three of these men, and I came to know how their disease could send them to the top round of ecstasy and to the lowest level of depression in a single day. I have seen them get up in the morning dancing at the very joy of life, planning their “going home” to surprise the old folks with their cure. Yet by night perhaps they put a handkerchief to the mouth and took it away stained with blood—and their spirits would fall to earth abruptly. They are even more distressing companions than inhabitants of the silence who feel that they have lost life, fortune and future with the closing of their ears.

This herder had built up trouble for me without telling me about it. The deaf man usually runs blindly into that form of trouble every week of his life; it is a sort of legacy which others leave at his door. Down the river some two miles lived a ranchman who had seeded wheat and made a garden on a low flat where the river curved past a bluff. The herder had carelessly let the cattle get away from him the previous day, and before he could stop them several cows had trampled through this garden with all the exasperating nonchalance that a fat and stupid cow is capable of showing. When a man has lived for a year or so on “sow belly,” pancakes and potatoes, and when he is naturally inclined to a profane disposition of language, he knows precisely what to do to the responsible party. As I came along the river behind the herd, I saw this ranchman and his wife advancing to meet me. He opened up at long range, but as I did not know what it was all about, and, moreover, could not hear him, I kept on riding right up to meet him. My pony had once belonged to a mule driver noted for his remarks to mules, and the little horse actually seemed to recognize a master in this excited individual. This man’s boy afterwards told me that as he advanced his father was relating in a dozen ways in which he proposed to punish me. Shooting, it appeared, was too easy. He would meet me man to man and roll me in the cactus, etc., and worse! Unfortunately, I did not hear at all until I got close to him, and then his breath had failed somewhat, so that he was not doing himself full justice. So I rode right up to him and asked him the most foolish of questions—so he must have thought:

“What can I do for you?”

He looked at me in amazement.

“Are you deaf?”

I told him that I could not hear well.

“Ain’t you heard a word of what I’ve been handing you?”

“Hardly a word!”

“Well, by God, if that don’t beat all! I’ve wasted all them words on a deaf man!”

There was genuine sorrow in his voice as he spoke of the loss sustained by society through my failure to hear. All his anger was gone.

“Come,” he said. “Get off your horse. The woman’s got dinner ready. Come in and eat.”

“But suppose the cows get on your wheat?”

“Darn the wheat. I don’t make a new friend like you every day. Anyway, the boy can herd ’em.”

He put his boy on my pony and we went into the house, where over coffee, fried pork, riz biscuits and rhubarb sauce we pledged eternal friendship. His wife was a very happy woman as she explained matters to me.

“My man is terrible profane at times. Some men go and get drunk now and again to relieve their feelings, but my man don’t do that. He just swears something awful, and when it’s all over he’s all right again. He was awful to you, but when he found out you didn’t hear him, he was terrible shocked, and came out of his mad like the man in the Scriptures. He met his match at last, and I do hope he’ll quit.”

I have heard that the Indians never torture or mutilate a deaf man. They seem to think that he is specially protected by the Great Spirit. Here was a white man with much the same feeling, and I have seen a like forbearance in other cases. I think the great majority of human beings seldom or never take deliberate advantage of the hard of hearing; they may be amused at our blunders or annoyed by our mistakes, but they hesitate to treat us with the severity they could justly accord one in full possession of his faculties. Some deaf man could probably point to bitter personal experiences, but this is my own feeling. The above encounter also helps to prove what I feel to be a psychological truth—that most of our fear comes as a result of sounds registered by the brain. I frankly confess that if I could have heard this big man I should not have gone within a hundred and fifty feet of him. I shall discuss this phase of fear later; but I learned early in my affliction that:

“Cowards die many times before their deaths;

The valiant never taste of death but once.”

One January night I was caught out in a Colorado blizzard. Only those who have felt and seen the icy blasts pour down out of the mountain canyons and roar over the plains, driving the hard flakes like the volley from a thousand machine guns, can realize what it means to face such a blast. The cattle turn from such a wind and drift before it, half-frozen, heads lowered, moaning with pain. A herd of horses will bunch together, heads at the center, ready to lash out at the wolves. I was riding carelessly, rubbing my frosted ears, when the pony stepped into a prairie-dog hole, fell and threw me into the snow. Then with a snort, reins dragging, he started at a wild run directly into the storm. I stood in the snow, in the midst of whirling blackness, with nothing to guide me except the rapidly filling tracks of the deserting horse. I knew he was headed for home, and I followed as best I could, feeling for his tracks in the snow. After wading for a few rods, I saw far ahead what seemed like a dim star, close to the earth. It grew brighter as I approached, and sooner than I expected I stumbled upon a small group of buildings and a sod corral—The star proved to be the light in the house window. My horse stood with drooping head in front of the door.

Then the door opened and revealed a sheep herder. He had on a fur coat and bags were tied about his feet. Out he came with his lantern, and we put the horse in a shed. The air was filled with a low and plaintive crying from the sheep in the corral, bunched together where the snow was drifting in over them. There was nothing we could do for them, so we made our way to the house.

It was a tiny one-room affair, built of sods piled up like bricks, with a roof made of poles covered with sods and wild hay; it boasted a wooden floor. There were a stove, a table, three chairs and a small cot. In these days there would be a phonograph and a collection of the latest music, but this herder’s only constant companions were a dog and a canary bird. For fuel there was a small pile of cottonwood sticks, a box of buffalo chips, and a barrel containing bunches of wild hay tied into knots. Two other men were there, also driven in by the blizzard. I shall always feel that the mental picture revealed to me by the contrast between those two men in that lonely hut had the greatest deciding influence in helping me to fit myself for the life of the silent world.

They were both white-haired old men, though full of vigor. One I recognized as the cattle king of Northern Colorado. His cattle were everywhere; he owned half a town and an army ran at his beck and call, yet he could barely write his own name. It was said he always signed his checks “Z,” because he could not be sure of spelling “Zachariah” properly. He had no poetry or imagination, except what he could drink out of a jug. In the old days, when the plains were ruled by brute force, this man was happy, for life becomes tolerable only as we can equal our friends in manners and education. But how the plains had changed! Schools, churches, music, culture, were working in with the towns—the leaven which was to change the soggy biscuit of the old life to the “riz bread” of the new. That strange, fateful, overmastering thing we call education was separating the people of the new prairie towns into classes more distinct than money and material power had ever been able to create. This old man had railed and cursed at the change, for a premonition of what was to come had entered his heart, and something told him that his blunt philosophy of life was all wrong.

In this country a man may climb from poverty up to wealth, or he may leave wealth to others, but it is not possible for him to climb in the same way up into education, and he cannot leave these benefits to those who follow him. The old man had begun to fear that he had climbed the wrong ladder. There he sat, bitter and hateful, chained to prejudice, the slave of ignorance. He had no companion to share his narrow prison except his money—the most useless and irritating single companion that any man can have for the harvest years.

His companion was about the same age, an educated man, a “lunger,” forced to spend the rest of his life in these dry plains. I had seen him before at the county convention, where there had been talk of nominating him for county clerk—a much-desired political job. He might have been nominated but for his own actions. He stood straight up in the convention and said:

“Gentlemen, I refuse to let my name go before this convention. I have been approached by certain people who would compromise my manhood, and now I would not accept your nomination, even if you offered it.”

“Made a fool of himself. Had a cinch and threw it away!”

That was the way they talked in the street afterwards; but I remember going home that night with this thought dancing through my brain:

“I wish I could get up and do such things.”

He would have ranked as a poor man, or at best one of modest competence, yet in his enforced exile from home and friends he was sustained and comforted by a mighty host of men and women who came trooping out of history at his call.

There they sat in the dimly lighted room—the cattle king and the scholar, a slave of disease. Their chosen companions were about them, and these had turned the king into a slave, the slave into a monarch. For one there were only the spirits of hopeless gloom, grinning, snarling as though they knew that fate disdains money in exchange for the things which alone can bring comfort and courage into the shadow of years. For the other man the dim room was crowded with a goodly company—the great spirits who live forever in song and story, who gladly come back from the unknown country at the call of those who have learned to know them.

I saw all this, and then I seemed to see myself in the years that were coming, in the shadow of the impending affliction, a resident of the silent world. It was evidently to be a choice of masters. I remember now as though it were yesterday how on that howling night in that dim sod house I made a desperate vow that I would, if need be, go through fire and acid before I would end my days or sit alone in the silence as mentally hopeless and impotent as that “cattle king.” And I had been ready to say “me, too,” only a short time before to the cowboy who said:

“If I could round up and brand the money old Zack can, I wouldn’t care how little else I knew.”

Take a man with dull hearing, little or no education, no surplus capital—nothing except health and a dim idea that “education” will prove the tool to crack the safe wherein is locked opportunity—and what college will take and train him? I am sure that the colleges to which my boys have gone would never have given me a chance. But one fine day in September found me entering the gate of the Michigan Agricultural College. I do not think I ever passed the examination—I think the instructors felt somewhat as the Indians do about the deaf. At any rate, I entered, not knowing what I wanted or what I was fitted for. It might be interesting to see what sort of an education may be picked up in this go-as-you-please manner, or what is required to fit a man for a happy life in the silent world. However needful it may be for a deaf man to acquire excellence in some definite work, it is most of all important that he soak in all possible poetry, human sunshine and inspiration against the time that he must enter prison.

CHAPTER V
“A Heart For Any Fate”

Early Adventures—From Boston to the West—The Milkman and the Ear Trumpet—The “Milk Cure”—The Office of the Apple—Cases of Mistaken Identity—The Prohibitionist and the Missing Uncle George.

Until I went to Colorado as a young man to work on a dairy ranch, I did not fully realize the possibilities of deafness. I made a long jump to the Rocky Mountains. In those days it was something of a leap in longitude, culture and occupation. I had been working in a publishing house, and for several years part of my job had consisted in running errands for a group of the most distinguished authors ever brought together in America. Of course, no gentleman can be a hero to his valet, but a great author can be more than a hero to his errand boy. I went out once and bought a bag of peanuts for this merry group of serious-minded men; I suppose I am the only living person who ever ate peanuts with Longfellow, Lowell, Emerson, Holmes, Whittier and Aldrich. I saw Dr. Oliver Wendell Holmes put a peanut shell on his thumb and shoot it across the room at John G. Saxe, as a boy would shoot a marble. To me the most impressive of all that group of supermen was John Greenleaf Whittier. He was quite deaf, and the affliction troubled him greatly.

Some of the critics think that his inability to hear accurately accounts for some of his slips of rhyme. To me the remarkable thing is that in all Whittier’s writings I can find only one indirect reference to his severe affliction. This is in the poem entitled “My Birthday”:

Better than self-indulgent years
The outflung heart of youth,
Than pleasant songs in idle years
The tumult of the truth.

*       *       *       *       *       *       *

And if the eye must fail of light,
The ear forget to hear,
Make clearer still the Spirit’s sight,
More fine the inward ear!

There could be no finer advice for the deaf. I think Whittier’s gentle and placid philosophy (whose only sting was for slavery) was ripened and mellowed by his narrow life, which was still more closely circumscribed by the years of silence. But how strangely does compensation spring from a bitter root, and how surely are its best fruits reserved for “character”! Denied wide experience and education, deprived of one important avenue of approach to humanity, nevertheless Whittier’s voice came from his lonely hills with a rugged power all its own. And the message still rings true and sweet. He is truly a noble Apostle of the Silence.

It was indeed something of a jump from such associations as these to a milking-stool beside a bad-smelling cow in a dusty barnyard, or out among the cactus on the dry plains. Then I soon found that I was on the road to silence. In that dry country those who naturally suffer from catarrh are sure to have trouble with the head and ears unless they can have expert treatment in time. Our ranch was just outside a growing town; the cattle were herded on the open prairie. We milked our cows in the open air in Summer and in low sheds in Winter; the milk was peddled from door to door, dipped out of an open can, so that the dust might increase the amount of milk solids. That was long before these days of certified milk or sanitary inspection; I doubt if there was a single milk inspector in the whole of Colorado. Such milk as we handled could never be sold for human consumption in these critical modern days. Happily for us, we had never heard of germs or bacteria. We doubtless consumed thousands of them with every meal—and rather liked the taste!

Our custom was to drive up in front of a house and ring a large bell until someone came out with pail or pitcher. The milk was dipped out of the can and poured into the open dish. On an early morning in cool weather some of our customers were slow in responding to the bell. At those times we would ring patiently until the side door would open a narrow crack and a hand would appear holding a receptacle for the milk. Whenever I saw those hands extended, I thought of Whittier’s terrible lines on Daniel Webster: “Walk backward with averted face.” That was the way we were expected to approach the door.

On one occasion the milkman had forgotten his glasses, and he was somewhat near-sighted. He rang his bell before one house for several minutes with no visible response. Finally he saw the front door open, and what seemed to him a tin bucket was thrust through the opening. Being somewhat familiar with the vagaries of lazy housewives, he filled a quart measure with milk and backed up to the door. He was careful, for hardly ten minutes before a lady holding out a hand in much the same way had plainly cautioned him:

“Walk straight now, and if you bat an eye at this door I’ll call my husband!”

In a community where women were a minority such a command was emphatic, so the milkman proceeded with care and circumspection. Peering about uncertainly, he carefully poured the milk into what he supposed was a milkpail. There was a tremendous commotion within, for quite innocently he had sent a forcible message into the world of silence. It later appeared that the woman of the house was ill and had been greatly disturbed by the bell, so Aunt Sarah had volunteered to end the noise. But Aunt Sarah, though a woman of large and very superior intentions, was not an expert on noises. She was very deaf, and made use of one of the old-fashioned trumpets with a mouthpiece as large as a good-sized funnel. She had not been able to fully complete her toilet, so she did not throw the door wide open; but in order to hear what the milkman had to say for himself, she made an opening just wide enough to thrust out the mouthpiece of her trumpet. The man poured the milk into it—literally giving Aunt Sarah “an earful.” I have heard of several cases where a great nervous shock or a long continuance of trouble has suddenly destroyed the hearing. I wish I might say that Aunt Sarah’s hearing was restored or improved by this milk treatment; the dispenser of the liquid declares that it had a striking effect upon her voice, but that she was quite unable to appreciate his explanation. Were I to repeat some of her remarks, I should add to the force of this narrative, but hardly to its dignity.

The town of Greeley was organized as a temperance community. It was recorded in every deed or lease that the title was to be forfeited at any time that liquor was sold on the premises, and this regulation was absolutely enforced, for the settlers were a band of earnest “cranks,” who saw to it that the wheels went ’round. The result was that this town contained more cases of near-delirium tremens than any other place of equal size in the State. It came to be a favorite plan for those who had been elsewhere on a spree to come to Greeley to sober up. They could get no liquor except what they brought, and most of that was taken away from them. The first time I drove the milk wagon I encountered one of these “patients.” At a lonely place on the outskirts of town a disreputable character suddenly started up from the roadside and caught the horse’s bridle with his left hand, meanwhile pointing a long forefinger at me. He was red-eyed, unshaven and trembly, and I could not hear a word he said. I took it to be “Money or your life”—and who ever knew a milkman to have money? It turned out that he was demanding a quart of new milk with which to help float over a new leaf. I had nothing in which to serve the milk except the quart measure, but I filled that and handed it over. The man sat down on the grass and slowly drank his “medicine”; then I washed the measure in an irrigating ditch and was prepared for the next customer.

This man told me that he was making a desperate effort to recover from a protracted spree, and it was the general belief that a diet of warm milk was the best treatment. It came to be a common thing for us to meet these haggard, wild-eyed sufferers, and help them to the milk cure. I have seldom heard of the treatment elsewhere. It was there considered a standard remedy, though I have never been able to understand the psychology or the physiology of it. A friend of mine who is quite deaf tells me of another experience with a new cure for the drink habit.

He took his vacation one Summer on a steamer running from Buffalo up the Great Lakes. Among other supplies he carried a peck of good apples. I cannot say that apples are to be recommended as a cure for deafness, but to many of us they are better than tobacco for companionship. The first day out, while waiting for his fellow-passengers to realize that a deaf man was not likely to eat them up or convey some terrible disease, my friend took two mellow Baldwins, found a shady place on the forward deck, and prepared for a lazy lunch. He was about to bite into the first of his fruit when an excited man hurried up from below and began talking eagerly. The deaf man could not imagine what it was all about, and while he was trying to explain the newcomer snatched the apple out of his hand and buried his teeth far into it. My friend was reminded of a wild animal half-crazed for food. At this moment an anxious-faced woman appeared. The man turned to her, and with his mouth well filled shouted:

“Mary, you’ll find it in the false bottom of my bag. Get rid of it at once.”

The woman disappeared on the run, while the man finished the first apple and held out his hand for the other. Presently she returned with two bottles of whiskey, and, going to the side of the steamer, she deliberately threw them overboard. Then, while her husband kept at the apples, she made the deaf man understand.

It appeared that her man was a hard drinker, though he was trying with all his poor enfeebled will to free himself from the slavery. He had tried many “cures,” but the only way to overcome the desire for whiskey was to eat sour apples when the craving became too strong. It did not always work, but frequently this remedy was successful. This trip was a vacation for him and his wife, and just before the boat had started some of his companions had brought him two bottles of whiskey, which he had hidden in the bottom of his bag, and he was waiting for an opportunity to “enjoy life.” All the morning he had been prowling about the boat trying to fight off the craving. Finally down in the hold he had come upon what he called a “funeral outfit.” There was a coffin—but let him tell it.

“That coffin was going as freight to the last resting-place, and it made me realize that I was going by express to the same place. Beside it stood an undertaker—one of those melancholy individuals with black burnsides and a long chin. He looked at me, and I thought he was saying:

‘Come on, old man! This is what rum is bringing you to. Give me the job.’”

“I knew right there that I must decide between that coffin and a barrel of apples.”

There came upon him a fierce craving to brace his nerves with some of the whiskey in his bag. He ran through the ship praying as fervently as a drowning man for some saving straw. He saw the deaf man with the Baldwin apple, and he ran to the fruit like a hunted animal—eager to bite into it and to ease his heated tongue against its sour juice.

Since I first heard the story I have investigated many cases, and have never found a heavy drinker who was at the same time a large consumer of raw apples. And I have run upon several cases where sour apples eaten freely have safely tided men past the desire to drink. Surely a prohibition country must be one flowing with milk and apples!

We founded the Apple Consumers’ League largely on that theory. Something over twenty-five years ago I was lunching at a New York restaurant. There was a bumper apple crop that year, and a poor sale for it. Looking over the bill of fare, I found oranges, prunes and bananas, and an idea struck me.

“Bring me a baked apple.”

“We ain’t got none.”

“What, no baked apples? I thought this was an American place.”

“Sorry, boss, but we ain’t got none.”

By this time everyone within fifty feet was listening. Soon came an anxious-looking man, rubbing his hands and trying to smile.

“Nothing the matter with the food, I hope.”

I could not hear much that he said, and it did not matter. I did my best to deliver a public lecture on the apple, and all around me people were nodding as if to say:

“I’d order one if I could get it.”

The manager was impressed, and that night for supper he had “Baked Apple with Cream” written into his card in red ink. Later he came to me and asked names of varieties and where they could be found. As a result of this experiment a few of us founded the “American Apple Consumers’ League.” We pledged ourselves to call for apple in some form whenever we sat at any public table. Our declaration was cast in rhyme:

Apple, apple, call for apple
Everywhere you go.
Closely scan the bill of fare,
And if apple is not there
Call the landlord down with care!
He will come with smirking manner
Offering the soft banana,
Or the orange—be not shaken
In the job you’ve undertaken.
Call for apple! Call for apple!
With the problem closely grapple.

Some commercial travelers took it up, and soon nearly every restaurant in the country began providing baked apple. There was one result which we did not anticipate. The finer apples do not “stand up” well on baking; they are delicious, but they flatten to a jelly. The public demands something that stands up like an apple in shape. This has created a great demand for the coarse-fleshed fruit of inferior quality, which will stand up well in the pan.

We came upon another good office of the apple in this campaign. It is an ideal toothbrush. We found that the bacteria which cause pyorrhea are weakened by the mild acid, thus a wash of vinegar and water is an excellent remedy. This has been verified by dentists, and a mellow, sour apple eaten raw is likewise helpful. Using a sour apple as a toothbrush ought to be a popular method of scrubbing the teeth.

I have perhaps spent unnecessary time over these matters, but in my study of men who live in the silent world I have found a number who consider the deaf man justified in finding solace in drink. It is a most foolish prescription, but I fear the practice is all too common. The deaf are subject to periods of deep depression, and the argument is that the moderate use of alcohol will brighten their lives. I can think of nothing more pitiful or ridiculous than an intoxicated deaf man. Alcohol is the worst possible companion for the silence. There, if anywhere, the faithless and deceitful comrades of life lead only to darkness and misery. The deaf man needs every moral brace that life can give him; no other character who tries to find a place and to adjust himself to his fellow-men has greater need of the discipline which self-denial alone can give. Only the finer and more substantial hopes are worth considering when music no longer greets us and well-loved voices fade away or lose all their tenderness, when they become harsh and discordant sounds. Bottled sunshine, taken from coal or the electric wire, may be a fair substitute for daylight, but bottled happiness will finally bring nothing but misery to the deaf.

And yet you never can tell how people will size you up. There was a deaf man who became greatly interested in prohibition. He could not even drink coffee as a stimulant. He was to be chairman of the State prohibition convention, and so started on a night train for the meeting. Just before retiring he read over his speech, and then crawled into his berth very well satisfied with himself. About midnight he was awakened by a heavy hand on his shoulder. You must remember that it is a great shock for the deaf to be rudely started from sleep in this way; it is then impossible for them to grasp any new situation quickly. In the dim light of the Pullman our deaf man saw the figure of a man who was fumbling about in his suitcase. When he saw that he had awakened the sleeper, this intruder left the case, opened the curtains and held out his hand with some object presented straight at the deaf man’s head. As he was evidently asking some question, the deaf man imagined that he was a train robber presenting a pistol with a “Hands up,” “Money or your life,” or some such appropriate remark. The prohibition orator thrust up his hands and said:

“I’m deaf. Take it all!”

The “train robber” talked for a while and then lowered his hand, took the deaf man by the arm and led him to the smoking-room. There the “robber” turned out to be the colored porter, with no pistol, but a glass bottle in his hand. Finally, he slowly and laboriously wrote out the following:

“Man in lower four sick. Has got to have brandy. Says you look like a sport and probably have it on you. Can you fill this bottle?”

They had taken our prohibition friend for the other sort of a “rum-punisher.” Such cases of mistaken identity are quite common to the deaf, and some of them are never fully untangled.

Once when I entered a crowded dining-room in New York City a young woman jumped up from a table and greeted me with every evidence of affection. I had never seen her before, and was greatly embarrassed, especially as I could not hear a word she said. I tried to explain, but she continued talking rapidly, holding me by the arm. Of all the people present, no one thought of coming to my aid except the colored waiter. He was the good Samaritan who talked to the lady and wrote out her story for me on the back of his order card. She thought I was her Uncle George, who had agreed to meet her there. She insisted that I was playing a practical joke in pretending that I was only a plain and somewhat bewildered deaf man. Finally she obtained a side view of my face which convinced her of her mistake, and then, greatly startled by the publicity she had caused, she hurried away. To this day I do not know who “Uncle George” was or if he ever found his niece. My colored interpreter, however, is still on duty, and frequently writes out for me the conversations of people near by.

CHAPTER VI
Memories of Early Life

Reflection versus Conversation—Old Memories—The Lecture and the Whipping—Education and the Stick—Ridicule Unbearable to the Deaf—The Office Fight—The Dangers of Bluffing.

The deaf man may not excel in conversation, but he is usually strong on reflection. He has plenty of time, for his life is roughly divided into three chief periods, working, sleeping and thinking. It may safely be said that the character and temper of the deaf are determined rather by their thought than by their work. The greater part of their thinking is a form of mental analysis. They like to go back to the beginning of things. That is why the deaf man is such a remarkably superior specimen of a “grouch” when he puts himself to the task of analyzing his own troubles. If you could read the thoughts of the deaf as they sit by themselves without book or work you would find that they are searching the past to find something which may be compared to their present experience.

It is a curious mental sensation, probably far different from anything that comes to you in your world of sound, unless it comes in moments of depression, or when you are deeply stirred by old memories. Sometimes in the evening we become tired of reading and we cannot join in the music or chatter about us; it is too dark to work outdoors, and we have accomplished enough for the day. So we amuse ourselves by trying to go back to the beginnings of things. When did I first fall in love with the portly lady who sits at the other side of the fire? How much smaller was she then? When did I find the first gray hair? When did I first discover that my eyes had failed so that I could not read signs across the way? When did I begin to discover something of the real life difference between work and play? We think these things out to no particular advantage, except that perhaps they may form a text for a moral lecture to our young people. And now I find that my children very properly pay little attention to my lectures. I have stopped delivering them since going back to the original dissertation given for my benefit.

The old gentleman who brought me up was much addicted to the lecture cure for youthful depravity. He would seat me in the corner on a little cricket, and with his long forefinger well extended would depict the sin and laziness of “this young generation” whenever I forgot to water the horses or to feed the hens. I can see him now, with his spectacles pushed up to the top of his bald head, and that thick finger projected at me as he recounted the hardships of his own boyhood, and his own faithful and unfailing service. What a remarkable boy he must have been! Then his wife, who was very deaf, and, more unfortunately, very inquisitive, would appear at the door and shout: “What say?” Her husband would patiently gather his lungs full of air, make a trumpet of his hands and roar in her ear:

“I’m telling the boy about the terrible sin and danger of this young generation. What kind of a world will it be, I ask you, when such boys as that grow up to control things? It will be another Babylon, and I don’t want to live to see it.”

And his wife, getting only a word here and there, would quote some appropriate passage from Isaiah and go back to her work well satisfied that she had done her duty.

“Behold, I and the children whom the Lord has given me are for signs and for wonders in Israel:” And now it seems to me, as I sit here, a gray-haired man of the silent world, that I have seen many of the signs and wonders, though I did not recognize them as they passed by. That “sinful young generation” has grown up, and men of my age may be said to control the nation. It seems to me that it is a good world after all, and I believe that my mischief-making children will grow up into a steadily developing generation which will make it better yet. For here in the silent world we learn to smile at youthful antics, and to have great charity for them.

The earliest incident of my childhood that I can remember is the time my father pretended to give us a whipping. My older brother and I had been sent to bed in disgrace, to wait for father to come home and administer punishment. I can just recall that we were up in a New England attic, in the bed at the head of the stairs, surrounded by a collection of trunks, boxes and old rubbish which a thrifty housewife always puts “upstairs.” She is too economical to throw them away, and too neat to have them in sight downstairs. I think the town bell was faintly ringing, as it always did at six o’clock, and there was a sound like a gentle tapping as the water lapped at the wharf in high tide. I can just dimly remember the sunshine streaming in through the dusty window as we lay there in bed. The dust danced and floated in it like a flock of tiny flies. Since then I have read much of history. There have been many occasions when brave souls have waited for death or an ominous sentence. These scenes haunt the deaf; we cannot talk and laugh them away as others do. We must put down our book and go back in memory, seeking something in our own lives which may even remotely resemble what we have read. That is part of the penalty which must come with the silence. I remember reading a powerful description of Louis XVI on the night before his execution. A well-meaning, easy-going man, he had never been able to realize the serious side of life until it suddenly peered in through his window with the hideous face of Revolution. Then, face to face with death, he rose to that dignity “which doth become a king.” As I read that passage I put my book down, and, ridiculously enough, there flashed into my mind the picture of these two little boys waiting for the coming of father with his stick. We had determined that we would not cry, no matter how hard he hit us. That was our nearest approach to “dignity.”

I think that even then my hearing was a little defective. I heard my father come in below, and mother’s clear voice was certainly intended for our hearing.

“Now, Joseph, you go right up and whip those boys! They would not mind me, and you must do it.”

All through my life I have somehow managed to hear the unpleasant remarks or thorns of life. We deaf usually miss the bouquets. Poor father! The Civil War was raging, and he had volunteered. My young people seem to think that the Civil War was a mere skirmish beside the great World War just ended. Perhaps so, if we count only money and men, yet our part in this recent conflict was but a plaything in intense living, in sentiment, and breaking up of family life, as compared with the war of the sixties. Father was to leave home for the front in less than a week. He was captain of the local company, and should probably have been stronger in family discipline. But his heart was tender. He did not want to whip his boys, and he protested, as many a man has done. I could not hear what he said, but I knew from the expression on my brother’s face that he was protesting. Tonight, after these long and toilsome years have boiled out much of ambition and the desire to know the great things of life, I wish most keenly that I could have heard what my father said.

But mother insisted, as good women do, and finally we heard the big man slowly mounting the stairs. I can see him now as he stood framed in the doorway with the bright splinter of sunshine bathing him in light; a tall man with a strong, kindly face and a thick black beard. It is the only real memory I have of my father, for he did not come back from the war alive. Long, long years after, I sat at a great banquet next to a famous Senator, who had seen much of life. I told him that I have only this memory of my father, but that I had finally found a man who had served in the same regiment with him, slept in the same tent, who had known him intimately as a man.

“Now,” I asked, “shall I hunt up that man and have him tell me in his own way just what kind of a man my father was?”

Quickly the answer came from this hardened old diplomat:

“Keep away from him! Let him alone! Never go near him! Burn his letters without reading them. You now have an ideal of your father. This man knows him as just a plain, common man, probably with most of the faults of humanity. Let him alone! If at your age God has permitted you to retain an ideal of any human being, keep it pure. Take no chances of having it blackened!”

I took his advice, and have always been glad that I did so. It has been my experience that deaf men are able to hold their ideals longer than those who can hear; probably this is another part of our compensation. I would advise every man of the silent world to build up a hobby and gain an ideal. One will serve to keep hand and brain busy, the other helps to keep the soul clean. I heard one deaf man say that clean ideals mark the difference between a “grouch” and a gentleman.

My father came slowly to the bed where we lay, tuning his voice as nearly to a growl as the nerves between the vocal chords and the heart-strings would permit.

“I’ll attend to your case, young men! I’ll teach you to mind your mother!”

Then he began to strike the pillow with his hand, growling as before.

“Now, will you mind your mother when she speaks to you?”

It was one of those cases of thought suggestion which I have mentioned. My brother and I understood. No one can prove that father told us to cry and help him play his part. Like the horses in the pasture, we understood. We screamed lustily as father spanked the pillow, though we had fully agreed between us that we would endure it all without a sound. In fact, we carried out our part so well that mother, listening below to see that father did not shirk his duty, finally came running upstairs to defend her brood.

“You ought to be ashamed of yourself, Joseph, to hurt those little boys so! They did nothing so very bad!” And there was a great loving time, with mother holding us close and making little crooning sounds as she swayed back and forth with us. Father stood by, trying to act the part of stern parent, with indifferent success. And then he carried us downstairs, a reunited family, where we boys each had a doughnut with our bread and milk.

That was nearly sixty years ago, and I have been forced to stand up and take punishment for many sins and omissions. If father had lived, it is not likely that we would have discussed this little deception, but it still would have been a beautiful memory. My wife, who was once a school teacher, strong in discipline, says it was a great mistake on father’s part. Perhaps I show this in defects of character. He should have taken a shingle to us, she says. Perhaps so; yet after all these years (and what test can compare with time?) I am glad he acted as he did. If I were starting on his long journey, I should be likely to treat my children in the same way.

I have often been asked if deaf people of middle-age can safely be entrusted with the bringing up of a little child. That depends—both on the grown people and the child. Generally speaking, I should not advise it. Deaf people are likely to be obstinate in their opinions, rather narrow in thought, and slow to understand that the habits and tendencies of society grow like a tree. Many of them have made a brilliant success in certain lines of work, but they are apt to be narrow as a board outside of their limited range. In rearing a child it is a great disadvantage not to be able to hear its little whispered confidences; if the little one has no reliable confidant it will grow up hard and unsympathetic, or it will go with its confidences to the wrong person. I know deaf people who regret bitterly that they can only give financial aid and reasonable example to their children, while they long to enter into that part of child life which can only be reached through sound.

Looking back over life, I become convinced that my hearing was always a little dull; probably the trouble started in a case of scarlet fever when I was a baby, and in those days no one thought of examining or treating the ears of a child. Also, I think one of my teachers helped to start me along the road to silence. Those were the days when “corporal punishment” was not only permitted, but was encouraged. Most of us were brought up on the “Scriptures and a stick,” and each teacher seemed to select some special portion of the human anatomy as the most susceptible part through which to make her authority felt. Some of the educational methods of those days were effective even if they were violent. I have had the teacher point a long stick at me and issue the order:

“Spell incomprehensibility!”

I would stumble on as far as “ability” and then fall down completely. In these days my children are led gently over the bad place in the road, but then we took it at a jump. The teacher would lay that long stick three times over your back, and while the dust was rising from your jacket would make another demand.

“Now spell it!”

And I must confess that we were then usually able to do so. This particular teacher chose the ear for her point of attack; she would steal up behind a whisperer or a loiterer and strike him over the ears with a large book, like a geography. Or she would upon occasion pull some special culprit out to the front of the school by the lobe of the ear. Such things are no longer permitted in the public schools, yet I frequently see people in sudden anger slap or “box” their children on the side of the face or on the ears. It is a cruel and degrading punishment, and, remembering my own experience, I always feel like striking those who are guilty of it squarely in their own faces with all my power.

What annoys the deaf man most is the suggestion that he is being used as the butt for ridicule. We can stand abuse or open attack with more or less serenity, but it is gall and wormwood to feel that there are those who can make sport of our serious affliction. I once worked on a newspaper where one of the editors was absolutely deaf, unable to hear his own voice. He was a big man, naturally good-natured and reasonably cheerful. The foreman of the composing-room was a man of medium size, and a great “bluffer.” Sometimes he would try to impress strangers in the office by using the big deaf man as a chopping block for courage. He would get out of sight behind, shake his fist over the poor fellow’s head and roar out his challenge:

“You big coward; for five cents I’d lift you out of that chair and mop up the floor with you. Step out in the street and I’ll knock your block off!”

It was very cheap stuff, though quite effective. The deaf man, of course, didn’t hear a word of it, but kept on with his work, and many visitors considered the foreman courageous for calling down a much larger man. But one day the editor chanced to see the reflection of that fist in his glasses. He looked up suddenly and caught the foreman right in the act. The deaf think quickly and accurately in a crisis, and in an instant this man was on his feet, pulling off his coat. He did not know what it was all about, but here was a man taking advantage of his affliction. There is something more than impressive about the wrath of the deaf, and the foreman ran behind a table, took a piece of paper and wrote the following:

“I cannot fight. I promised a Christian mother that I would never strike a cripple, or a deaf or a blind man!”

The deaf man read the communication and made but one remark:

“I am under no such obligation!”

The way he polished off his tormentor was a joy to us all. He could not hear the foreman yell “Enough!” and we did not notify him until the job was perfectly done.

However, the deaf man will be wise if he keeps out of quarrels. When they arise suddenly he cannot tell which side he ought to be on. I have taken part vigorously in several sudden and violent battles only to find when it was all over that I had been doing valiant work—on the wrong side! Likewise, “bluffing” is taboo. Few men can ever escape with even the wreckage of a “bluff” unless it is safely mounted on skids of sound. We all learn these things by hard experience before we discover the limitations of the silent life.

Some years ago I attended a banquet where a great company of lions appeared to have gathered to feed and to listen to a few roars after the meal. The man next to me would have made a splendid “announcer” for a circus. Here, he told me, was a famous statesman; that man over there might have been President; this man had enough money to buy a European state; the man helping himself to a double portion of terrapin was a poet; the big man nibbling his bit of cheese was a well-known historian. He was a man of great ability, though unfortunately somewhat deaf, which fact naturally interested me so much that I kept an eye on the historian.

When the toastmaster began his “We have with us tonight,” it seemed as though every speaker felt that he carried a ticket to a front seat in the Hall of Fame, and in an evil hour I decided to attempt a little “bluff.” I rose for a few remarks on agriculture. Pedigree or good stock is essential to good farming, so it was easy to refer to “my ancestor, Lord Collingwood.” I had read somewhere that Lord Collingwood was present at the Battle of Bunker Hill as a petty officer on one of the English warships. It was quite easy to refer to the fact that I had one ancestor in that battle wearing a red coat and another behind the American breastworks wearing overalls! What would have happened to me if both had been killed? It was what we call very cheap stuff—too cheap for a deaf man to handle. It was a very silly thing to do, but for the moment it seemed to impress the audience. Out of the corner of my eye I saw the historian with his hand at his ear whisper to his companion and then make notes on a sheet of paper.

“Ah,” I thought with gratification, “I have impressed the great historian!” And I sat down thinking very well of myself. But the eminent historian folded his paper and sent it to me by a waiter. This is what I read:

“Are you sure of your pedigree? The facts seem to be that Lord Collingwood had only two children, both daughters. I think neither of them ever married.”

Then and there I lost interest in my ancestors. I have no further desire to trace back my pedigree, especially in the presence of well-read historians. And I am cured of “bluffing.”

CHAPTER VII
Experimenting With the Deaf Man

Deafness Cures—We Forget to Listen—Science and Scent—Lip-Reading—Judging Character.

We all have our pet aversions, and with deaf people the popular candidate for this position is the man who is positive that he can cure the disease. The “hope-deferred” period comes to most of us, and for a time we try every possible remedy, only to find that the affliction is still marching steadily upon us. Then it is the part of wisdom to give up the experimenting and to dig in as a line of defense all the humor and philosophy we can muster. It is not so much resignation to our fate as it is determination to make that fate luminous with hope and good cheer. Miraculous cures which restore the wasted organs of the body may now and then be possible, but they are not probable, while it is certain that too long a period of hope-deferred will cause a sickness of the soul as well as of the heart.

Many cannot agree with this philosophy. I think they add to the terror and trouble of their lives by submitting their poor bodies to a continuous series of experiments. There was a prominent merchant in New York, blind, with a disease which the best physicians declared incurable. He made a standing offer of a quarter of a million to anyone who would restore his sight. His theory was that this constant experimenting and treatment kept hope and faith alive. My own experience with the deaf does not point that way. I truly consider it wiser to devote the spirit which may be wasted in false expectation to the task of making the silent land endurable. I know of a woman for whom a tuberculosis expert prescribed a dry, hilly country, a simple diet and a cheerful mode of life, involving little or no medicine. She settled in the country, and some local “quack” told her that a friend had been cured by taking whiskey in which pine chips had been soaked. This intelligent woman, considering her doctor’s treatment too mild, was actually ready to follow this method. As a boy I lived with people whose lives were long experiments with deafness cures. At that time the country was full of unlicensed practitioners, who went about promising to cure every possible disease, and our folks tried them all, just as they sampled every new brand of patent medicine. Even now, many deaf men, and especially those who live in the country or small towns, must expect to be regarded as human experiment stations. We can all relate remarkable experiences with the various “cures” which have been tried out on us. From skunk oil to chiropractic and back again, we know every way station. Few persons appear to aspire to curing blindness, but in every community in which I have ever lived were several individuals who were certain that they could successfully handle diseases of the ear. I have seen them stand impatient, their fingers fairly itching to get hold of me. Usually their “knowledge” of the ear is merely that they recognize it as the organ of hearing, yet they are quite ready to rush in where aurists hesitate to enter. Most of the quack remedies may be harmless, yet sometimes these practitioners have done great injury where relief might have been obtained through proper care. I think several of them injured me, and I should feel like taking a shotgun to one of these amateur aurists were I to find him operating on one of my children. I wish I knew why the community deaf man of a country neighborhood is considered so fair a subject for experimentation. Probably in some cases it is really a nuisance to communicate with him, and again he may be the object of genuine sympathy, perhaps with an admixture of curiosity. I have run the whole gauntlet, and should need an entire book to report all the remedies suggested or actually tried on me.

Perhaps the most popular “cure” is skunk oil. This theory appears to be that since the skunk has a very acute sense of hearing, he can communicate this faculty to a human, through his oil. Personally, I believe the skunk to be a lazy, stupid beast, with hearing below normal; but, at any rate, we are earnestly told that oil from a skunk, if dropped into the ears, will surely improve their hearing. No man has ever given this remedy a fairer trial than I have done. Later an aurist diagnosed my case as a disorder of the interior ear which was rather encouraged than cured by the application of the oil. Another “remedy,” based on a similar principle, is an exclusive diet of pork. Here the excellent ears of the pig are to be transmitted to the consumer! I have been several times presented with the argument that deafness is more prevalent among the Jews and other non-pork eaters than among any other class. Also, they say that the disease of deafness was rarely known among the earlier pioneers, who lived mostly on “hog and hominy.” Possibly this was due to the fact that corn grows on “ears.” At any rate, here are fair samples of the arguments which are submitted to the unfortunate deaf. One Winter, when I taught school and “boarded round,” I experienced a full course of treatments based on this remedy. It was started by the school trustee, an economical soul, who sold his butter and fed his family on pork fat. In those days we were innocent of bacteria or vitamines, and this clever adaptation of a deafness cure helped the trustee to avoid the local odium which would naturally center upon a householder who fed the teacher on lard. And with one accord the neighbors joined in the good work. I moved to a new family each week, and as the news of the projected treatment spread, each farmer killed a hog just before my arrival. I ate fresh pork every day for three months. Ungratefully enough, I did not recover my hearing, but the treatment surely roused the sporting instinct in that neighborhood. Near the close of the term this comment was reported to me:

“No, it ain’t done him no good—he can’t scarcely hear it thunder; but I’ll bet fifty dollars he’s raised bristles on his back.”

At another time one of these experimenters took me up into the church belfry, ostensibly to “see the country.” As I stood beside the bell, he suddenly struck it a hard blow with a hammer, on the theory that this sudden and violent noise would “break up the wax in my ear” and “frighten the muscle into a new grip”—whatever that may mean. He protested that his grandfather had been cured in this way. This same investigator once tried a very radical treatment on his deaf hired man. It was Sunday afternoon, and the man had sought surcease from sorrow in a nap in the haymow. The boss knew how to handle bees, so he selected one from his hives, caught it safely by its wings, and, climbing the haymow, he dropped the buzzing creature into the ear of the sleeping hired man. He was working on a supposition that the man had forgotten how to listen, and that the buzzing of the bee, and possibly his sting, would shock him into remembering. But the victim merely started up from sleep like an insane man, and rushed screaming to the brook, where he ducked his head vigorously under water and drowned the bee. For long weeks the poor fellow feared to go to sleep unless his ears were stuffed full of cotton.

I asked the boss how he ever came to devise such a treatment for deafness. He explained that some years before he had had a sick cow, who had “lost her courage.” She positively refused to stand up, though she might easily have done so. I have also had cows act this way; they seem suddenly to have become “infirm of purpose,” and will die before they will exert themselves. A horse under similar circumstances will finally struggle to regain its feet, but the cow completely loses her nerve and will not try. I have had such a cow lifted off the ground by a rope and pulley, and yet refuse to use her legs. This farmer told me that he called in a local “horse doctor,” who suddenly threw a good-sized dog on the cow’s back. The dog barked and scratched, and under the influence of sudden fear the cow scrambled to her feet and instantly regained the power to walk. This farmer really was wiser than he knew, for there are some cases of deafness, such as those caused by shell shock, which consist in the loss of the ability to listen. Of course, our use of instruments or lip-reading dulls the art of listening intently, in any case, and it finally passes completely out of use. In some instances, where the actual ear is unimpaired, this faculty may be shocked back into use.

I once had an old lady solemnly assure me that a plaster made from the lard of a white sow and the wool from the left ear of a black sheep would surely cure any case of deafness. Query: Could the black sheep of a family effect a simpler cure by rubbing on the lard and brushing his hair down over it?

These are but samples of the dozens of ridiculous “cures” which have been suggested to me, or even put into operation. I can vouch for the comparative virtues of skunk oil, vibration, or the inflation of the Eustachian tubes at the hands of a skilled aurist. And, after all, I feel that in many cases the doom is sure, and that the best alleviation for the future silent days is the store of accumulated philosophy and sunshine. It seems to me that the surgery and general treatment of the ears has not kept pace with the successful handling of diseases of other organs. Some real “cure” may be developed, but hardly in my day. I consider the study of lip-reading the most useful course for the deaf, and we may at least prepare for the next generation by having the ears of our children watched as carefully as we watch their teeth, their eyes, their hands and feet.

For lip-reading one must have good eyes and a quick brain. Some of us deaf become proficient in the use of the science, and I think its practice will extend and become far more general. I have some little knowledge of it, though I have not made it a prolonged study. It would be difficult for me to explain exactly why I have not studied the science more carefully. For many years my aurist told me that my great hope for holding such hearing as I had was to force myself to listen, even though I could get little of conversation. He thought that the constant use of instruments or of lip-reading would weaken and finally destroy my limited natural hearing, so that in time I should forget how to listen and hear. This advice was, no doubt, good, though if I were to go through life again I should make a thorough study of lip-reading, anyway. In fact, I once started seriously enough, but was switched away by a curious and disheartening discovery. I began practicing on the train, studying intently the faces of men and women, trying to take their words from their lips. Next to the ability to read thought comes for interest and excitement the power of interpreting ordinary conversation when the speaker has no thought of betraying his communications to outsiders. I succeeded only too well with one man. I had always supposed him to be a person of high character, and had been wont to envy the recipients of his conversation. I finally was able to read his lips, only to find that all of his talk was trivial, and some of it filthy beyond expression. I, in my silence, busy with my gleanings from good literature, had fancied that my companions were using a gift priceless to me, and denied, for what we may honestly call “the glory of God.” My little essay into lip-reading was thus discouraged; it seemed suddenly a waste of time. Youth is probably the best time for studying lip-reading, when the spirit for riding down obstacles and discouragements is stronger.

The inexplicable sixth sense—a sort of intuition which we deaf acquire—appears to be even stronger in afflicted animals than in men. Sometimes it leads to an amusing outcome. In a certain New England State a law was passed prohibiting exports of quail, and a well-informed scientist was put in charge of it. He knew all about the habits of quail, but little about the practical side of legal enforcement. He made a tour through the State to consult with his deputies, and in one locality he found a rough old farmer serving as game warden; an independent old fellow, very deaf, most opinionated, with small respect for professional knowledge. His constant companion was a little mongrel dog, also very deaf. A strange silent combination they made, but they carried a State-wide reputation for “spotting quail.”

The clash came at the railroad station, where the professor was waiting for his train, completely disgusted with the appearance and general attitude of the warden. The latter came slouching along the platform with the small brown dog at his heels, and the face of the learned man became as a book, in which the countryman could “read strange matters.”

The deaf are prompt to act when action seems necessary or desirable. They do not join in useless preliminaries. Quickly and decisively the game warden opened the campaign.

“You’re going home to fire me, but before you leave I want to tell you before this crowd that you don’t know as much about this business as my dog Jack does. He’s deaf, too!”

There are few situations more damaging to dignity than a public argument with an angry deaf person—especially when the participator with good ears is a polished gentleman and ladies are present. Again, some men might appreciate the compliment of being associated with a large, noble-looking dog. But the professor glanced at Jack and fully realized the size of the insult. Here was just a little brown dog of no particular breed, with one ear upright and the other lying limp, evidence of previous injury in a fight. How was the professor to know that because the outer door of those ears was shut the brain had been forced to greater activity. And here was a shambling backwoodsman telling a Ph.D. that this disreputable creature was his mental superior! The professor was too indignant for words, but the game warden was ready to continue:

“I’ll prove it! I’ll prove it right here. There’s a shipment of quail going out of this town right now. Right on this platform are three farmers, an old woman with a basket, two drummers with bags, old man

Edwards with a trunk, and that young woman with a fiddle case. Who’s got the quail? Here’s a case where it don’t do us no good to know how many eggs a quail lays or how many potato bugs she has in her gizzard. Who’s got the quail? Can you tell?”

“Why,” gasped the indignant professor, “do you suppose I am going to insult this young woman by intimating that she is a quail runner? And these gentlemen? It’s preposterous!”

“It is, hey? Give it up, do ye? Well, we’ll try Jack. He can’t hear nothing, but his ears have went to nose. Sic ’em, Jack!” And he snapped his fingers at the little dog.

Jack put up his one capable ear and trotted along the platform, applying his scarred nose to each package. He sniffed at the bags of the drummers, nosed the trunk and the baskets, and finally came to the violin case of the beautiful young woman. The instant his nose touched that case every hair on Jack’s back stood erect and that broken ear came as near to rising as it ever had done since the fight. Jack was undoubtedly “pointing” at the hiding-place of the quail. In spite of the young woman’s protest, the warden opened the case, and inside were thirteen quail, snugly packed. Probably the lady could not even play the “Rogue’s March” on a real violin.

And the farmer strode up triumphantly to the professor. Shaking a long forefinger, he stated an evident truth.

“Professor, mebbe you’ve got the science, but you hain’t got the scent!”

Some of you who think that the loss of hearing can never be replaced by a new sense may well be wary in your dealings with the deaf. There are those like Jack, whose “ears have went to nose” and their “scent” is quite too acute to be deceived.

I am often asked how we pass our time when we are alone or unoccupied. We cannot, of course, beguile the time with music or the conversation of chance acquaintance. In some way the mind must be kept occupied—an idle mind leads to depression, the first step of the trip to insanity. One’s eyes weary of constant reading. Perhaps our loneliest situations are found in the great crowds. I have invented all sorts of schemes to keep my mind busy. In the old days, when I crossed the Hudson daily to New York on a ferryboat, I would count the number of revolutions which the great wheel required to take us over. I had the average of many trips. I have gathered all sorts of statistics. What proportion of men in a crowd wear soft hats? How many wear straw hats after the regulation date for shedding them? Does the majority of women wear black hats? What proportion of men cross the knee when sitting? Does a right-handed man ease his left leg in this way? What proportion of the dark-colored horses one sees have the white spot or star on the forehead? I started that investigation and was astonished to find how common this white star is. Then I went through all available books to learn how this star originated. Is it the remnant of a blazed face? I have never solved my question. Such investigation is a marvelous help to the deaf.

Another of my plans is character study. I try to determine the occupation and general character of strangers from their appearance, their habits and the books they read. You would be surprised at the accuracy of the observant deaf man in detecting these external marks which he comes to understand. He finally secures a most interesting chart of humanity, for in spite of us, character and occupation will leave a stamp upon the face and actions. But we cannot always classify strangers accurately. Here is one of my curious blunders: I saw daily on the train a big, brutal-looking fellow with a red face, a flat nose, well-protected eyes, and enormous arms and shoulders. I finally classified him as a prize-fighter. One day he was reading a small book, in which he was making frequent marks and comments. I reasoned that it must be some new version of the “Manly Art of Self-Defense.” Soon my man put down his book and went into the next car. Of course, I could not resist the impulse to glance at the volume. It was “The Influence of Christian Character in College Work.” My prize-fighter turned out to be a professor in a theological seminary. At any rate, he was in the battle against evil.

No other persons can ride a hobby so gracefully and to such good purpose as the deaf are able to do. No matter what it is, however childish, so long as it can keep the mind clean and busy, it is our most wholesome mental exercise. I know a deaf farmer who late in life started to collect and properly name every plant that grew on his farm. It was not only a wonderful help to him, but he became an expert botanist. And this recalls a discussion perennial with deaf men. Will they be happier in the country or in the city? The person inexperienced in deafness will immediately decide for the country, but I am not so sure that he is right. Farming is a business in which sound is important; animals betray pain or pleasure largely through sound; a poultryman is at a great disadvantage if he cannot hear the little ones. Then, too, some deaf persons crave the sight of their fellows; it is a pleasure to them to mingle silently with crowds; to see the multitudes pass by. The country—far from the rush and struggle of humans—actually terrorizes some deaf men. For myself, I greatly prefer the country, and I have selected fruit trees as my working companions. They talk the silent language, and they do not need to cry out when they wish to tell me that they need help. Yet, of course, we are better off if we mingle frequently with our fellows.

Sometimes in public life or in crowds the right thing comes to us like an inspiration. There was a deaf man who went out to address a meeting of farmers. It was held in the open air, and a stiff wind blew straight from the ocean to the speaker’s stand. The meeting was important; the farmers were discouraged and discontented and had come to hear sound advice and fearless comment. A cautious politician gave them half an hour of unmitigated “hot air”—a collection of meaningless words and high-sounding phrases. Then a well-known scientist followed with what might appropriately be called “dry air.” The farmers disconsolately classified both addresses as “wind,” and enough of that was blowing from the ocean. Instinct told the deaf man that something was wrong, though he had sat patiently through the long speeches without hearing a word. When his turn came, he walked out of the wind into the shelter of a tree and began:

“Job was the most afflicted man who ever lived. Of course, I know that there are men who claim that Job had a bed of roses compared with their constant afflictions. But Job has the advantage of good advertising in the Bible. He spoke a great truth when he said:

‘Can a man fill his belly with the east wind?’”

A mighty roar of laughter from that audience startled the deaf man. Fortunately he had said just what was needed to explode the gloom and disappointment of that audience.

CHAPTER VIII
Companions in Trouble

The Deaf in Social and Business Life—The Partially Deaf—Endeavors to “Get By”—The Yeas and the Nays—Fifty Cents or a Dollar?—The Safety of the Written Word—The Indian and the Whisky—The Boiling-down Process—The New Sense Developed by Affliction—The Deaf Cat and the Piano.

During the years of expectancy, when we continue to look forward to a cure, we deaf generally try to deceive ourselves along with others by refusing to admit our condition, and by attempting to conceal the defect in conversation. Many people are more or less deaf in one ear; frequently they really do not realize the extent of their affliction. They go through strange performances in their efforts to hear. Have you ever seen a horse or a mule traveling with one ear bent forward and the other reversed? The animal is, no doubt, somewhat defective in hearing, and he “points” his ears front and back so as to catch all noises, particularly commands from the driver. Back in the earlier ages man also possessed this power of moving the ears; most of us have seen individuals who still can control the muscles on the side of the head so that their ears “wiggle.” All of us still have these muscles, even if they have fallen out of use. Ear specialists say that many of us do actually move our ears slightly when making a great effort to catch the conversation. At any rate, human beings with defective hearing must bend forward, or even move about a circle of talkers to get in full range of the voices. We wonder sometimes why people insist upon getting on a certain side of their companions, and always walk on the inside of the street. Such a person is merely maneuvering to present the live side of his head.

It is really very foolish for the deaf to attempt to conceal their affliction; it places us in a false position, and we are at an added disadvantage in society. We may hide our trouble for a time, but sooner or later we will be found out, and it is far wiser to be frank in the first place. Some of our misguided efforts to pose as full men have humorous results. We have various tricks of the trade which we at times employ to catch or hold conversation. One common plan is to lead the discussion along lines which will enable us to do most of the talking. It has been said of the deaf man that he either talks all the time or else says nothing, and that sometimes he does both at once. Sometimes we meet a talker who is desperately determined to tell all of his own story—which is one involving many fatal direct questions, such as “Am I right?” “Do I make myself clear?” Then the deaf man is hopelessly lost, and the part of wisdom is to produce pencil and pad.

A friend of mine who knew that he was going deaf conceived the brilliant scheme of saying “Yes,” or nodding his head to agree with everything that was said to him. He felt that the path of least resistance lies along the affirmative—in letting others always have the say. One day he settled himself in the first vacant chair in a barber shop, at the mercy of a very talkative barber, with whom expression of thought had become merely a vocal exercise. My friend knew that this man was talking and asking questions, but as he could hear nothing, he merely nodded at each evident interrogation point. He had some important work on hand which he was trying to develop, and, as is the habit of the deaf at such times, he became absorbed in his thought and quite unmindful of what the barber was doing. At each questioning look he emerged from his brown study only long enough to nod his head. Finally the barber finished, and presented a check for about three dollars. It then appeared that instead of asking the usual questions about the weather and business the man had been talking hair cut, singeing, facial massage, moustache curling, hair renewer, and all the rest. Delighted at such a model customer, the loquacious barber had done his full duty. Nothing but that special Providence which guards fools and deaf men had saved my friend from the bootblack, the vibrator and the manicure girl.

I recently read in the daily paper of a lawsuit in which a man sued his barber to recover $4.75 obtained in just this way—the plaintiff being a deaf man. The justice decided against the barber on the ground that a man cannot legally be said to order a service unless he knows what it is going to be. So, score another for the deaf man.

This and similar experiences convinced my deaf friend that the road to affirmation is well lined with a group of citizens who do far more than hold out their hats for charity. No deaf man is safe on that highway. So he changed his method and shook his head at all questions. He said that experience had convinced him that at best this is a selfish world, and most men approached him seeking some advantage rather than offering service: therefore a general negative was the best policy. Shortly after making this decision he attended a reception at a wealthy man’s country home. At one stage of the proceedings the men were all invited into a side room, where a very dignified butler marched about and whispered to each guest in turn. My friend ran true to form and shook his head. In a short time a fine drink was served to everyone except himself.

As his affliction progresses, the deaf man learns frankly to admit his inability to hear. This turns out to be a remarkably effective way to separate the sheep from the goats, for most people will never go to the trouble of making us understand unless they have some really important message to deliver. Whenever we owe money, we find that our creditors are quite able to communicate with us; would that our debtors were equally insistent! Now and then comes a man who feels the tremendous importance of his message, although no one else recognizes it. He looks upon the deaf man as his select audience, and after giving us an agonizing half-hour, he goes on his way, pluming himself on the kindly deed he has performed in helping the neglected deaf man to valuable information!

I once lived in a little Southern town where the man who kept the livery stable was quite deaf. He was popularly known as a “near” man, “so close you could see him.” “The only thing he could hear was the clink of money in his pocket.” The men who worked for him often had trouble getting their money. One day his stableman, Ben Adams, colored, approached the boss and screamed in his ear:

“Mr. Brown, can I have fifty cents?”

Brown heard him perfectly, but no one ever extracted fifty cents from him without working for it. So he put on a fierce look and roared:

“What? What did you say?”

Exceeding penury had made Ben Adams bold. Here was a chance to raise his demand, and the delay bolstered his courage. So he made a trumpet of his hands and roared again:

“Massa Brown, can I have a dollar?”

Brown donned that fierce scowl which the deaf know so well how to assume, and roared himself:

“I thought you said fifty cents!”

The only safety for the very deaf man is to have the message written out. Lip-reading and the use of superior instruments are frequently very helpful, but my own experience is that it is a mistake to accept anything but written evidence. I take it that sound conversation is uncertain at best, and when a message is passed along through several persons, all more or less careless in speaking or listening, it is sure to be twisted out of its original shape. In our Southern printing office there was a stock anecdote about the Indian who mixed up his message.

This Indian was printer’s devil in a small newspaper office in Mississippi. He was said to be a star performer whenever he was supported by firewater. In those days local printers made their own ink rollers out of glue and molasses. During the Civil War the old roller wore out, and it became necessary to send the Indian to Vicksburg for the material for a new one. The printers did not dare write out the order, for if papers were found on the Indian he would be hung for a spy. So they coached him carefully and told him to go on saying over and over to himself:

“Something sticky and something sweet.”

They felt that Vicksburg would understand this trade language, so they started him off with the money. The Indian made straight for Vicksburg through swamps and woods and across streams, ever repeating the mysterious message. On the last lap of his journey he fell and struck his head on a log with such force that he lay unconscious for a time. Finally he recovered, shook his scattered wits together and went on repeating the message. But it had been affected by the fall. Subjective audition may even have been responsible, but, at any rate, when he finally scrambled into the store at Vicksburg and presented his money, he called for:

“Something sweet and something to drink.”

The merchant was well posted in this metaphor, so he fitted the Indian out with a jug of whiskey and five pounds of brown sugar. A day or two later the red man walked proudly into the printing office with this roller material. The printers were given to philosophy, and, being unable to make the ink roller, they proceeded to make a company of high rollers, in which task they were ably assisted by the faithful messenger. During the carouse a company of Grierson’s Union cavalry rode into town. All trades were represented in the Union army, and a couple of Northern printers used the printing outfit to good advantage. When the owners woke up they were put to work printing one of Lincoln’s proclamations.

By insisting upon written communications we deaf lose much of the skim-milk of conversation, but we come to be expert in estimating the ability of our friends to express themselves in clear and simple English. Try it on a few of your visitors. You will be astonished to see how many well-educated men will fail at the simple test of writing what they have to say quickly and tersely on paper. They flounder like schoolboys. My observation, as I look out from the silent world, is that with many humans talking becomes a sort of mechanical operation, usually involving no particular thought. It takes brains to put words on paper; and, again, the written word is actual evidence. A man speaking to you, and writing to me, would probably give me the stronger and more reliable account—and work harder while doing it. I know a very pompous, dignified gentleman of the old school who would probably say to you:

“The fateful hands upon the clock registered midnight’s doleful hour before my head sought my pillow.”

Or, “The emotions generated by that pathetic occasion had such a profound effect upon me that I fell into a lachrymose condition.”

If I handed him my pencil and pad he would get down to:

“I went to bed at twelve. I wept.”

Another bar to wordy discussions on paper is the fact that many well-informed people are not sure of their spelling. In this modern age too many business men depend upon their clerks and stenographers to see to such trifles as spelling and grammar; their own knowledge of the mechanics of expression grows dusty. One reason for the decline of the Roman Empire was that the soldiers became too lazy to carry their own weapons. They left them to slaves, and the slaves practiced with the implements of war until they became so expert that they overcame the masters. I think of this sometimes when a man who has nearly lost the art of writing through this transfer of the medium of expression from the hand to the mouth tries to communicate with me. Once I received a scathing reply to an excuse I made to a correspondent—that a sore throat had made it difficult for me to dictate letters. He acidly inquired how long it had been since people wrote letters with the throat.

Ignorant men who write little usually make the meaning evident, though the form cannot be called graceful. One night a drunken man drove into my yard by mistake. It was pitch dark, and I happened to be alone on the farm. His horses, eager for harbor, had turned into our road. I went without a lantern (the family had taken it on their trip) to turn his horses about and start them down the highway. Then he became possessed with a strong desire to tell me all his troubles. Of course, as I could not hear them, I made no reply, and my silence so enraged him that he wanted to fight. He clambered down from the wagon and groped about in the darkness to reach me. At last I made him understand that I could not hear, whereupon he was seized with a great grief for my trouble, and insisted on writing out his sentiments for me. There was no denying him, so off at one side of the buildings I started a little blaze of straw, and by its light he scrawled on a piece of writing paper with a blunt pencil. By the same flickering light I deciphered this:

“I am darn sorry. My brother cured his’n with skunk oil.”

Then he drove off singing, glad in his heart that he had offered consolation to an afflicted brother.

My children have been interpreters for me from the time they were able to write. They can go with me on business trips and get the message which others frequently cannot deliver on paper. At first they found this hard and irksome, but it has proved remarkably good drill for them in English. They have come to be excellent reporters, with the ability to put the pith of long sentences and whole lectures into a few exact words. This exercise of giving the deaf man an accurate and brief account of the great volume of an ordinary conversation has really developed their powers of expression.

We of the silence know that but few words are needed to grasp the really essential things of life, and we often wonder why others lose so much time in the useless approach to a subject when we can often see through it by intuition. Probably one of the compensations of our affliction is that we actually come to consider that these talkative, emotional people who surround us are abnormal. Two men with good ears meet for a business deal. They must go through the formula of discussing the weather, crops, or politics before they start at the real subject. The whole discussion is useless and irrelevant, yet they both feel that in some way it is necessary, and even when they reach the point at issue, they seem to prolong the debate with useless formal details. The deaf man cannot do it that way. He must fully understand his side of the case beforehand, forego all preliminaries, and plunge right into the heart of the subject with as few words as possible. Is this entirely a disadvantage? I think the man with perfect hearing might well learn from the deaf man whom he pities in this respect to cut out useless conversation and spend the extra time in thinking out his project. The most forceful and dependable men you know are not long talkers and elaborators. Their words are few and strong.

While a philosopher may perhaps summon this sort of reasoning to his aid in the matter of conversation, he cannot apply it to music. Here the deaf are quite hopeless. I have little knowledge of music, and could never fairly distinguish one note from another. I have often wondered whether a real musician who has lost his hearing can obtain any comfort from reading music as we read poetry or history for consolation. Can a man hum over to himself some of the noble operas and obtain the satisfaction which comes to me from “Paradise Lost” or Shakespeare? No one seems to be able to tell of this; but of all the sorrowful people of the silent world, the saddest are the musicians, for sound was more than life to them. I read that Beethoven could muster no consolation when the silence finally fell upon him. Life had turned dark, with no hope of light.

I often sit with people who tell me that they are listening to delightful harmony of sound—music. My children grow up and learn to play and sing, but I do not hear them. When my boy plays his violin I get no more pleasure from it than I do from his sawing of a stick of wood—not so much, in fact, for I know that the wood will build up my fire and give me the light and heat which I can appreciate. It is absurd, and I smile to myself, but sometimes when others sit beside me with invisible fingers playing over their heart-strings at the wailing of the violin and the calm tones of the piano, my mind goes back to Lump, the white cat.

There is a general belief that white cats are deaf. I know that some of them cannot hear, and Lump was one of the afflicted. I am bound to say that Lump endured his loss with great equanimity; he was more of a success than I ever was. He has given me more points on living happily in the silence than I ever obtained from any human being. He forgot the drawbacks and enlarged the advantages. Lump was never strikingly popular with my wife. She would not have cats in the house, and, her hearing being good, she could not appreciate the philosophy of this particular specimen. The proper place for cats, in her mind, was the barn, where they may perform their life duty of demolishing rats and mice. There are some humans who, like Lump, are forced into ignoble service when they are really capable of giving instruction in psychology.

Long before my time men have been forced to meet their boon companions under cover of darkness, or they have had to make private arrangements for a rendezvous with the “guide, philosopher and friend.” So, sometimes at night, after the rest of the family had retired, I would open the back door. There always was Lump, curled on the mat, ready to share my fire. Many a time as I let him in I have taken down a familiar old book from its shelf and read Thackeray’s poem:

“So each shall mourn, in life’s advance,
Dear hopes dear friends untimely killed;
Shall grieve for many a forfeit chance,
And longing passion unfulfilled.
Amen! Whatever fate be sent,
Pray God the heart may kindly glow,
Although the head with care be bent,
And whitened with the Winter’s snow.

“Come wealth or want, come good or ill,
Let old and young accept their part,
And bow before the awful will;
And bear it with an honest heart,
Who misses or who wins the prize.
Go; lose or conquer as you can,
And if you fail, or if you rise,
Be each, pray God, a gentleman!”

And Lump would sit at the other side of the fire, turn his wise head to one side, and look over at me as if to say:

“Old fellow, we are two of a kind—a rejected kind. They pity us for our misfortune; let’s make them envy us for our advantages. I know more of the habits of rats and mice than any cat in this neighborhood, because I have been forced to study them. I have made new ears out of my eyes and nose and brain, and so developed a new sense—instinct, which is worth far more than their hearing. Why can’t you do the same with men?”

Those were great nights with Lump before my fire, and we both understood that when the interview was over he was to go outside. One night, however, I forgot this, and as I went sleepily off to bed he stayed curled up by the warm hearth. The dreams of a deaf man are usually vivid and emphatic. Sleep may be your time for rest and relief from noise; with us it may be our period of music and excitement. That night I dreamed that I was engaged in a prize-fight. I had given the other man a knockout blow, when suddenly the referee came up from behind and struck me on the side with such force that my ribs all seemed to give way. I “came to” to find an energetic figure sitting up in bed beside me, and pounding my side in an effort to bring me back to assume my true position as defender of the family. Around the bed were grouped several small white figures, and at last they made me understand.

“There’s someone downstairs. He’s robbing the house. We can hear him. Go down and see about it!”

“What’s he doing?”

“Playing the piano.”

I will admit that my experience with burglars is somewhat limited, but I had never heard of one who stopped to play the piano before starting to burgle. Only a very desperate character would be likely to do that. There have been numerous cases where a deaf man has been shot down when approaching a house at night. He may have come on the most innocent errand, but as he could not hear the command, “Speak or I’ll fire!” he kept steadily on and was shot. I remembered these incidents, but could not recall any instance where the deaf man was supposed to give the order. But I had been telling my children great stories of life on the plains, and the only way for me to remain a hero was to tackle the intruder. I took my big stick and started down, while my wife brought a lamp and held it at the top of the stairs. I presume she was handing out some very sensible advice as I descended—but I could not hear it.

Now, what would you do and what would you say if you were roused at night, led by your family into a conflict, only to find an old and trusted friend robbing the henroost? I probably felt all your emotions when I caught sight of that robber. The piano had been left open, and there, walking up and down the keyboard impartially on black and white was my old friend Lump—the deaf cat. He was taking advantage of a night in the house to go on a voyage of exploration. His jump on to the piano led to my disgrace. The “robber” was quickly flung into outer darkness by an indignant woman, and probably I escaped a plain recital of my shortcomings only by lack of hearing. Do you know, while I would congratulate the husband on his escape, I always feel sorry for the lady, who would be well justified in giving her man a full lecture, and yet knows that he would not hear it. However, I feel that some innocent member of the family may receive the impact of these remarks. At any rate, before we were settled the baby woke up. It certainly was one of those rare occasions when the deaf man appreciates his advantages enthusiastically.

But why did Lump, in spite of his usual good sense, decide to try the piano at midnight? Of course, he did not know he was making a noise; but why mount the piano? I puzzled over this, and the wise old cat looked at me pityingly; but I could not understand. Every time he could slip into the house he went straight to the piano for a promenade up and down the keys. I began to think that we had developed a wonderful “musical cat.”

Some time later the piano seemed to need tuning, and a tuner came to take the muffle and twang out of its strings. When he opened up the front, the mystery of the musical cat was revealed. Just behind the keys, inside, was the nest of a mouse; she had carried in a handful of soft material—and in it were half a dozen baby mice. Lump had not been attempting “Home, Sweet Home”; his thought had been more nearly along the line of “Thou Art So Near, and Yet So Far.” He had no ear for music, but he had a nose for mice, and he had demonstrated his knowledge of the habits of mice. I, too, have found it wiser to judge people by their habits rather than by their music, for there are many who would be willing to play “Home, Sweet Home” while in reality they are after the mice.

CHAPTER IX
The Approach to Silence

The Approach of Deafness—The College Woman—Student Methods in General—Calamity and Courage—Animals and Thought Communication—Another Compensation—Pronunciation and the Defensive Campaign.

Some years ago we planted a hedge at the end of my lawn. For years I could sit at the dining-table and look over it. At night I saw my neighbor’s window-light, and by day I could see him or some of his family moving about the house or the fields. As the years went on I became aware that the hedge was growing. Finally there came a Spring when the bushes were filled out with foliage so that all view of the neighbor’s house was lost. I could not see the light at night. While I knew the people were moving about during the daytime, I could not see them. The hedge had shut me away from them, yet it had grown so slowly and so gently that there was no shock. Had my neighbor shut himself suddenly away from view by building a spite fence, the loss would have been far greater. This instance somewhat resembles the difference between sudden loss of hearing and its slow fading away.

I know of the curious case of a woman who could not be made to realize that her hearing was going until the common tests of everyday life convinced her that she was going deaf. What are these common tests? The usual ones are inability to hear the clocks and the birds. Very likely you have been in the habit of listening to the clock at night when for some reason sleep was impossible. It has been a comfort to you to think how this constant old friend goes calmly on through sun or storm, through joy or sorrow, gathering up the dust of the seconds into the grains of the minutes, and forming them into bricks of the hours and days. Or you may have been alone in the house on a Winter’s night. You heard the house timbers crack, and gentle fingers seemed to be tapping on the window pane. Then there came a night when you lay awake and missed the sound of your old friend, who seemed to have stopped checking off the marching hours. Many a deaf person waking in the night, missing the sound of the clock, has risen from bed and brought a light to start the old timepiece going. Not one of you can realize what it means when the light falls upon the face of the clock, revealing the minute hand still cheerfully circling its appointed course. The clock is still going, but something else has stopped.

We have endured another test in watching the birds. Most of us can remember when the morning was full of bird music. One day as we walk about it comes suddenly home to us that the birds are silent or have disappeared. At least, we can no longer hear them. We look about and notice a robin on the lawn. We see him throw back his head, open his mouth and move his throat. He is evidently singing—but we did not know it. I cannot tell you in ordinary language how a chill suddenly passes over the heart as we realize that as long as life lasts music is to become to us as unsubstantial as the shadow of a cloud passing over the lawn.

The woman I speak of knew by these tests that her hearing was failing. She was a student at college, where quick and sound ears are essential if one is to obtain full benefit from lectures. I know just what this means from my own experience, since I entered college some little time after my ears began to fail. I am frequently asked how it is possible for students with defective hearing to obtain an education. To the ambitious man or woman the first thought on discovering the beginnings of deafness is that the mind must be improved so as to make skilled labor possible. Too many deaf people after a brief struggle feel that fate has denied them the right to an education, and they give up trying in despair. I found several ways of partly overcoming the difficulty. I copied notes made by another student. In every class you will find several natural reporters who make a very clear synopsis of the lectures, and are rather proud of their skill. I found one lazy and brilliant fellow who was an excellent reporter, though he absolutely refused to study. He would give me his report and I would look up the authorities and help him fill in the skeleton. We served each other like the blind and the halt. I also made arrangements with several professors to read their lecture notes. Most of them are quite willing to permit this when they find the deaf man earnest and determined. In fact, the average professor comes to be a dry sawbones of a fact dispenser, whose daily struggle is to cram these facts into the more or less unwilling student brain. When an interested deaf man appears, actually eager to read the lectures, the soul of the driest professor will expand, for here, he thinks, is full evidence of appreciation. The world and the units which comprise it have always admired determination, or what plain people call “grit.” I think it has been given that name because it is that substance which the fighter may throw into the works of the machine which would otherwise roll over him.

Working thus, I came to know something of the inner life of these professors, whose daily routine comes to be a struggle with untrained minds which resent all efforts to harness them. The attitude of the average student in the class-room, as I recall it, reminds me of our trotting colt, Beauty. She was so full of trotting blood that at times it boiled over into a desire for a mad run. We thought we had a world-beater, but when we put her on the track she could barely shade four minutes. An experienced trainer took her in hand, put foot-weights and straps on her and forced her to change her gait and concentrate her power. How that beautiful little horse did rage and chafe at this indignity! One could imagine her protest.

“Let me be free! Do I not know how to pick up my feet and use my limbs for speed? My father was a king of speed—my mother of royal blood! Set me free! Nature has given me natural swiftness—I do not need your art!”

But they held poor Beauty to it, though she chafed and lathered, and tried to throw herself down. Everywhere she met the weights, the straps and the cruel whip. At last she submitted to discipline and did as she was told. She clipped fully ninety seconds from her natural speed for a mile, but while she was forced to obey she had little respect for her trainer.

Could my college professors have controlled their human colts with weights, straps and whips, it is more than likely that education would have established a new record. I found my teachers quite willing to give the list of references from which their lectures were taken, and with these in hand the deaf student may read in advance of his class and be fully prepared. As a rule, he does not stand high in recitations, but excels in his written work. The truth is that for work which requires study and research, deafness is something of an advantage. It enables a student fully to concentrate his mind on the subject. It seems to me that most of the world’s imperishable thoughts have been born in the silence, or, at least, in solitude. The fact is that the human ear, for all the joy, comfort or power it may give, is at best a treacherous and undependable organ. Perhaps I cannot be classed as an authority on a subject which involves accurate hearing, but I know that the greatest danger in my business is that we are sometimes forced to rely upon spoken or hearsay evidence. I will not use statements in print until they are written out and signed. Too many people depend for their facts upon what others tell them. The brain may distort the message and memory may blur it. The wise deaf man learns to discount spoken testimony, and will act only upon printed or written words. I have had people come to me fully primed for an hour’s talk of complaint or scandal; I hand them a pad of paper and a pencil, settle back and say:

“Now tell me all about it.”

That pen or pencil is usually as efficient as a milk-tester in determining the surprisingly small amount of fat which exists in the milk of ordinary conversation.

You see, as I told you I should be likely to do, I have wandered away from the text. That is characteristic of the deaf, for we seldom hear the text, anyway. The woman I started to tell about managed to work through college and began treatment for her deafness. This promised some relief, when suddenly the great earthquake shook San Francisco. The shock and fright of that catastrophe destroyed her hearing entirely. I have heard of several cases where deafness came like this, in a flash. As one man repeated to me:

“At twenty-nine minutes past ten I actually heard a pin drop on the floor of my room. At half-past ten it would have been necessary to prick me to let me know that the pin was there.”

And this woman’s mother died. Her daughter was forced to sit beside her at the last, unable to hear the message which the mother, just passing into the unseen country, tried to give. In all the book of time, I suppose there is recorded no more terrifying sadness than the fact of this inability to hear the parting words. Sometimes I regret that I promised not to make this book a tale of woe, for what could I not tell, if I would, of the soul-destroying sadness of this longing to hear a whispered confidence?

The woman of whom I speak did not shrivel under the heat of calamity. She continued treatment, and has made some slight gain in hearing. And now she has qualified as an expert physician. People wonder how a deaf person can possibly diagnose organic diseases, such as heart trouble, or even pneumonia. They can do it, for I have known several very deaf physicians who yet have met with marked success. One in particular was for years a chief examiner for a large insurance company. There was something almost uncanny about the way this man could look into the human body and put his finger upon any weak spot. I finally decided that he had developed as a substitute for hearing a hidden power to record with the eye and mind the symptoms not visible to most of his profession. The others depended on man-made charts and rules. Their perfect ears had made them slaves to common practice. My deaf friend, deprived of the ordinary avenue of approach for consultation, had pushed off like a pioneer into the unknown, where he had found the mysterious power.

I am well aware that I am getting out where the water is deep and that many of you are not prepared to swim with me. But there are some very strange things happening in the silent world. Have you ever noticed two deaf people trying to communicate? Strange as the process may appear, they are able to make each other understand, and they do it quite easily, where a person with good ears would have great trouble. I feel convinced that this century will see a system of wordless thought communication worked out, though its beginnings may be crude. It will be developed first by the afflicted, chiefly by the deaf. I am sure that you have noticed, as I have, how the so-called dumb animals can communicate. Let us take a group of horses at pasture. Now that gasoline has so largely superseded oats as motive force on our farms, younger people may not fully understand, but most people of middle age will remember how old Dick and Kate and all the rest went to a service of grass on Sunday. Perhaps they were scattered all over the field. Suddenly Dick, the galled old veteran off by his fence corner, raised his head and considered for a moment. Near by were old Sport and Kate, feeding side by side as they have worked in the harness for years. Soon old Dick walked meditatively up to this pair. He halted beside them and they stopped feeding for a moment, apparently to listen. The old horse stayed with them for a time and then walked slowly about the field to the others. No audible sound was made, but finally, one by one, the horses all stopped feeding and followed their leader up to the shadow of the big tree. The gray mare and her foal were the last to go. There in the shade the horses stood for some time with their heads together. Evidently some soundless discussion was taking place. At one point the gray mare threatened to kick old Dick, but she was prevented by big Tom, who seemed to be sergeant-at-arms. After a time they separated, and each went back to the spot where he was feeding. Who does not know that there has been a convention at which these horses have agreed upon some definite line of conduct? They may have organized a barnyard strike or mutiny. Dick and Kate may refuse to pull at the plow. Perhaps the council agreed to let certain parts of the pasture grow up to fresh grass. We saw the colt chasing the sheep back to the hill. No doubt he had been appointed a committee of one to do this, since the sheep nibble too close to allow an honest horse a good mouthful. At any rate, through some power which humans do not possess, these animals are able to communicate, and to make their wants known. I presume that originally man possessed something of this strange power. As he developed audible language he let the ability fall into disuse. The Indians and some savages have retained much of it. I take it that the deaf, shut away from much of ordinary conversation, redevelop something of this power.

Kipling brings this idea out well in some of his Vermont stories. The farmer goes on Sunday afternoon to salt the horses in the back pasture, where the boarding horses are feeding. These boarders represent a strange mixture. There are “sore” truck horses from the city, family nags on vacation, and old veterans whose days of usefulness are ended. With this mixed company, bringing in all the tricks of the city, are the sober work horses of the farm. The farmer puts his salt on the rocks where the horses can lick it, and then sits down to look over the rolling country. Several of these city boarders are of the “tough”

element, and they attempt to stir up a mutiny.

“See,” they say as they lick the salt, “now we have him. He does not suspect us. We can creep up behind him, kick him off that rock and trample him.”

But the farm horses object. This man has treated them well, and they will fight for him, and the toughs are awed. I have spent much time watching farm animals at silent communication, and I have come to believe that Kipling’s story may be partly true. I have seen our big Airedale, Bruce, sit with his head at one side watching the children at play on the lawn. He will walk off to where the other dogs are, and evidently tell them about it, glancing at the children as he does so.

Some men are able to talk with their eyebrows or their shoulders or their hands so that they are easily understood. I talked with an Italian once through an interpreter. This man was a fruit-grower, and my friend explained to him that I was growing peaches without cultivating the soil, just cutting the grass and weeds and letting them lie on the top of the ground. The Italian regarded this as rank heresy, and he evidently regretted his inability to express himself in English. He did give a curious long shrug to his shoulders, he spread out his hands, rolled his eyes and spat on the ground. He could not possibly have expressed his disapproval more eloquently, and I understood his feelings far better than I did those of the learned professor who elaborated a complicated theory for growing peaches.

All intelligent deaf men will tell you that they know something of this subtle power. Edison is very deaf, and I am not surprised to learn that he is studying it, attempting to organize it. It is one of the interesting mysteries of the silent world, and it can be made into a great healing compensation for one who will view his affliction with philosophy, concentrating his mind upon its study.

While, of course, I could make a long catalogue of the compensations and advantages of deafness, we must all admit that there is another side. For instance, the man of the silent world must avoid the pitfall of pronunciation. When sound is lost he forgets how words are pronounced, and the new words and phrases constantly entering the language are mysterious stumbling blocks. For example, no sensible deaf man will mention the name of that Russian society, the epithet now so glibly applied by conservatives to all who show radical tendencies. Nor would he attempt to put tongue to the hideous names of some of the new European States, or even to the name of McKinley’s assassin. He lets someone else attempt those, some reckless person with good ears. A strange thing about it is that our friends do not understand our limitations in this respect. My wife ought to know most of the restrictions and tricks of the deaf. Yet she was quite surprised when I hesitated about reading a church lecture without a rehearsal. It was a canned lecture, where you procure the slides and the manuscript, and select some well-voiced “home talent” to read it. I was chosen as the “talent,” but I remembered how years before I upset a sober-minded group by twisting up “Beelzebub.” Therefore, I wanted to read the lecture over several times and practice on some of the hard Bible names. Suppose I ran unexpectedly on those men who went down into the fiery furnace. Every child in the Sunday school could reel them off perfectly, but I had not heard of them for years, and I defy any one to get them right at sight.

Let the wise deaf man stick to the words he knows about until he has practiced the new ones to the satisfaction of his wife and daughter. He may well put up a defensive fight in most of his battles. Let him be sure of his facts, sure that he is right, and then stand his ground. Let others do the advancing and the countering and play the part of Napoleon generally; the deaf man will do better to “stand pat.”

“But when was there ever a successful defensive campaign?”

I advise you to get out your history and read of the Norman conquest. The battle of Hastings decided that. The Saxons lost that battle by refusing to “stand pat.” They ran out of their stronghold and were divided and destroyed. Had they taken my advice to deaf men, the history of England would have been bound in blond leather instead of black! That might have made considerable difference to you and me. I think I may say without fear of contradiction that the deaf invite most of their troubles by running out after them; when if we would keep within our own defenses and stand our ground we might avoid them.

CHAPTER X
Mixing Word Meanings

Misunderstandings and Half-meanings—The Lazy Vocalists—The Minister and the Chicken Pie—Reconciling the Deaf Old Couple—When One Book Agent Received a Welcome—Putting the “Sick” in “Music.”

The average man does not begin to realize how sadly he has neglected the training of his vocal organs. I have known men who have less than half the articulation of a bullfrog to blame people with dull hearing because they cannot understand the muffled mouthings and lazy vocalisms. Here we deaf have a real grievance. There ought to be a world where the blame and the ridicule for a failure to hear would go to the talker rather than to the listener. The mouth is more often at fault than the ears, although society will not have it so. There are people who run their words together like beads crowded on a string. Others talk as though their mouths were made for eating entirely, and were constantly employed for that purpose. “His mouth is full of hot hasty pudd’n,” is the way my deaf aunt would put it—and she was right in more ways than one, for usually these mumblers and mouthers come with a foolish or useless message, though they may consider it of the highest importance. Others seem to consider it bad form to talk loud enough for the ordinary ear to catch the sounds. I frequently wonder if people with such featureless voices realize how they are regarded by those who are approaching the silence. They seem to me persons who have hidden a priceless talent—not in the earth like the unfaithful servant of the parable, but in their chests, like a miser. It seems to me a crime to turn what might become a flute or a silver-toned cornet into a whimpering bellows or a cracked tin horn. I would have every child trained in some form of elocutlon or music; such lessons would be far more useful to the world than much of the geography and so-called science now taught in our schools. Many blunders can be traced to the mumblers and lazy-voiced talkers.

Some of our commonest and most amusing mishaps are caused by our getting only a word here and there in a conversation—and it often happens that we seize upon something unimportant in a sentence and dress it up grotesquely with our own ideas of what the speaker is trying to convey. This is bad business, I know, but many people show such impatience when we ask for repetitions that we prefer to take chances.

I remember one farm family consisting years ago of a very deaf and dominating woman, her mild and well-drilled husband, and the boy they were “bringing up.” The woman mastered the household, partly because it was her nature to rule, and partly because it was impossible to argue with her. She never heard any opposing opinions. The evidence was always all one way—her way. The dominant or self-assertive deaf are the greatest tyrants on earth; those who are not self-assertive are usually bossed and put aside. In this family the deaf man and the boy well knew how to keep to their places. There was something calculated to make you shiver in the almost uncanny way the deaf woman would catch that boy at his tricks. Every now and then she would stand him up in a corner, point a long, bony finger at him and demand:

“Boy, are you doing right?”

As he was usually meditating some bit of mischief, this constant appeal to conscience kept him well under subjection.

One cold day in early Spring the man and the boy were sorting potatoes down cellar. That is a hungry job, and they were poorly fortified by a light breakfast. The old man had cut a piece from the salt fish which hung from a nail and divided it with the boy, but he truthfully said it was not very “filling.” However, it made them thirsty, so in a few minutes the man went up to the kitchen for a drink of water, and also for the purpose of considering the prospects for dinner. His wife sat by the stove reading her Bible, and he came up close to her.

“What ye goin’ ter have for dinner?”

“Who’s goin’ ter be here?”

“Nobody but the boy.”

In those days the line-up at the dinner-table made considerable difference to the housekeeper. A “picked-up dinner” was ample for the family, but special guests meant more elaborate fare. The lady had listened attentively and had caught the sound of just one word—“boy.” She used that for the foundation of the sentence, and let imagination do the rest. So she gave her husband credit for saying:

“The Reverend Mr. Joy.”

Now this Mr. Joy was the minister. There was little about him to suggest his name, but those were the good old days when “the cloth” was entitled to a full yard of respect—and received it. In these days a woman may gain fame by writing a book, running for office or appearing in some spectacular divorce case; but these are commonplace affairs compared with the old-time excitement of entertaining the minister and having him praise the dinner. If the Rev. Mr. Joy was to be her guest, the farm must shake itself to provide a full meal. So the deaf lady hastened at once into action; she put her book aside, shook up the fire vigorously, and meanwhile acquired a program.

“In that case we’ll have chicken pie!”

The man and the boy went out and ran down the old Brahma rooster. They finally cornered him by the fence, where the old gentleman fell on him and pinned him to the ground. Then they cut off his head, plunged him into hot water, and the boy picked him, having stepped into a grain sack, which served as an apron. That rooster had the reputation of being old enough to vote, but those New England housekeepers well knew how to put such a tough old customer into the pot and take him out as tender as a broiler.

It was not until that chicken pie was on the table that the old lady finally understood that she had exerted herself for the boy and not for the minister. But again she rose at once to the occasion. That pie was too rich for her plain family, so she carefully put it away in the pantry and fed her husband and the boy on remnants. These consisted of scrapings from the bean-pot, one fish ball, boiled turnips and one “Taunton turkey,” which was the fashionable name for smoked herring. The pie was held for next day, when the reverend was actually invited, and he came.

It may have been your pleasant privilege to see a hungry minister, whose lines are cast in a community where thrift marches a little ahead of charity in the social parade, get within a few feet of a genuine New England chicken pie. If you have not experienced this, you do not know the real meaning of eloquent anticipation. Mr. Joy was hungry, and old Brahma had certainly acquired the tenderness of youth. The minister had had two helps and wanted another; he saw a fine piece of breast meat right at the edge of the crust. It was an occasion for diplomacy, for well he knew that the lady was planning to save enough of that pie for the Sunday dinner. He cleared his throat and put his best pulpit voice into the announcement:

“Mrs. Reed, this is an excellent pie!”

This compliment did not quite carry across the table.

“What say?”

Very slowly and distinctly did Mr. Joy repeat his compliment in shorter words.

“This hen is a great success.”

The lady got part of that sentence. She was sure of “hen” and “great success.” It happened that her nephew, Henry, was a student at the theological seminary, and had delivered a strong sermon in the local church shortly before. Naturally she thought the “hen” referred to him, particularly as anyone ought to have known that the pie had been made from an old rooster. So, with a pleasant smile she acknowledged the compliment, coming as near to the target as the deaf generally do:

“Yes, I always said that Henry was best fitted of all our flock to enter the ministry.”

The Reverend Mr. Joy put his head on one side and let this remark thoroughly soak into his mind. Then he silently passed his plate for that piece of white meat, as he should have done before. Action is far more emphatic than words to the deaf.

Then there were the two old people who had become estranged. Both were very deaf, without imagination, and very stubborn. They quarreled over some trivial misunderstanding, and refused to speak to each other; for years they had lived in the same house, with never a word passing between them. Probably the original trouble was due to a misunderstanding of words, but when the deaf are obstinate and “set in their ways,” you have the human mind like an oyster depositing a thick shell of prejudice around the germ of charity and good nature. This is one reason why they of all people should continuously read good poetry and stories of human nature; this is their best chance for keeping in touch with common humanity, and if a man lose the contact he is no longer a full man.

So these old people lived together and yet never addressed each other. There was one ear trumpet between them, and they always waited for visitors to come before trying to communicate. They had been known to call in some stranger who chanced to be passing in order that he might act as intermediary. In truth, the old couple still loved each other in an odd, clumsy fashion, and both would gladly have broken the silence had not the pride of each refused to “give way.”

One day the neighbor’s boy came to borrow some milk, and both seized upon him to act as interpreter. He screamed an explanation of his errand to the old lady.

“Pa tried to milk old Spot, and she kicked him and the pail over. Ma wants to borry some milk to feed the baby.”

“Tell him to get the pan off the pantry shelf.”

The boy delivered the message and the old man got the milk.

“Tell her I want my dinner.”

The boy did his best to scream this into the lady’s ear, but his feeble voice cracked under the strain. The listener got only one clear sound.

“Says he’s a miserable sinner, does he? You’re right; he is. I’m glad to see he’s getting humble. Tell him I’m waiting for dry wood. If I don’t get it, I’ll raise Cain!”

The boy ran over to the man with this message. The part about the wood was easy for there was the empty wood box. The rest of the message was too dull for his ears. So he hunted up pencil and paper and told the boy to write it out, while his wife sat congratulating herself with:

“Well, I may be kinda deaf; but I ain’t so bad as he is.”

After a protracted struggle with the pencil, the boy produced:

“She says she’ll give you cane.”

“A gold-headed cane. Just what I wanted! ’Pears to me Aunt Mary’s getting ready to admit she was wrong. You tell her I knew she’d smart for it!”

The boy went faithfully back across the room and screamed the message, which she understood to be:

“He knew you’re awful smart!”

There was no question about the pleasure this gave her, but when was any woman of spirit easily won? She could not give way so quickly.

“You just tell him to keep his soft soap for washing days!”

The boy again did his best, but the old man only heard “soap” and “days,” and happily, imagination came to his aid and framed:

“I hope for happy days!”

The old man looked at his wife for a moment, and there was a mighty struggle in his mind. Finally he hunted for their community ear trumpet, and marched across the room to her side. At great cost of pride he put the tube of the trumpet to her ear and shouted:

“I’d like to make it happy days, Mary; and I kinda think I was part wrong. Anyway, here I be speaking first.”

Aunt Mary took her turn at the trumpet.

“Reuben, I’m awful glad you spoke first. Thinking it over, I guess I was a little to blame, too, but not half as much as you were!”

And Reuben saw visions of his old courting days, when they could both hear whispered confidences, when this gray and wrinkled woman was a blooming girl. And the old man rose to heights of wild extravagance.

“Here, boy,” he said, “I’ll give you ten cents to go out to the shed and split an armful of that soft pine.”

And after the door closed behind him—well, there is a human language which needs no words for its interpretation; it is action.

It is no wonder that when the boy returned Aunt Mary was so flustered that instead of filling the pail with the skim-milk, she poured in fine cream! That baby had a full supply of vitamines for once.

I am acquainted with a young man who once went out into a country neighborhood to canvass for a subscription book. This man was somewhat deaf, just enough to make him mix words a little. Of course, he had no business to serve as a book agent, but the deaf will sometimes attempt strange things. He stopped at one farmhouse and found a middle-aged man and woman in the sitting-room. The man was evidently annoyed and embarrassed by the book agent’s entrance, but the latter paid little attention. He ran glibly through his story twice, and finished as usual, handing his pencil over with his usual persuasive:

“Sign right here, on this dotted line.”

“Not on your life,” was the man’s response; but the agent heard only one word distinctly, and got that wrong. He understood:

“Talk to my wife,” and, being on the lookout for any encouragement, he proceeded to do this in his best style.

“Why, madam, think for a moment what it will mean to have this beautiful book on your center table. When your husband here comes in from his work it will entertain him and give him a kindly regard for his family. And, madam, consider your children. When they come to the age of maturity with such parents—” But that was as far as he could go, for the woman dropped her work, screamed and ran from the room, leaving the book agent completely mystified over what he had said to start such a scene. The man glanced at him for a moment, and then snorted with satisfaction. He rose and started after the woman, only halting in the doorway to say:

“It’s a good idea, all right. You wait here until I come back.”

Moments like these test the temper of the deaf man’s steel. He had evidently stirred up a violent tumult, but he has no idea what it is about and when or where it will boil over. The troubled agent sat by the window and looked out at a savage bulldog which had come from behind the house and was now waiting in the path with something like a sneer on his brutal face, expressing:

“Here I am, on duty. Come and get yours! I need a new toothbrush, and your coat is just what I have been looking for.”

And then back came the man, smiling like a May morning.

“Here, let me have the book. I’ll take two copies. Never had anything do me so much good. Why, sir, I’ve been courting that fine woman for ten years, and neither one of us could ever get up to the point, leap year or any other. Then you come along and make that break about calling her my wife. That did the business, sure—pushed us right into the river. I just chased right after her and caught her in the kitchen. ‘Ain’t it the truth?’ says I. ‘And if it ain’t, let’s make it so.’ And all she said was: ‘Oh, William, I’m so happy—go right in and tell him to stay to dinner.’ Say, give me that pencil. I’ll sign up for three copies while I’m at it.”

Looking through the window, the agent saw that the bulldog was listening, and he must in some way have understood, for he shook himself and walked mournfully back to the barn.

If lifelong practice will bring perfection in the art of communicating with the deaf, my daughter ought to be an expert. Her experience shows something of the magnitude of the job. This young woman and her mother attended a reception at the Old Ladies’ Home. There was to be a very fine musical program, and the elder lady, as one of the managers, appointed her daughter a scout to see that all the old ladies came in to hear the music. This energetic scout found one sweet-faced inmate waiting patiently in her room, even after the entertainment had started.

“Can you hear the music?”

The young woman knows how to talk to the deaf, and she did her best.

“What?”

“Are you not coming to hear the music?”

The words were carefully separated, and shouted close to the ear.

“Hey, who’s sick? I’m sure I don’t know.”

The old lady heard one sound clearly, and twisted it into the wrong word.

“Of course, you went on and explained the thing carefully to her,” I suggested.

“No, I did not. I just changed the subject, and told her it was a fine day.”

And that, I take it, is typical of much of the effort to interpret life to the deaf. We can always tell them that it is a fine day. The old lady sat contentedly in the silence, unaware of the fact that near at hand the orchestra was working gloriously through what the local paper called a “fine musical program.” The chances are that she was better off in the silence. Most of us hear too much, anyway.

CHAPTER XI
“The Whispering Wire”

Telephone Difficulties—Seeing and Believing—Bell and the First Telephone—Choosing Intermediaries by Professions and Appearance—When the Bartender Beat the Preacher and the Farmer—The Prohibition Convention—The Hebrew Drummer as a Satisfactory Proxy.

Often I wonder if those who make such glib use of the telephone can possibly realize what it means to be unable to operate it at all. I see my wife with the instrument at her ear bowing and smiling to some invisible talker some miles away. Sometimes I ask why she should smile, frown, or nod, to some one over in the next county, and though she has never given a satisfactory answer, I take it that the mere sound of the human voice is enough to excite most of the emotions. This commonplace affair, as a matter of course conveying audible sound over long distance, becomes to the deaf marvelous, a contrivance almost uncanny.

The woman who brought me up was very deaf, and, like many of us who live in the silence, very narrow and most inquisitive. On Winter evenings she would often read aloud to us chapters from Isaiah describing some of the wonders which that poet and visionary predicted for the future. Then she would give her own version of the account, while her husband nodded in his chair and I was busied with my own dreams. I now wonder what would have happened if I had told her that some day a man would stand in the city of Boston with a small instrument at his ear and would hear a person in San Francisco talking in an ordinary tone of voice. At that time there was not even a railroad across the continent. West of Omaha was a wild Indian country, filled with cactus and alkali water. The folly of talking about delivering coherent sound across that waste! I have heard of a missionary who went to the interior of Africa and lived there with a pagan tribe. He told them stories of life in the temperate zone, and while they could not understand, they made no objection and politely listened. Finally he told them that at one season of the year the water froze—that it became so hard that people could walk on it. Here was something tangible; they understood water. The statement that people could walk on it was a lie, of course, and they threatened to kill the liar. Another man, a Vermonter, went to the Island of Java and married a native woman. He told her about buckwheat cakes and maple syrup in the Green Mountain State, and she would not believe him. Finally she came to regard him as a deceiver. He wrote me for help, and I sent him a sack of buckwheat flour and a can of syrup. They made a journey half around the world, but at last the Vermonter cooked a batch of pancakes which quite restored him to favor. The deaf and the deficient are likewise hard to convince unless the evidence is put before them in terms of their own understanding. If I had presented my humble amendment to the prophecies of Isaiah, I think it would have been decided that I possessed an evil spirit of the variety which may be exorcised by a hickory stick.

Later, as a young man, I saw Alexander Graham Bell working with the first telephone—a short line between Osgood’s publishing house in Boston and the University Press in Cambridge. It seemed then more of a toy than a device of practical value, and as I remember him, Bell was a rather shabby inventor. His messages were mostly a loud shouting of: “Hello! Hello! Can you understand me?”

Beginnings are rarely impressive or attractive, and the actual pioneer seldom recognizes himself as such. I saw one of the great men of Boston stand and laugh at Bell’s clumsy machine and at his efforts to make it work.

“Bell,” he said, “it isn’t even a good plaything. I’ll agree to write a letter, walk to Cambridge with it, walk back with the answer and get here long before you can ever get a reply with that thing.”

And Bell looked up from his apparent failure with a smile of confidence.

“I will make it work. The principle is right. We will find the way. The time will come when this boy here will be able to talk with anyone in any part of New England without raising his voice above an ordinary tone.”

And as a boy I thought that if I could ever face criticism and ridicule with such confidence, the world, or at least as much of it as is worth while, would be mine. I had faith in what Bell told us, and looked forward to the day when his words would come true. The prophecy has been more than fulfilled for others, but for us of the silence the telephone remains a mystery which others must interpret for us. Yet somehow I feel as confident as Bell that in some way out of our affliction will come a new means of communication between humans which will make the silence an enviable abiding-place.

My children have become greatly interested in radio communication. As I write this one of my boys is developing a crude outfit with which he actually takes sound waves from the air and translates them into music or speech. People tell me of great concerts and speeches sent through the air for hundreds of miles. Tonight thousands of country people, seated in their own homes, are listening while this marvelous instrument reaches up into the air and brings down treasures of sound until it seems as though the speaker or singer were in the next room. We deaf can readily understand what all this will mean for the future; it will undoubtedly do more than the automobile toward bringing humanity together and grouping the peoples of the world in thought and pleasure. Yet how little it will mean to us! It may even be an added cross, for evidently both pleasure and the business of the future are to depend more and more upon the ability to hear well.

I can remember as though it were yesterday the day that Lincoln was assassinated. I was a small youngster, but the event was printed into my brain. I know that news of this world-shaking event passed but slowly out into the country. There were lonely farms out among the hills where farmers did not know of Lincoln’s death for days. There was no way of quick communication. I thought of that during the last deciding baseball game between the Giants and the Yankees. Seated in our farmhouse beside his little radio ’phone, my boy could even hear the crack of the bat against the ball. He could hear the roaring of the crowd and the growl of “Babe” Ruth when the umpire called him out on strikes. And all this marvellous change has come about during my life! You may perhaps imagine the feelings of the deaf when they realize that they are shut away from such wonderful things.

But modern life is so efficiently strung upon wires that even the deaf must at times make use of the telephone. Some of our experiences in selecting proxies to represent us at the wire are worth recording. Every deaf man who takes even a small part in modern business must make some use of the ’phone or be helplessly outdistanced in the race. In the West they tell of a Mexican who wanted to get a message to his sweetheart. They offered him his choice between the telegraph and the telephone, and explained the difference. He chose the telephone without hesitation, for he “wanted no man in between.” The deaf man must have some one “in between,” and usually it is a matter of nice judgment to choose the person to occupy that position. From choice the deaf will take the telegram; they can read it, and the fact that each word costs a certain sum of money means a brief message. If telephone messages were paid for in the same way, all the world would gain in brevity of expression, or else the income taxes of telephone companies would soon pay the national debt.

It is remarkable how a deaf person with good eyes comes to be an expert at estimating character by appearance or actions. I find that we unconsciously analyze habits or manners, and group the possessors with some skill. Let a man come to me and write out his questions, and I am very sure that I can tell his business. A doctor accustomed to writing prescriptions frames his questions slowly and stops at the end of each sentence to make sure of the next one. A bookkeeper writes mechanically, and seldom prepares an original question. A grocer or a drygoods clerk, accustomed to writing down orders, betrays his occupation by certain flourishes with the pencil when he tries to write out a question, just as he is seized with a desire to rub his hands together during a sale. One would think that a lawyer would be very successful at this task. He usually fails. I have appeared as witness in several lawsuits, and able lawyers have completely lost their efficiency (and their patience) in trying to cross-examine me. Should any deaf person who reads this be called to the witness chair, my advice would be absolutely to refuse to answer any question that is not written out and first read by the judge. His examination will not become tedious. To the lawyer who desires a clear, straight story from a deaf person, I should say make the questions short and clear. Have most of them typewritten beforehand, and keep good-natured. A deaf man who knows the resources of his affliction can become expert at concealing evidence.

Many men tell me that they finally estimate a man’s power and character by the quality and tone of his voice. The substitute knowledge or “instinct” which we gain through observation is nowhere more useful than in selecting telephone proxies from strangers. Take this man with the stiff neck and erect shoulders. Where shall we draw the line between stupid obstinacy and firm character? Here is this shambling and shuffling person. Does his manner denote a weak, nerveless will, and inability to concentrate his mind, or is it merely superficial, easy-going good nature, when at heart he is capable of flashing out in anger or taking a bold stand? The fellow who keeps his hands in his pocket and the other who constantly waves them about—a deaf man may well beware when either approach him. And what of the man who seems to be continually looking for post, tree or wall against which he may lean? We come to know them all.

Some years ago I chanced to be in a small Alabama town, among people I had never seen before. My mission was a delicate one, demanding keen judgment and careful diplomacy. It became absolutely necessary for me to communicate promptly and privately with my wife, who at the time was on a steamship somewhere off Cape Hatteras. I could not use a telephone, but I found a man whom I could trust. So I telegraphed to Charleston and instructed my wife to call a certain ’phone number in this Alabama town. The message was repeated by wireless, and far off on the wind-blown ocean it reached the ship and was delivered. When the good lady reached Charleston she called up the number I had given, delivered her message to good ears, and it was turned over to me accurately in writing. One can readily see how tragic it would be if the interpreter for the deaf man chanced to be careless or criminal, for I should regard it as no less than a criminal act for one purposely to deceive a deaf person. I have employed strangers of all colors and conditions in this position of trust, and it is pleasant to think that most of them have been efficient and true in the emergencies. For it is an emergency when one is suddenly called upon to act as interpreter in the affairs of a stranger. This matter of using the telephone has become so simple to most people that it is hard to realize the dire complications it may involve for the deaf.

Once I was delegated to meet my sister and daughter at the old Long Island ferry in New York. They had spent the day on the island, and were to come back at night. Before the Pennsylvania Railroad dug its tunnels under the East River passengers came across from Long Island City at Thirty-fourth street. The landing and the transfer to street-cars was a jumble at best. It was about the easiest place in the world to miss your friends in daylight, while in the evening, under the dim lights, hunting for human express packages was much like going through a grab-bag. My passengers did not arrive. There was no sign of them anywhere among the masses of humans which boat after boat poured out. I began to be worried, for neither of them had been over the route before. I found that the train they had named had arrived on time. Either they had not come or the great city had swallowed them. It was plainly a case where the telephone became a necessity, but I could not go to the nearest ’phone and call up the friends with whom they had been staying. I had to find some proxy who would deliver my message and give me an honest report. All this was serious business at a time when the papers were full of stories of abductions and insults to girls. Whom could I trust in such a situation?

I looked about, and finally decided to appeal to a man who resembled a Methodist minister. At least, he wore a black coat, a white tie, and had adorned his face with a pair of “burnsides.” Also, I caught a gesture—a spreading out of the hands—which seemed to say: “Bless you, my children!” So, as an occasional occupant of the pews, I confidently approached the pulpit.

“My friend, can I ask you to use the telephone for me?”

I learned then how slight a contraction of the facial muscles may change a beneficent smile into a snarl.

“Why don’t you do it yourself?” I could see the words and the unpleasant frown. “Are you too lazy?”

I tried to explain the situation and show him that I could not hear; but he took no trouble to grasp my predicament. Several women had stopped to listen, and were smiling. I have learned that no man who wears white vest and tie can feel that women are laughing at him and retain his dignity. So my clerical gentleman turned on his heel and walked away.

“I have no time to bother!”

No doubt, he was right. He could preach the Christian religion, but had no time to practice it. It has always been my blessed privilege to see the humor of a trying situation. That dignified exit made me think of the deaf woman who lived in our old town. One day a stranger called, said he was a retired minister, and asked her to board him a week free of charge, so that he might “meditate over the follies of human life.” She refused, and he became quite insistent. He roared in her ear:

“Be careful, now, lest ye entertain an angel unawares!”

She was quick to reply:

“I’m deaf, but I’m reasonably acquainted with the Lord, and I know He won’t send no angel to my house with a cud of tobacco in his mouth.”

After failing with the ministry, I approached a man who looked like a substantial farmer—a man apparently with some sense of humor, though I judged him to be a bit stubborn.

“Sir, I need your help. I must find someone to telephone for me. My sister and daughter are in the country, and—”

That was as far as I could go with him. He put one hand on his pocket as if to make sure of his wallet, and waved the other at me.

“No, you don’t! I’m no ‘come-on.’ None of your bunco games on me. That story is too old; I’ve heard it before. Get out or I’ll call the police!”

I think the last sermon I ever heard was preached from the text, “And they all, with one accord, began to make excuses.”

Unfortunately, the preacher had never been deaf, so he did not develop all the possibilities of that text. But these rebuffs did not discourage me; they are only part of the “social service” which the deaf must expect. These men merely lacked the imagination needed to show them the pleasure which would surely come from doing a kindly act. They had declined opportunity.

Near the station was a saloon. It was a warm night, and the door was open. I had just been offered the nomination for Congress on the Prohibition ticket in my home district. Of course, a Prohibition statesman has no business inside a saloon; but I paused at the door and looked in. A pleasant-faced, red-haired Irishman stood behind the bar, serving a glass of beer to a customer. I have always believed in experimenting with extremes. By hitting both ends one generally finds a soft spot at the middle. I was on a desperate quest, and, having been rejected by the pulpit and the plow, I was willing to approach the bar. So I entered the “unholy place.” The bartender ran an appraising eye over me, and like a good salesman asked:

“What’ll it be—a beer? Or you likely need some of the hard stuff to brace you up?”

“No; I want to find an honest man who will telephone for me. I cannot hear well, and I must have help. Can you do it?”

“Sure I can, me friend, sure! ’Tis me job to serve the people. I’m very sorry for ye, and ye can borry me ears and welcome. Here, Mike! You run the bar while I help this gentleman find his friends.”

And he did the job well. I wrote out my message and he went into the booth with it. Through the glass I saw him nodding his head and waving his hands in explanation. He came out all smiles.

“Sure, and it’s all right. They missed the train through stopping too long to eat. They’re on their way now safe and sound, and happy as larks—and due in half an hour. They’d have let ye know, but couldn’t tell where to reach ye!”

And he would have nothing but the regular toll for the service. But he put his hand on my shoulder and said:

“Happy to meet ye. It’s a pleasure to serve such as ye. Come, now, and have something on me!”

And right there I came as near accepting a drink as I ever did in my life. But there is one thing I did do. I declined the honor of running for Congress on the Prohibition ticket after receiving that kindly Christian service from a saloonkeeper.

I told this story to a missionary who had spent much of his life among rough-and-ready customers. His comment was:

“Many a hog will put on a white necktie, and many a saint will wear a flannel shirt, and one not overly clean at that. The best judge of a necktie is the hangman, and the final judgment over the boiled shirt is made at the washtub. He who sells beer brewed in charity is a better man than he who delivers sermons stuffed with cant and selfishness.”

I presume he is right, but how can a deaf man distinguish the virtues and vices of the dispenser of selfish sermons from those of the dispenser of charitable beer—when he cannot hear the sermons and declines to taste the beer? However, since that night I have not been able to trust the combination of white vest and necktie and a taste for “burnsides.”

My experience with this variety of costume had begun years before, when I happened to be a receptive candidate for Governor of New Jersey on this same Prohibition ticket. My boom never developed beyond that receptive stage, but I started for the convention feeling well disposed toward myself—as I presume all candidates do. At Trenton I had to hunt for the convention hall, and, as usual, tried to select the proper guide from his appearance. On a street corner stood a portly, well-filled gentleman, wearing a suit of solemn black, with a beard to match; also there was the white necktie and the voluminous white vest. In truth, he was a prosperous grocer come to town to marry his third wife, but to me he looked like the chairman of the coming convention.

“Can you tell me where the convention is to be held?”

“What convention?”

“Why, the State Prohibition convention. I thought you were a brother delegate.”

“Brother nothing.”

“But where is it to be held?”

He muttered something that was lost in that black beard. I could not get it, and finally held out my notebook and pencil. He stared at me for a moment, and then wrote—about as he would enter an order of salt fish for Mrs. Brown:

“The Lord knows. I don’t.”

It was a shock to my boom, the first of many it received that day. For a moment depression came over me. Then philosophy came to my aid and gave me the proper answer.

“Well, if the Lord really knows, I guess it doesn’t make so much difference whether you do or not! It is better to trust in the Lord.”

I left him staring after me. It is doubtful if he ever got the full sense of the incident, but I have always remembered it.

It is one of my landmarks along the road to silence. For if the Lord designs that the deaf man shall reach the convention, all the powers of prejudice and selfishness cannot keep him away. I finally found a bootblack who gave me the proper directions.

One Winter’s night I found myself in the railroad station of a small New England town, waiting for a belated train. A blizzard was raging outside, with the mercury in the thermometer close to zero. My train was far up in Vermont, four hours behind time, feebly plowing through snowdrifts. In order to obtain a berth and comfortable passage for New York on that train it was necessary to ’phone Springfield and have the agent there catch the train at some stopping place up country to make arrangements. Perhaps a prudent deaf man should have given up the effort and remained in that little town overnight. But I have found that the deaf, even more than others, need the constant stimulus of attempting the difficult or impossible.

It was necessary to find some honest proxy at once. The ticket agent had closed his office and gone home. The array of available talent spread before me on the seats was not, at first sight, promising. A German Socialist had fallen asleep after a violent discussion about the war. There was an Irishman who gave full evidence to at least three senses that he did not favor prohibition enforcement. A fat, good-natured looking colored man with a stupid moon face and a receding chin sprawled over one of the wooden benches. An Italian woman, surrounded by several great packages, was holding a sleeping child. There were two ladies of uncertain age, who evidently belonged to that unmistakable class of society—the New England old maid. At one side, figuring out his day’s sales of cigars and notions, was a typical Hebrew drummer, a little rat-faced man with hooked nose, low, receding forehead, and bald head and beady eyes.

Now, if you had been the deaf man, forced to depend on one of these agents to arrange for a sleeping place, which one would you have chosen? The negro was too stupid, the German too belligerent, the Irishman would have tried to bully Springfield, and who could think of asking the stern-faced ladies to discuss such a matter? I selected the drummer as the most promising material.

“Sure, I get it,” he said, when I gave him a statement of what I wanted. He disappeared inside the telephone booth, where I soon saw him gesticulating and shrugging his shoulders as he talked rapidly. He looked around at me, and with my slight knowledge of lip-reading, I could make out:

“This is a great man what asks this. You must help him out.”

Soon he came rushing out holding up one finger.

“It cost you one dollar!”

I paid him and back he went to his conversation. Before long he emerged with a paper, on which he had written the name of the car, the number of my berth, the name of the conductor, and the time of the train’s arrival. It was all there. How he did it I have never been able to tell. It was a marvel of speedy, skilful work.

I seldom find such an efficient proxy, but through long experience one becomes able to select some stranger with patience enough to attempt the job. One man who seemed fairly intelligent completely twisted my message, and put me to no end of trouble. Once a woman deliberately misrepresented me, but I was saved by a good Samaritan who stood by, heard part of the discussion, and set me right.

Sometimes in public places the telephone operator will send the message and report the answer, but it seems unfair to ask such service. A very dignified gentleman once asked a stranger to telephone for him, and was answered thus:

“Why not go and visit with the ‘hello girl’ over there?”

Being deaf, he lost one important syllable of the adjective, and something of his dignity in consequence. Never select a person without imagination as proxy for the deaf. In the city the colored porters who are found about public places are usually excellent telephone agents; colored waiters I have also found good. They are good-natured and imaginative, usually intelligent, and always wonderfully faithful.

CHAPTER XII
“No Music in Himself”

Music—Beethoven in the Silent World—And Milton—Our Emotional Desert—Dream Compensation—The “Sings” in the Old Farmhouse, and the “Rest” for the Weary—The Drunken Irish Singer in the Barber Shop.

“The man that hath no music in himself,
Nor is not moved by concord of sweet sounds
Is fit for treasons, stratagems and spoils;
The motions of his spirit are dull as night,
And his affections dark as Erebus.
Let no such man be trusted.”

This passage always reminds me of the colored man who went to church to hear the new minister’s trial sermon. The preacher was fond of quotations, and among others he gave an old favorite in new guise:

“He who steals my purse is po’ white trash!”

One of the elders of the church immediately jumped up and interrupted:

“Say, brother, where you done git that idee at?”

“Dat, sar, am one ob the immortal, thoughtful gems of William Shakespeare.”

“Well, sar,” came in rich tones from the gentleman who had come to criticise the sermon, “my only remark am: Amen, Shakespeare!”

Shakespeare certainly did not have the citizens of the silent world in mind when he wrote that, but we deaf are often moved to say Amen. Stratagems are somewhat out of our line, since they require good ears to carry them through, but otherwise this is a perfect description of what the lack of music may mean to us. It is our greatest loss. We may rise in imagination above many deprivations, but we can never forget the sinister fate which keeps from our ears forever the beauty of the singing voice and the vibrating string.

“Music hath charms to soothe the savage breast.

To soften rocks or bend the knotted oak.”

Probably Congreve was drawing on his imagination entirely, especially as it is not likely that he ever encountered a genuine savage; but a deaf man with a natural love for music could have given him full understanding and appreciation of its mighty power. And, on the other hand, the silent life becomes drab and cold without the sweet tones of harmony. In this respect I think the man who was born deaf has less to regret than he who has known music only to lose it.

One of the most wretchedly pathetic figures in human history was Beethoven when he became convinced that he was losing his hearing. He realized at last that the melodies which meant all of life to him were passing from him with ever-increasing rapidity. He must have watched them go as a condemned man might see the sands dropping through the hourglass. For Beethoven was sadly deficient in the needed equipment of one who must enter the silent world. He had nothing but his music. There was no remaining solace. The deaf Beethoven does not present an heroic picture; he seems like a man cast upon a desert island without the instinct or the ability to search intelligently for food and water. There can be nothing more tragic than the fate of such a man thrown into alien conditions which demand skill and courage of a high order, who yet stands helpless through grief or terror. Compare Beethoven’s unmitigated despair with Milton’s heroic serenity:

“Who best

Bear his mild yoke, they serve him best; his state

Is kingly; thousands at his bidding speed,
And post o’er land and ocean without rest;
They also serve who only stand and wait.”

But here we also see something of the different effects upon character of the two afflictions. The blind are more cheerful than the deaf. Some of their cheerfulness comes through the ability to hear music; the courage comes through their inability to see the danger.

When we deaf are adapting our lives to the inevitable we are surprised to find the number of new handles life really presents. We have been forced to look for them, and we can find new interests to give us a fresh hold upon life. Yet there is nothing we can do, there is no thought, philosophy or mental training that will ever be anything but a poor substitute for music.

Perhaps the most peculiar sensation in all our affliction comes when we sit in a room where skilled musicians are playing, and observe the effect of sound upon our companions. They are moved to laughter or tears. Their eyes brighten, their hands are clenched, or are beating time to the music; their faces flush as waves of emotion sweep over them. To us it seems most commonplace. We can merely see nimble fingers dancing over the piano keys or touching the strings of the violin. Perhaps we see the singer opening and shutting her mouth—much as she would eat her food—and this is all we know. The mechanical processes may even be grotesque. So far as any effect upon our emotions may be considered, the flying fingers might as well be sewing or knitting, the mouth might be talking the ordinary platitudes of conversation. The thrill is not for us. Large audiences rise while “America” is being sung or played—men and women listen with bowed heads. I stand up with them, but I hear no sound. I feel a thrill—for it is my country, too; yet can I be blamed for feeling that life has denied me the power to be as deeply stirred with that great emotion, and has given me no substitute?

The mighty charms which may “soften rocks or bend the knotted oak” are made powerless by the little bones which have grown together inside my ear, and they are the smallest bones in the body.

I have talked with deaf persons about their conception of heaven. What will be the physical sensation when what we call “life” is finally stolen away? I have given much thought to that. Most deaf people tell me without hesitation that, according to their great hope and belief, some great burst of music will suddenly be borne in upon them when:

“The casement slowly grows a glimmering square.”

They can conceive of no greater joy or reward; no existence more sublime than that which is filled with the noblest music.

Partial compensation for the longing and its denial comes with the music that we hear in dreams. The brain treasures up the desires of our waking hours, and attempts to satisfy them during sleep. I knew of a man who had lived a wild, sunny life in the open air. He was thrown into prison unjustly, and was held in a dark cell for weeks. He was able to endure this because, as he said, he had for years “soaked up all possible sunshine.” The sun’s energy had been “canned in his system,” and it carried him through his trouble. So may the deaf man be cheered after he enters the silent world if in his youth he was able to “soak up” his full share of music. It was my privilege as a boy to serve as “supe”

or stage-hand at a theater, where I heard most of the great operas. The memory of that music has remained with me all through these long years. Sometimes I am tempted to sing one of those wonderful songs to my children. I presume there are few objects more ridiculous to a musician than a deaf man trying to sing. My people may well smile at my painful efforts (though the children do not, until they become worldly-wise), but they will never understand unless they become exiled to the silent land what such remembered music really means. But I must wait for dreams, wherein all outside conventions and inhibitions are thrown off, to give me the perfect rendition of remembered melodies.

There was an old farmer who used to scold his daughter because she would spend five dollars of her money for an occasional trip to the city, where she could hear famous singers.

“Why,” said he, “what nonsense, what folly to spend five dollars for only two short hours of pleasure.”

But he did not realize that the money was paying for a memory which would remain with the girl all her life. I would, if I could, have a child soak his soul full of the noblest music that human power can give him.

In a fair analysis of the situation even the advantages of being deaf to music should be stated. I am not asked to listen while little Mary plays her piece on the piano. No one primes little Tommy to sing “Let me like a soldier fall” for my benefit. I am not required to render any opinion regarding the musical ability of those hopefuls. I am told that such musical criticism has developed some most remarkable liars, chiefly, I fancy, among the young men who are particularly interested in little Mary’s older sister. I am also informed that some of the singing to which you must listen is rather calculated to rouse the savage breast than to soothe it. Once I spent the night at a country house where, long after honest people should have been abed, a company of young men drove out from town to serenade the young lady daughter. I slept through it all, from “Stars of the Summer Night” to “Good Night, Ladies!” The father of the serenaded one was a very outspoken business man, whose word carried far, and he assured me that I was to be envied, for the “quartette of calves” kept him awake for hours. He wanted someone to give them more rope. “Why,” said this critical parent, “you should have heard these softheads sing ‘How Can I Bear to Leave Thee?’ I tried to make them understand that I could let them leave without turning a hair.” Hand organs beneath the window, German bands blowing wind, wandering minstrels of all kinds, may start waves of more or less harmonious sound afloat, so that my sensitive friends go about with fingers at their ears, while I have the pleasure of imagining that it is angel music. But at the end of all this satisfactory reasoning I shrug my shoulders and begin to figure what I would give if I could go back through the years to one of the old “sings” in my uncle’s kitchen. How I should like to bring back the night when the stranger from Boston sang “Jesus, Lover of My Soul” to that beautiful air from “Norma.”

However, if I could have my choice tonight of all the music I have ever heard, I should go back to that lonely farmhouse beside the marsh. The neighbors have come over the hill for a Sunday night “sing.” No lamps are needed, for there is a fine blaze in the fireplace. There is snow outside, and creepy, crackling sounds from the frost are in the timbers; the moonlight sparkles over all. One of the girls sits at the little melodeon. I’d give—well, what can a man give—to hear old Uncle Dwelly Baker sing “Rest for the Weary.” I can see him now sitting in the big rocking-chair by the window. How his bald head and his white whiskers shine in the moonlight! His eyes are shut, his spectacles have been pushed to the top of his head. He rocks and rocks, singing:

“On the other side of Jordan,
In the sweet fields of Eden,
Where the tree of Life is blooming,
There is rest for you.”

And here we all come in on the chorus:

“There is rest for the weary,
There is rest for the weary,
There is rest for the weary,
There is rest for you!”

My reason for choosing this above all other music is that these people in their dull, hard life were really weary, and they really found rest in this song.

Some years ago I went for a shave into a barber shop of a New England city. I was to deliver an address, and somehow I have found nothing more soothing to the nerves than to sink down into a chair while the barber rubs in the lather and then scrapes it off. All this, of course, is conditioned upon the sharpness of the razor and my inability to hear the barber’s questions. I have often wondered if imaginative barbers ever feel a desire to seize the victim by the throat and use the razor like a carving-knife. Several of them have looked at me as though they would enjoy doing this, and the thought has actually driven me to a safety razor. But, at any rate, shortly before this speech was due I went in for my shave. At that time I carried an electric instrument, a sort of personal telephone, which enabled me to hear at least part of conversations. It contained a small battery, a sound magnifier and an ear piece. I hung this on a nail, threw my overcoat and hat over it, and sat down for my shave when the boss barber motioned “next.”

I think I must have drifted away in a half-dream while the barber went over one side of my face. He was just brushing in the hot lather on the other side when I suddenly became aware of a great commotion in the shop. I straightened up with one side of my face well lathered, to find a “spirit hunt” in progress. The barber stood with his brush in one hand and an open razor in the other. Several men had armed themselves with canes and umbrellas. A fierce-looking Irishman with a club was stealthily approaching my overcoat as it hung on the nail. He raised his club to strike a heavy blow. I jumped out of that chair as I fancy a person would leave the electric chair if he were suddenly freed. I caught him by the arm.

“What are you spoiling my overcoat for?”

“It’s a spirit. The devil himself. Hear him holler in there! Hark at him! Do ye not hear thim groans?”

Then it suddenly came to me what the “spirit” was. I had put my “acousticon” or electric hearing device into its case without shutting off the electric current. It was really a small telephone, and while the current is on, the sound magnifier gathers the sounds in a room and throws them out in a series of whistles, groanings and roarings. The Irishman and his friends had finally located the “spirit” emitting these noises under my coat, where it certainly was hiding.

With the coating of lather still on my face, I took the coat down and explained the instrument. The men listened like children as I switched the current on and off, explained the dry cell battery, the ear piece and the receiver. I let them try it at the ear until they were satisfied—all but the Irishman. He looked at the machine for a moment and then glanced at me and raised his voice:

“Ye poor thing; ye don’t hear nothin’, do ye?”

“Not much. I have the advantage of you, for you must listen to everybody. I don’t have to. I am sure you have heard things today you were sorry to hear.”

“Ain’t that right now? But don’t nobody ever come and bawl ye out?”

“No; not even my wife, for, you see, her throat would give out before my ears would give in. Bawling out a deaf man is no joke for the bawler!”

“Well, it’s good to be delivered from the women; they have tongues like a fish-hook, ’tis true. But don’t ye hear no good music?”

“No; I have not heard natural music for years; the little that comes to me seems to have some tin-pan drumming in it.”

“But, say, mister, don’t ye hear no good music in your dreams? I ask ye that now—as man to man. Have ye no singing dreams?”

“Yes, that is the strangest part of it. While I am asleep music often comes to me, such music as, I am sure, mortal rarely hears. It seems to me like music far beyond this world.”

“Ah, but don’t ye hate to wake up and leave that music behind ye? Don’t ye hate to come back to life, where ye hear no sound? Ain’t it terrible to think God has forsaken ye by shutting out music? Wouldn’t ye rather be dead when ye might sleep forever with music in your ears?”

“No; for God has not forsaken me. I have my work to do in the world, and I must do it. I will not run away from a thing like this. I will rise above it. You see, I have friends. You are interested, and I know you would help me if I needed help.”

“Would I not, now? Just put that tail-piece to your ear.”

I hesitated for a moment, but he repeated, sternly:

“Put that tail-piece to your ear and let on the juice again right away.”

With the cold lather still on my face, I put up the ear piece and turned on the current. Then a beautiful thing happened. My Irish friend took off his hat, put his mouth close to my receiver, and began to sing. He had a beautiful tenor voice, and it came to me sweet and clear, while the barber and the others gathered to listen.

“Kathleen mavourneen, the gray dawn is breaking,

The horn of the hunter is heard on the hill.

The lark from her gray wing the bright dew is shaking—

Oh, Kathleen mavourneen,—what? lingering still?

Oh, hast thou forgotten, this day we must sever,

Oh, hast thou forgotten, this day we must part?”

He sang it through—the sad, hopeless longing of a weary heart. “It may be for years, and it may be forever.” I glanced at the barber, and saw him still with the open razor and the brush in his hands, while the others stood about with heads bowed as they listened. And at the end of the song my friend started another:

“Come back to Erin, mavourneen, mavourneen,

Come back, Aroon, to the land of thy birth.

Come with the shamrocks of springtime, mavourneen,

And its Killarney shall ring with thy mirth!”

I have often thought that to another deaf man we would have presented a most ridiculous spectacle. By this time I had discovered that my musical friend was by no means a prohibitionist; the breath which carried the sweet sound had a flavor all its own. He had been tarrying with other spirits besides the collection under my overcoat. I, still with the thick smear of lather, diligently held the “tail-piece” to my ear; the barber was scowling to hide his emotion, and with the open razor he looked like a pirate. Yet I think there has never been such music since the glorious night long ago when the angels’ song was heard by men. You will smile at the extravagant language of a deaf man who has no other music for comparison. Yet I think you never heard anything like this. No doubt you have listened at the opera or at church while some golden-voiced singer poured out marvelous melody. Ah, it could not compare With the soft, tender voice which came to my dull ears in that dim-lighted barber shop. For this man out of the troubles of his own life put all the sorrow, all the yearning, all the tender hopelessness of an imaginative race into its native songs. And with this came the glow of feeling that he was doing a kindly deed for an unfortunate person.

As he sang I saw it all; the sunshine splintering on the white cliffs, the sparkle of the little streams, the grassy meadows, the heavenly blue sky over all. And there was the heavy, muttering ocean with the glitter of the sun on its face. I thought of the thousands who had bravely passed over it seeking a distant home, but loyal in their hearts to the old green hills.

“Come back to Erin, mavourneen, mavourneen!”

We were carried back, and for the moment all the troubles and afflictions were forgotten. I saw tears in the eyes of the barber. The others shuffled their feet, and one found it necessary to blow his nose. And then—the song ended, and I was back on earth with only the old dull roaring in my ears, and a mass of lather on my face. I thought the Irishman turned sadly away.

“I cannot tell you, my friend, how much that means to me. It seems to me the most beautiful human music I ever heard. What can I do to repay you?”

“Nothing—it was only a neighborly deed, what any man should do with his poor gift. You cannot pay me. ’Tis only from love of the music and of helping that I did it.”

“But who are you—with such a voice?”

“I’m a poor Irishman, half-drunk now, ye see. I cannot sing without whiskey. I make me living at vaudeville, and the movies is bad for the business. I sing funny songs—some of them nasty. I know it’s a bad living, but sometimes, like now, I love the best old songs. But on the stage—” He shrugged.

“But tonight, instead of singing your comic songs, go on the stage and sing as you have done for me. It would be wonderful.”

“No, they’d get a hook and pull me off. You don’t understand. The people who come to hear me have got to laugh or die. Their lives are too hard. They must laugh and forget it. Make them think and cry and they would go crazy. That is where you folks go wrong on us. You say to think and work out of our troubles—but sorrow is always with us, and we must laugh or we shall drink and die.”

Then came the reception committee on the run for me, for my time on the program had come and the speaker who was to hold the stage until I came had already repeated part of his speech three times. The barber finished shaving me, and I went my way; but I shall always remember my Irish singer and his philosophy.

“A man in trouble must either laugh or die.”

CHAPTER XIII
Silence Not Always Golden

Looking Wise and Saying Nothing—Passing Encouragement Around—The Critic and the Short Skirts—The “Lion” and the Honest Deaf Man—How Reputation and the Deaf Man Overtook the Hon. Robt. Grey—The Simultaneous Blessings at the Dinner-table—Jealousy and Mrs. Brewster.

It has been said of a Cape Cod man that if he will tell where he comes from, look wise and say nothing, he will pass as a person of fine intellect. Much the same is true of the deaf man. He is too apt to talk all the time, or else to say nothing—and sometimes he does both at once. Many of us betray the shoals of our mind and our shallow waters of thought by talking too much. The Yankee is naturally inquisitive. He has injured his position in history by asking too many useless questions. Unfortunately, this is also the failing of too many of the deaf. Instead of realizing that the choicest bits of conversation are reserved for them, they persist in trying to borrow the dross. Cardinal Wolsey’s outburst of bitter self-reproach would be a valuable memory gem for us:

“I charge thee, fling away ambition.

By that crime fell the angels.”

Here we must part with the foolish ambition to deal in small talk. The surest way for us to become social nuisances is constantly to demand the details of current conversation, and some of our worst embarrassments come when some well-meaning, loud-voiced person diligently relays to us the trivial remarks. For be it known that the bubbles of words which work up from the feeble fermenting of shallow thoughts are usually stale and unprofitable. And many a deaf person has passed an hour of agony in company smiling and pretending to enjoy conversation which might as well be carried on in Europe, as far as his understanding goes. A student of lip-reading can find much amusing practice in such situations, but it is far better for the rest of us to say frankly that we cannot hear the talk, and then retire from the field with a book.

Every deaf person who possesses even a trace of humor can tell how he or she has passed as an important personage by looking wise and saying nothing. On several occasions I have played the part of intelligent critic with some success. I can sit on the front seat at a lecture or a concert, look intently at the speaker or singer, smile and frown at the right places in the program, and make an effort to look wise. The performer soon comes to think that he has at least one very keen and appreciative listener, and soon he aims the best points at me. Of course, we all know how the heart and spirit glow in the face of evident appreciation. I do not hear a sound, but I present the appearance of the mighty rock in the weary land of inattentive listeners. I have even had the susceptible artist hunt me out afterwards, evidently seeking some delicate compliment—for who is proof against such desires? However, I keep out of the way, for it would never do for him to find that the appreciative hearer is a deaf man. A friend of mine, working on the same principle of passing encouragement around, keeps an eye open for deaf men or those who seem discouraged, and when he meets some one who seems to be losing his grip, he gives a military salute. When his children criticise such a performance, he says:

“Why not? It makes him feel good. It inoculates his pride. He goes on his way thinking that perhaps after all he may be somebody, since that ‘distinguished-looking man’ recognized him!”

There is a sorry old joke that I have played repeatedly on vain or inquisitive people. I worked it off on my friend, Brown, three times running. Brown is the type of fellow who is much in love with his own voice. They tell me that he can deliver a fair speech, but that he spoils the effect by making it quite evident that he is casting pearls, and that lack of proper appreciation classes the audience with a well-known suggestion of the New Testament. I have never heard Brown’s words, but his actions speak loudly to a deaf man. So I wait until he begins to describe some oratorical triumph and then start on him.

“Great! I know a man down town who would gladly pay five hundred dollars to hear you speak. Thus far he has not been able to hear you.”

Brown absorbs the compliment with the air of a man well accustomed to such little tributes. But I know how his mind is working, and, sure enough, soon he rises to the bait.

“By the way, what did you say about that man who is anxious to hear me speak?”

“I said that there is a very intelligent man down town who says he would give five hundred dollars to hear you speak. Thus far he has been denied that privilege, but I think he means what he says.”

“That’s good! No doubt some one who has heard me has told him about it. I expect to speak at a banquet next week. Perhaps we could have this man invited. I should be glad to give him pleasure.”

“It certainly would give him great pleasure. I am sure he would travel far to get within sound of your voice.”

“By the way, I do not recall that you mentioned the name of this gentleman.”

“He is a deaf man. He has not heard a sound for years! I know he would give five hundred dollars to be able to hear you.”

And then Brown refuses to speak to me for a month. He has no use for these “funny men.” His vanity finally gets the best of him, however, and a little later he “falls” for the same story with variations. You can tell him of the man who would willingly give a thousand dollars to see the great orator. Of course, he is blind. Then there is the enthusiastic citizen who would gladly run a mile in order to join the audience. He is a cripple with only one leg. Of course, these are worn, old jokes, but the deaf man may be pardoned for indulging in the old-timers if they help to offset some of his own blunders and mishaps.

Let it be known, however, that we deaf never shine as critics where our opinions will have weight. Some men, naturally strong and dominant, reach high positions, where they have power over others, and they become hard taskmasters because through their inability to hear they make too many snap judgments and become too critical. They may be efficient, but frequently it is a raw and brutal efficiency which accomplishes little good. One very deaf man was invited to a meeting of a literary society in a Western town. It seemed to be the only entertainment in town that night, and though it was obviously no place for a deaf man, he went along with his friends. We know how to amuse ourselves at such places. We may not hear a word, but the mind can be kept active with some detail of business, or a review or something we have read. This man applauded and smiled with the rest. It is often a foolish performance, but we invariably fall into it. By assuming a serious expression of countenance whenever it was apparent that the program called for thought, this man found himself being accepted as a wise critic. One young woman was determined to attract the attention of the distinguished-looking stranger. She read her essay with one eye on him, and he did his best to look appreciative. When the literary exercises were over the chairman called various leading citizens to discuss the meeting and criticise the various performances. The young woman was anxious to hear a word of praise from the visitor. So, at her suggestion, the president wrote a note and passed it to the deaf man—a note suggesting that he give a truthful criticism of at least one number. This fishing for compliments is like other forms of angling; you never know what you are going to catch. My friend protested and tried to explain, but there was no escape. Being a man of some determination, and, moreover, with severe old-fashioned ideas, he stood up and delivered his criticism:

“My friends, I am no critic. Nature has made it necessary for me to hear with my eyes, and I can offer but one suggestion. I may be wrong. Perhaps I am old-fashioned, but it seems to me that if I had to walk through life on such a pair of pipestems as I have seen tonight, they would be the last thing in the world that I would take pride in exhibiting. I’d wear a dress that would sweep the floor.”

The company reserved their laughter until they were safe at home, but with one accord everyone glanced at the short skirt of the literary young woman. It is safe to say that she never again suggested an unknown deaf man as critic of her literary efforts.

Sometimes the deaf go fishing for compliments themselves, with very disastrous results. We may wisely conclude that few bouquets will be thrown in our direction. Even those which reach us may contain some kind of hook concealed amid the flowers. Yet there was Henry Bascom, very deaf, very vain, and filled with the almost criminal idea that he could write poetry. He refused to work at his trade, for he felt that his muse did not care to brush her skirts against overalls or working clothes. His brother-in-law, a blunt, outspoken man, was growing weary of “feeding lazy poets.” Once he roared out a protest, but Henry did not get it straight, and hoped it was some sort of compliment. So he insisted that his sister repeat it. But she hesitated. Finally she temporized:

“George merely said something about the great need of energy in the world.”

Of course, Henry should have known that there was explosive material hidden in all this, but he only decided that something fine was being kept away from him. So when George came home he began again:

“George, I was much interested in what you said this morning. Won’t you repeat it so that I can have it exact?”

And George very willingly complied. He wrote the message carefully in ink:

“I told Mary that if you belonged to me I would make you work even if you bust a gut!”

Investigation will destroy illusion nine times out of ten. If you think your friends are saying nice things about you, let it go at that. Take my advice and let analysis of such doubtful remarks alone. Eight times out of ten, for the deaf, it will lead to an explosion.

And there was the deaf man who went to the reception with his wife and daughter. Some remarkable literary lion had come to town, and the elite had turned out to see him feed and hear him roar, if he could be induced to perform. The deaf man, at his distance, watched the lion carefully and felt that here was a kindred spirit. For back of the stereotyped smile and the smug mask of conventionality there was another person, a real human being, who had grown weary of the foolishness, and was eager to get back into the wilderness, where outsiders, like the deaf and the uncelebrated, may have their fling.

But the women continued to parade themselves and their ideas before the celebrity with an ostentation that was quite enough to rouse the ire of a sensible dweller in the silence. This man held in as long as he could, and then remarked to his wife in what he thought was a whisper:

“Those silly girls make me very tired.”

The entire company heard him, and the wife and daughter were deeply mortified. They did manage to cut off the rest of his remarks, and finally, exceedingly conscious that he had made a bad blunder, the deaf man retreated to the porch to look at the stars. They are old friends who never find fault when one stumbles over some woman-made rule of society. And there came the lion, broken away temporarily from his keepers, fumigating with a cigar some of the thoughts which his admirers had aroused. He went straight to the deaf man and held out his hand.

“My friend, you are the only honest man in this house. The rest of us are tired, but we lack the courage to admit it in public. How do you come to be so brave?”

Another deaf man went back to his old town after fifteen years’ absence. They were about to hold a political convention to nominate a candidate for Congress. The Hon. Robert Grey controlled most of the delegates. No one in particular was enthusiastic about the Hon. Robert excepting himself and his close friends, yet no one could quite summon the courage to tell the truth about him. The deaf man arrived, and saw a large, black-haired man dominating the stage.

“Why,” he said, in what he intended to be a subdued tone, “there is Bob Gray. He’s the man who stole the town funds while he was treasurer. What’s he doing here? He should be in jail!”

He had not gauged his voice correctly, and half the people in the hall heard him. It was just what the rest had lacked the courage to say. The deaf man, with his simplicity and directness, had penetrated into the hiding place of the big issue of the campaign. His remark changed the entire spirit of the convention, and the Hon. Robert Grey was left at home.

The deaf man is often laughed at for his blunders, but, unwittingly, he has pricked many a bubble and exposed many a fraud through his blunderings. Take the case of the young man who fancied the minister’s daughter and went to church with her. The congregation was small, and the collections were generally in line with the congregation. The collector was a deaf man, a faithful attendant, who, as he said, could not even hear the money drop into the box. Our young man took a five-dollar gold piece out of his pocket and held it up so that the minister’s daughter could see it and observe his great liberality. She protested in a whisper:

“Oh, that’s too much! I wouldn’t give that amount.”

“Oh, that’s nothing. My usual habit is to give ten dollars, but I don’t happen to have such a coin with me today.”

So the bluffer waved her away, and really would have been able to “get away with it” had it not been for the deaf man. When the box was presented the young man deftly palmed his gold piece and dropped a penny into the box. The organist played on through the offertory, and the deaf man marched up the aisle with his contributions. The minister had tried to tell him several times that it was not in good taste to report the size of the contributions publicly, but the deaf man was a zealous soul, and did not quite understand, so he carefully counted the amount found in the box, and, just before the last hymn, he stood up in front of the pulpit.

“My friends, I want to announce that the contributions for the day amount to $3.27. ‘The Lord loveth a cheerful giver.’”

And the minister’s daughter, being rather good at mental arithmetic, glanced at the young man, and fully understood.

Dr. A. W. Jackson tells a story which all deaf men will appreciate. He was invited to preach the sermon in a country church, and after the service he was taken for dinner to Deacon Bentley’s house. There was a great family gathering, and the long table was spread in the kitchen. The deacon sat at one end, the minister at the other. Naturally, the minister expected to be asked to say the “grace,” so he prepared his mind for it. We deaf demand a “sign” for such invitations, and Dr. Jackson thought he had one when the deacon, far down the room, seemed to nod his head as at a suggestion. So the preacher shut his eyes, bent down his head and blessed the food with a long and fervent prayer. He knew something was wrong, for he felt the table shaking, but he went serenely on until he finished with a devout “amen.” How are we to know what really happens at such times until we get home, where our faithful reporter can tell us about it? Dr. Jackson did not in the least understand until his wife explained that Deacon Bentley had not given the expected sign, and, being deaf himself, he had bowed his own head and said a rival blessing. Probably the spectacle of the two deaf men offering simultaneous petitions blessed all who were present with abundant appetite.

This was indeed ridiculous, but, no doubt, you have seen normal men acting in much the same way, foolishly interfering with the jobs or prerogatives of others when they know full well they have no business out of their own corners. It is like the group of men I saw at a country railway station trying to turn a locomotive on an old-fashioned turntable. The engineer had run his machine on to the table, and though the men were pushing on the lever with all their might, they could not move the engine. Finally the engineer backed her about two feet. The weight was then so nicely adjusted that a single man turned the table with ease. At first there had been a poor adjustment. The men were trying to lift the entire weight; when it became nicely balanced the engine nearly turned itself. I think most men at some period of their lives get out of their own corners to show others how the job of life should be worked out. They throw the machinery out of balance and double the world’s work.

Years ago, when I worked as a hired man in a back-country neighborhood, I belonged to a debating society. I was on the program committee, and we found something of a task in selecting subjects for debate which were within the life and thought of our audience. “Resolved, that the mop is a more useful element in civilization than the dishcloth” was a prime favorite with the women. “Resolved, that for a man starting on a farm a cow is more useful than a woman” brought out great argumentative effort from the men, and as I recall it, the cow won on the statement that if crops failed and you could not pay the mortgage, you could sell the cow. If I were back there now, knowing what I do of life, I should suggest a new topic: “Resolved, that deafness is a greater affliction to a woman than to a man.” Here is fine opportunity for argument. The man is shut out of many lines of bread-winning, while the woman is denied the right to indulge largely in small talk and gossip.

I think deaf women are more likely than men to be exceedingly jealous. Mrs. Helen Brewster was deaf, and she made life a burden to her husband, Frank. He was really one of the most circumspect of men, but if he stopped for a moment to talk with Miss Kempton, the sixty-year-old dressmaker, poor Helen was quick to imagine him taking advantage of her affliction to exchange nonsense with the other ladies. And right here let me say to the deaf and the near-deaf: force yourselves to believe that your friends, and particularly the members of your family, are absolutely true; do not ever permit your mind to suggest that those upon whom you must rely for help or interpretation are unfaithful. Never admit this until you cannot escape the conviction. Remember that most persons we meet are kindly and well disposed, if selfish and thoughtless. They are not plotting our destruction or even our unhappiness. It is too easy for the deaf to turn life into a veritable hell by permitting the hideous devils of depression to master the brain.

Now, Helen Brewster was jealous without reason, and perhaps the unreasonable phase of that disease runs its most violent course. The Brewsters lived on the ground floor of an old-fashioned town house. In the family living on the upper floor was a daughter, Mary Crimmins, who caused Helen’s worst paroxysms. In Winter, after an unusually hard storm, the old roof was endangered by its load of snow. Mary Crimmins called from her window to Frank as the only man then in the house to mount the roof and shovel away the snow. And Helen, washing dinner dishes at the sink, saw the two talking, Frank looking up and smiling, and immediately concluded that the topic was much warmer than snow. Frank got a ladder and a shovel, and mounted to the roof, while poor Helen sat in the sitting-room bathing her soul in misery, for while men do not usually present a ladder when planning an elopement in broad daylight, all things were possible to her distorted mind. Soon there came a small avalanche of snow from the roof, but the distracted deaf woman did not hear it. Then her son came rushing into the room, screaming with such breath as was left in him:

“Oh, ma! It’s terrible!”

“What’s the matter?”

“The snow all slipped and knocked the ladder down, and pa—”

“What about pa?”

“He’s up there hugging—”

Johnnie really finished his sentence, but the words “pa” and “hugging” were enough for Helen.

“He is, is he? I’ll attend to him!” And she rushed upstairs and knocked loudly at the door; then, without waiting for any invitation, she strode in. Old Mrs. Crimmins sat knitting by the window, while in a corner behind her sat Mary with a stranger, a fine-looking young man. Before the irate deaf woman could properly unload her mind, Mary blushing red, came and screamed in her neighbor’s ear:

“This is my fiance, Henry Jordon. We meant to keep it secret, and you are the first one I’ve told. I know you won’t repeat it.”

“But where’s Frank?” the astonished Helen at last managed to say. Johnnie had followed her upstairs, and he was well drilled in handling the deaf. So he caught hold of his mother’s dress and pulled her to the door.

“Come and see, ma,” he cried.

He led her downstairs, out into the snow and pointed. And there was pa. The snow had slipped beneath his feet, and carried him to the very edge of the roof. He had saved himself only by catching at the chimney. There he stood, with both hands clasped about it, “hugging” literally for dear life.

It was a very silent and thoughtful deaf woman who raised the ladder and gave her husband a chance to discontinue his attention to the chimney. And that is about the way nine-tenths of our imaginary troubles terminate. It never did pay to hug a rumor or a delusion too strenuously. Better conserve your strength for something more substantial.

CHAPTER XIV
Cases of Mistaken Identity

Traveling for the Deaf—When the Deaf Man Saved a Leg for Someone Else—The Cornetist Who Couldn’t Play a Note—When the Deaf Meet the Drunk.

Some deaf persons make the mistake of concluding that the affliction chains them at home and that they should not attempt to travel. This is wrong, for they thus lose many extraordinary adventures. It is better for us to get about if possible, and to take our chances with the world. I travel about as freely as any man with perfect ears might do, and thus see much of human nature which would otherwise be lost to me. No adventures are more amusing or exciting than those which start with mistaken identity. I have come to think that in the molding or shaping of humanity comparatively few patterns are really used, judging from the number of times that I and other deaf men have been mistaken for strange persons in the mental shuffle of ordinary minds. The man with good ears can usually explain at once, but we do not always understand, and we are led into embarrassing situations.

Once years ago I went to the country to spend the night with an old friend. It was dark when we reached the little town where I was to meet

“an elderly man with a gray beard,” who would drive me to the farm. We deaf are careful to have all such arrangements understood beforehand. It was a black, gloomy night, and there were no lights at the little station except the lanterns carried by the agent and a few farmers. The deaf man is at his worst in darkness. It holds unimaginable terrors for him. Perhaps I should say perplexities, for the deaf are rarely afraid.

Most of us do more or less lip-reading, whether we make a study of the science or not, and through long habit we come to make use of the eyes without realizing how largely our lives must depend upon light. Thus, when suddenly plunged into darkness, we are lost. I carried in my hand a small black case containing the electric instrument which I used as an aid to hearing, and this proved my undoing. Such a case may be accepted as professional evidence; it may contain only a lunch or your laundry, but lawyers and physicians also carry similar ones. As I stood looking about in the dim light an elderly man with a short beard stepped up and held his lantern so as to view my face. I saw his lips frame the words:

“Come on; hurry! We are all waiting.”

I supposed he referred to supper, for I knew my friend had a very orderly and precise wife, who is a little deaf. One must be promptly on time in keeping appointments with such a character. The old man caught me by the arm, hurried me to a carriage, and fairly bundled me into it. He paid no attention to my questions, but jumped into the front seat and urged on the horse to full speed. The lantern swinging from the front axle went out as we bumped off into the darkness over mud holes and ruts without number. I tried to get my electric device into operation, but the plug had dropped out of place and I could not make connections. So on we plunged. Soon I found that the old man in front was nearly as deaf as I. The combination of two deaf men in the darkness rushing through what was to one of them an absolutely unknown country should have been thrilling, but the deaf man rarely experiences a thrill; he must wait for some one to tell him what it is all about. As usual, my mind worked back for some comparative incident.

I remembered two. The year before I had gone to Canada during the Winter. A farmer met me at the station after dark. It was very cold, and the body of a closed carriage which had been put on runners was filled with straw. This made a warm, comfortable nest, and the farmer got in with me, while his son sat up in front to drive. The same plug to my hearing device had dropped out, and in order to give me a light for finding it, my host struck a match. He held it too long and it burned his fingers. Then it fell into the straw and started a great blaze. No two men ever showed greater activity than we did as we plunged out of that carriage and threw in snow until the fire was extinguished. That scene came to my mind, and then followed the story by Ian Maclaren of the great surgeon who came up from London to perform an operation, and was carried off into the wilderness against his will by the local doctor.

We drove several miles, it seemed to me, and then suddenly turned into the yard of a farmhouse. I felt the carriage shudder as the wheel grazed the stone gatepost. The door opened and a long splinter of light darted out upon us. Two women hurried down the walk and helped me out of the carriage. They were strangers to me, and now I was sure that I was in the midst of an exciting adventure, not at the home of my friend. The women escorted me to the house, where I found two solemn-faced gentlemen evidently waiting for me. One of them held up a finger and beckoned me into an adjoining room, where upon a bed lay a man who glared at me with no agreeable face. By this time I had my “acousticon” in working order, and as this man evidently had something to say, I held the mouthpiece down to him and heard him shout:

“I tell you I won’t have it cut off!”

The two men who had brought me in were very much startled when the exact contents of my black case was revealed. They glanced at each other and then promptly escorted me out of the room. We went into the kitchen, and there, beside the stove, the mystery was explained. One of the men looked curiously at me and then asked:

“Are you not Dr. Newton of New York?”

I hastened to explain that I had never before heard of Dr. Newton. Then it was revealed to me that these men were country doctors, waiting to hold a consultation with the great surgeon, who had been expected to arrive on my train. The man on the bed had had serious trouble with his knee. These physicians had agreed that the limb must be removed, yet both hesitated to perform a complicated operation. Hence, the surgeon was coming to do it. The sick man’s father-in-law had gone to the station; he had been instructed to bring back a man of medium size, who said little and carried a black case of surgical instruments. I was to look for an elderly man with a gray beard. Father-in-law and I had mixed our signals.

It took me but a short time to convince these physicians that I could not fill the bill or saw off the leg. At last it developed that the actual surgeon was detained and could not come until the following day.

The man on the bed forgot his terror and laughed when I told him my story, and it gave him the fighting courage to compel his wife to telegraph the surgeon not to come at all. But those doctors acted as though I had deprived them of their prey. In my capacity as substitute surgeon I gave the patient the best advice I knew of:

“As one afflicted man to another, I advise you to hang right on to your leg. Try the faith cure and make yourself believe it can be saved.”

“You bet I will. They’ll have to cut my throat before they cut this leg off!”

I saw him some years later. He carried a cane and limped, but he still had two legs.

“They never cut it off,” he reported. “They put a silver cord in the joint, and it has held ever since. It’s a little stiff—but it’s a leg. I guess if Pa Morton and you hadn’t been deaf that night they would have finished the job.”

I have heard of a deaf man who had an experience somewhat similar to this. He also left the train one dark, stormy night in a good-sized city. He was a stranger, so he was quite unfamiliar with the place. He carried a small black case containing his hearing device and a few toilet articles. As he stood in the dim light looking about for his friends, two men rushed up to him, talking quite excitedly; they grasped him by the arms and hurried him outside the station. Unable to understand the performance, the deaf man followed, trying to explain that he was waiting for his friends. Almost before he knew it he found himself inside a car with these excitable gentlemen, driving rapidly through the streets. Of course, you wonder why deaf men under such conditions do not explain and break away.

“You wouldn’t catch me in any such situation,” says my friend Jones. “I’d soon make ’em understand.”

There is only one thing the matter with Jones’ point of view—he has never lived in the silence. Let him try that and he will understand that philosophy assumes a form of patience in such situations. We are usually quite helpless in the darkness, and when we go among strangers we must either suspect everyone who approaches us or consider him a friend. Most of us conclude from experience that it is wiser to drop suspicion and assume that the majority of human beings are honest. And as the great emotion of fear apparently enters the brain through the ear, we are apt to be calm under most extraordinary conditions.

We left our puzzled deaf man rushing in a car through the streets of an unknown city. The auto finally entered a narrow, dark alley and stopped before what appeared to be the back door of a large building. The deaf man was urged out of the car by his nervous companions and was hurried up a steep stairway. They blundered through several dark passages and finally came out on the stage of a theater, where they stood in the wings and watched a long-haired pianist in the center of the stage laboring to unlock the keys of a piano in a way calculated to let loose a horde of imprisoned melodies. A vast audience filled the house.

A man who appeared to be master of ceremonies rushed up to the deaf man and wrote on his notebook:

“Delighted to see you! We feared you were not coming. Your first number is next on the program. We will give the professor an encore while you are preparing.”

The poor deaf man could only stare and protest in wonder, but soon a ponderous German puffed up the stairs in great excitement. He pulled the unfortunate victim back among the heaps of properties and roared, shaking his fist:

“I am the cornetist what plays here! What do you mean, you impostor, who try to take my place?”

After they had succeeded in pacifying the German they explained to the deaf man. They had engaged a celebrated cornet soloist for the benefit concert, and had sent a reception committee to the station to meet him. It was late, and these nervous men had never seen the great musician. They did see a dignified man carrying what looked like a case for musical instruments. When they asked him if he was Professor Hoffman, the deaf man merely nodded his head as the quickest way to get rid of them, and they naturally rushed him to the theater without further ado, leaving the musician to find his way alone.

This deaf man had a keen sense of humor, and greatly relished the situation, but the German had never recognized a joke in his life, so he continued to glare at the “impostor.” After a most humble apology about all the committee could offer as recompense was an invitation to the deaf man to remain and hear the music. He remained and was interested in seeing his musical rival blow himself up to nearly twice his natural size in order properly to express his feelings through his cornet.

Many of his most amusing and at the same time tragic experiences come to the deaf man through his association with drunken people. We meet them in all our travels, and I must confess that I have never found a more interesting study than that which deals with the effect of alcohol upon the human character. A drunken deaf man is a most pitiable object, but to the observant deaf man his drunken neighbor presents a case of infinite wonder and variety. We see men naturally grim and silent singing ridiculous songs, or attempting to dance. Men usually profane, making no pretense at religion, suddenly quote from the Scriptures devoutly. Quarrelsome men of rough, ugly temper overwhelm us with attentions, while men of kindly nature challenge us to fight. We see it all, and must judge such people mainly by their actions.

Usually drunken men begin to talk to me. When they find that I do not reply they generally foam over with sorrow or anger, and it is hard to decide which is the more embarrassing. Once in a strange town when I was looking about for my friends the town drunkard accosted me. I have never known just what he did want, but when I explained that I was a stranger looking for a certain street he volunteered to show me the way. So he caught my arm and led me up the street, staggering against me at every other step, and talking loudly. And on our way we met my friend and his wife, sober and dignified persons who were horrified at my appearance under the escort of the town drunkard. In his sober moments my guide would never have thought of associating with these aristocratic representatives of Main Street, but now he greeted them jovially, as old friends. It was a most embarrassing situation, and my friends, being absolutely devoid of humor, have never felt quite sure of me since the incident.

A drunken man once approached a friend of mine with a remark which he did not understand, as he was deaf, so he merely shook his head and turned away. The intoxicated man, full of fight, followed, shouting challenges and pulling off his coat. A crowd gathered about them, and two rough-looking fellows got behind the deaf man and offered to act as his seconds. One of them advised:

“Give him an upper cut on the chin whisker and follow it up with one on his basket!”

What the deaf man did was to pull out his notebook and pencil and give them to the drunken man, who now was quite ready for the fray.

“I cannot hear a word you say. Write it out for me!”

This is offered as a suggestion to the peace-makers, that they may be more blessed than ever before. Whenever a man curses you, and you want to gain time—ask him to write it out! Here the drunken man looked curiously at the deaf man and then at the notebook. He pondered deeply for a moment and then slowly began to put on his coat. He walked unsteadily to a little box nearby, mounted it carefully and delivered a short speech something like this:

“Ladies and gentlemen, I am wrong. This man is not my enemy, but my friend, made so through affliction. He is in need. I suggest that we all chip in and help him on his way. I’ll start with the price of three drinks! Come now, loosen up! He who giveth let him give quickly!”

Once I lived in the house with a kindly man who had a fierce craving for drink. He really fought against it, but it mastered him again and again. One year at Christmas he had gone for several months without drinking. He was like a consumptive who imagines that he has overcome his disease while it still lurks within only waiting for favorable conditions to blaze up. A few days before Christmas several old friends stepped out of his wild past and broke down the man’s self-control. When I came home he was “roaring drunk”—I had never seen him in worse condition. As I came up the stairs he rushed suddenly out of his room and caught me unexpectedly by the collar. As I was taken off my guard he was able to pull me inside the room, shut the door and throw himself against it. At that time I could hear much of what he said. He glared at me like a maniac. His fists were clenched, his eyes were bloodshot and he was altogether a terrifying and a pitiful spectacle.

I expected him to throw himself upon me, and I was ready. I had no idea wherein I had offended, and I did not want to hurt him. I derided that when he sprang at me I would sidestep and give him the “French trip” which I had learned in the lumber camps. That will floor anyone who is not prepared for it, and I knew that I could tie him if necessary. But there was no fight in him except the frightful battle he was waging against himself. His fists opened and he held out his hands appealingly.

“I’ve brought you here to pray for me! Get right down on your knees and pray that I may be a man and not a skunk!”

Well—take it as you like, the deaf man has his share of excitement with all sorts of men. There seems to be no good reason that we should lead uneventful lives! I have often wondered what various pompous friends of mine would have done with the above situation. Or I should like to see them master another incident which involved the same man. Once he approached me as I stood talking with visitors.

“I want you to do me a favor!” he said in the thick, eager voice of the intoxicated. “I want you to kick me, and kick me hard!” As I did not reply he thought I had not heard, so taking off his coat he backed up to me in a way any deaf person could understand!

CHAPTER XV
All in a Lifetime

The Training School for Robbers—Eavesdroppers Who Heard Not a Word—The Fox and the Wolf—The Murderer—The Plans for Eloping—Regarding the Deaf as Uncanny—The Narrowness and Prejudice of the Deaf Themselves—Dancing and Singing Eliminated—The Blind and the Deaf, and the Man with Both Afflictions.

On a lonely corner in New York City I once saw three boys practicing the gentle art of highway robbery. One played the part of victim; he walked along giving a good imitation of the ordinary citizen busy with his own thoughts, giving little attention to his surroundings. The other two boys approached him carelessly, apparently laughing at some joke. As they passed, one of the “robbers” suddenly turned and threw his left arm around the “citizen’s” head just below the chin. Then he quickly slid his right arm down to pinion the arms of the victim just above the elbow. He put his left knee at the middle of the victim’s back and pulled with the left arm. It was a murderous grip; the more the victim struggled the closer drew the “head lock” under his chin, and the neck was forced back to the breaking point. The other boys deftly emptied the unprotected pockets of watch and money. Then they threw the victim to the ground and ran away. They rehearsed this over and over—taking turns at the different positions, perfecting themselves in this barbarous business.

I watched this fascinating play for some time, studying to think of some way in which the victim might defend himself. He might possibly use his feet, but taken unaware probably his breath would be shut off before he could organize any defense. One can easily realize how powerless an unsuspecting stranger would be at the hands of three trained villains such as these boys seemed likely to become.

Two years later I had occasion to pass through the street where this rogue’s training had been carried on. It was after dark, and just as my mind reverted to this grewsome drill two men appeared from under the shadow of the elevated station. They stopped and spoke to me, but I did not understand. One of them repeated his question, pointing at my watch chain. Naturally I pulled back my arm to strike him as I saw an opening, but the other man quickly caught my head and arms in that murderous lock which I had seen those boys practicing. He did not hurt me, but I found myself powerless to move or speak. I cannot describe the feeling of utter helplessness caused by that grip at my throat and arms. The first man took my watch from my pocket and held it to the light, looked at it carefully—and put it back again! He looked over my shoulder at his companion who held me captive, and as his face was then in the light, I could read the words on his lips:

“Only nine o’clock?”

Then I read once more:

“Thank you!”

My arms were set free, and, smiling, the two men hurried on. I assume that they merely wanted to know the time. They saw that I could not hear them and that I might call for help and put them in a bad position, so they helped themselves to the time of day in true hold-up style.

One man’s adventure illustrates how deafness may be converted into an asset if the affliction can be kept concealed. He went to a city park, and was sitting on a bench which was partly concealed by trees and shrubs. He was undergoing one of those periods of depression which often fall upon us in the silence, after some sharp rebuff, or when the real trouble of our affliction is visited upon us by some careless associate. Completely absorbed, this man did not notice that a nearby seat was occupied by a young woman and a man. Finally he did perceive that they were talking earnestly—the man was evidently pleading and the woman was inclined to deny him. But at last she evidently consented to his proposition, and he looked cautiously around to make sure that they were alone before sealing the agreement in the usual way. Then for the first time he discovered my deaf friend within ten feet of their bench! Of course these young people assumed that the deaf man had heard it all. From the beginning conscience has made cowards of most of us. The girl started to advertise her feelings with a scream, but her companion checked her just in time by pointing to a park policeman who was swinging his club at the corner of the path. Then he took out his notebook, and without trying to talk he wrote this brief explanation and handed it to the deaf man.

“Please don’t betray us. It is true that we have planned to elope. We will be married this afternoon in New Jersey. I am sure her father will forgive us when we return; it is our only way. You overheard by accident—now be a good sport and let us alone!”

The deaf man put on his glasses to read the note. Through the film which gathered on the lenses he saw only visions of youth and romance. No woman would be likely to come into the land of silence and elope with him! That would be but a clumsy and ridiculous performance, and he knew it well. These young people were probably all wrong. Yonder policeman would question them, find where they lived and notify the father of the girl. As a sober-minded citizen opposed to youthful folly and far removed from it, was it not his duty to stop such nonsense? And yet—

He who hesitates is frequently spared the necessity for decision. He looked up to find that the young people had disappeared, they had slipped out of sight during his meditation. And in his lonely silence the deaf man could smile, for he was glad that they got away.

Another deaf man was traveling through a Western State in a Pullman. This man noticed two men who seemed to be engaged in a most earnest discussion. They sat across the aisle from him and as they talked they glanced furtively about. They were a forbidding pair, one a great hulking brute with a broad red face—the other a little rat of a man with a low, receding forehead and a bright, restless eye. The wolf and the fox appeared to be hunting together. Frequently the big man became emphatic and struck the back of the seat with his great fist while the little man shook his head and bared his teeth in a smile which seemed like a menace. The deaf man wished to change his position so as to get a better view of the country, and he happened to drop into the seat which backed up against the one in which the wolf and the fox were laying their plans. At first they paid no attention to him, but continued to argue and gesticulate. Finally the fox realized that the head of the deaf man was within a foot of their conversation. How was he to know that the “listener” might as well have been a mile away in so far as successful eavesdropping was concerned? He instantly signalled to the wolf and the discussion stopped. They both soon moved to the smoking-room, where they whispered for a little time; then the fox came to sit beside the deaf man. He glanced about anxiously, but finally said:

“Did you happen to hear what we were saying?”

The “eavesdropper” read some of the words on the lips of the other, and vaguely nodded his head. Then the fox took a piece of paper and wrote:

“It is a good joke. I made a bet with my friend that we could make you think we were in earnest in planning the job. Of course there is nothing to it. It was a fake talk.”

Just then the wolf appeared with his hat and suitcase. The train was approaching a small town. “Come,” he said, “we get out here.” His friend jumped up to join him. They sprang off as the train stopped, though the conductor said that their tickets would have carried them fifty miles farther. The deaf man caught a look of fear and suspicion from the fox as the two disappeared. Of course they were planning mischief, but fear of this deaf man caused them to run from him as they would have fled a plague.

Many years ago I passed a Winter in a lumber camp far up among the snows of Northern Michigan. My bunk-mate was a gigantic, silent man, a stranger and a mystery to all the rest of us. He said little and made no friends. He had a curious habit of glancing hurriedly about him; he started at light sounds and appeared to keep a watchful eye always upon the door. Frequently at night I found him awake, gazing at the lantern which always hung at the door, near the end of the camp. One day the driver of the supply team smuggled a bottle of whiskey into camp and my bunk-mate was able to get two good drinks. We worked together that day in a lonely place, and he became quite talkative. I could not hear him well, but he was evidently trying to tell some incident of his own life. There in the forest, knee deep in snow, he appeared to be acting out a tragedy. At the last he did not seem to realize that I was there. He addressed some imaginary person, holding out his hands as if in appeal. Apparently this was rejected, and his face changed in anger. He caught up his axe and rushed up to a fallen log; he struck it a blow which sent a great chip flying a hundred feet away. Then he looked at me in wonder, seeming to realize that I must have overheard him. He sat on the log, took great handfuls of snow and held them against his head. I found myself helping him with a great chunk of ice which I had brought from the brook.

“It was the whiskey,” he suddenly shouted. “It’s poison. It makes me talk and think. Say—did you hear what I said? What was it?”

He looked at me with hard, savage eyes. I had not heard his ravings and did not recount his actions. He continued to stare at me silently, axe in hand. Then he decided to believe my denial and he kept at work as before, silent and grim. As we went back to camp that night he asked me once more, with apparent irrelevance:

“Did you hear what I said?”

I again assured him that I had understood nothing, which was the truth. He seemed satisfied, but during the evening he divided his attention between me and the outside door; he was again puzzled over the chance that I had heard. In the early morning I awoke to find myself alone in the bunk. The man did not appear again.

Two nights later I sat on the bench by the camp stove drying my clothes after another day in the wet snow. At the moment when I was remembering that curious watch-dog habit of my bunk-mate’s the door suddenly opened and two men entered. One was the sheriff of a county in the lower tier, near the Ohio line; the other was also armed. They were after my bunk-mate—too late.

“What’s it for?” asked the foreman.

“Murder, I reckon. He quarreled with his wife and hit her with an axe.”

And to this day I wonder what would have happened to me in the woods if I had heard what he said.

Deaf persons undoubtedly come to be really troublesome to many kindly and essentially generous men and women. I have never been able to understand the feeling; perhaps it resembles the creepy terror which the touch or the sight of a cat arouses in some persons. At any rate I have been introduced to people who are unmistakably afraid of me. They cross the street to avoid a face-to-face encounter. I think they would not dare to walk alone with me at night. I have come to realize that a fair proportion of the human beings I meet are actually afraid of me, or uncomfortable in my presence until I in some way make them understand that I will not annoy them, or that I have a message for them which can be delivered by no one else. Some deaf people live tormented by the thought that society rejects them, or at best merely tolerates them. They would be far happier to admit frankly that they are not as other men, and realize that there is no reason why the world should give them special accommodation. They should rather seek to acquire original personality or power which would make them so luminous that the world would eagerly follow them. This is possible in some way for every deaf person. It is our best hope.

One of the finest men I ever knew told me frankly that two classes of people make him shudder; men belonging to the Salvation Army, in uniform, and deaf persons, trying to hear. This friend is a thoroughly sincere clergyman, with a leaning toward the full dignity of the cloth. The Salvation Army came to his town, and being charitably disposed toward the workers, he attended one of their meetings. Greatly to his embarrassment the captain called in a loud voice for Brother Johnson to pray. The clergyman started in the formal manner but at the first period he was greeted with a loud chorus—“Amen, brother!” While the drummer pounded on his drum and clashed his brass. My friend still suffers from the shock. His feeling for the deaf may be traced to Aunt Sallie. At the bedside of a sick friend he was asked to pray. Before he could even start, Aunt Sallie, very deaf but anxious to miss nothing, planted herself so close as to place her ear about six inches from his mouth. I do not wonder that this man will cross the street at the approach of deafness or a uniformed Salvation Army officer.

And it must be admitted that it is quite easy for the deaf themselves to become narrow and prejudiced. Frequently when exiled to the silent world, with poetry and laughter shut out, we use a clipped yard-stick to measure the good which is always to be found in everyone. Sometimes prejudice is carried to a ridiculous extreme. When I was a boy Deacon Drake of the Congregational Church went to a funeral at which a Unitarian minister officiated. The Deacon had not heard for years, but he sat stiff-necked and solemn until the choir sang a hymn which visibly affected the people. He asked his daughter for the name of the hymn and she wrote it out—“Nearer, My God, to Thee.” The old man had heard not a note, but as he disapproved of the sentiment expressed he rose and tramped firmly out of the room.

Job asked “Where is wisdom to be found?” Surely the deaf may eliminate singing and dancing as promising prospects for their search! Once a deaf man went to a party and fell into the hands of a feminine “joker.” This lady had wagered that she could dance a Virginia reel with a man unable to hear a note of the music. She contended that she would make him hear through vibration and thus guide him properly. Of course the deaf man knew better, but what was he to do? What could any man do in such a case? You yourself would probably trample all over judgment and common sense and stand out to make yourself ridiculous as man has done for centuries, and will doubtless continue to do!

They started bravely, but half way down the line the music quickened and the ill-starred deaf man landed heavily upon the foot of his partner. It was a cruel smash. The vibration process was reversed. She lost her wager and he was counted out, but he should have known better.

Perhaps you have seen a deaf man trying to march in a parade; I once saw one trying to keep step to his own wedding march! Well, I may say that the wife of a deaf man has many trials, usually she must do the marching for both.

I have often been asked whether total deafness is a greater affliction than total blindness. It would be very difficult to decide. At times the blind man would gladly exchange his hearing for sight; he so longs to see the faces of old friends or of his children. Yet frequently he is glad that the burden of deafness has not been laid upon him. In like manner the deaf man would sometimes give all he has for the sound of some familiar voice or the melody of some old song. Yet, considering carefully and weighing all the evidence, total blindness seems the greater affliction. But I have had blind men “feel sorry” for me because I miss the sounds of the birds and cannot hear whispered confidences.

However, I think the blind are happier than the deaf. There is less of the torture of Tantalus about their affliction. If they are surrounded by loving and considerate friends they have less to regret than the deaf; their embarrassments are not brought home so cruelly, for they do not see the consequences of their own blunders. I know a woman who was suddenly blinded, twenty-five years ago. She has lived usefully and happily with her family. Her children are now middle-age men and women, showing the wrinkles and the wear of life. Her husband and her brother have aged, but not for her. She only sees the old vision of youth and power. An illuminated silence would have given her all the signs of age creeping upon those nearest her, and would have destroyed her intimate part in the everyday family life. Her children never could have come to her, weeping, seeking her sacred confidences, had she been unable to hear them.

Society has a more kindly feeling for the blind man than for the deaf—at least so it seems to us. You may find a good illustration of this at some party or social gathering in the country. The neighbors gather; very likely it is Winter and they come from lonely places, eager for human companionship. It is a jolly gathering. Perhaps a blind man and a deaf man of equal social importance, will enter the room simultaneously. The blind man hears the laughter and the happy chatter and at once enters into the spirit of the evening. The deaf man catches no happy contagion, he feels a melancholy irritation. He would have been far happier at home with his book, but his wife and daughter urged upon him the duty of coming to “enjoy himself” and—here he is.

Half a dozen people rush to the blind man. He must be guided to a comfortable seat where a willing interpreter will quickly make him feel at home. He is told about the new red dress which Mrs. Jones is wearing, it is so becoming! Miss Foster is in blue, and her hair is arranged in the latest New York style. Henry Benson has shaved off his beard. John Mercer has a bandage on his hand where he cut it with the saw. The Chase girls have new fur coats. The blind man sees it through the eyes of his neighbor. It is a pleasure to sit unobtrusively and talk to him—it gives one a thrill of satisfaction to feel that the blind man is made happy.

But who rushes to the deaf man for the privilege of being his interpreter? In all my experience I have known only one person to do this. As he looks about him for a vacant seat the deaf man sees few inviting hands or faces. If he is able to read facial expressions at all he soon fancies that there are many versions of the thought:

“Oh, I hope that man will not sit near me!”

Who desires to attract attention by screaming at the deaf man or to spend the evening writing out for him what others are saying?

A little handful of people once attended a prayer meeting at a little country church back among the hills. It was during a severe, gloomy Winter, a season of unusual trouble and unusual complaint. The little stove could barely melt the thick frost on the windows. The feeble lamps gave but a dim light. Yet as the meeting progressed through prayer and song that melancholy group of farmers mellowed, and undoubtedly something of holy joy came to them. I, of course, heard not a word of the service, but apparently each person waited for the spirit to move them, then rose and repeated some well-worn prayer or a verse of Scripture. It was utterly crude and simple, but a certain power fell upon that company and for the moment it was lifted out of the dull commonplace of daily life. Little or nothing of the spiritual uplift came to me. At the close of the service I saw people who had come gloomy and depressed acting like happy children, shaking hands, forgetting old troubles, buoyed and braced. And some of them seemed to regard my calmness with wonder—I could not fully join in their happiness.

It is evident that a sincere religious spirit can bring great comfort to the deaf. Now and then I find a deaf man who practices what I call professional religion with all the cant and the pious phrases necessary. It never seems to ring true. The deaf are notorious failures at deception. But a firm trust in God and a sincere belief in His power and mercy should be “As the shadow of a mighty rock in a weary land”—of silence. We must have the best possible moral support.

I know of a man who is both blind and deaf. Once when I gave way momentarily to depression his wife wrote me:

“I felt like writing an invitation to you to come and look at my husband who is both blind and deaf. An accident twenty-one years ago caused the loss of sight, which came on gradually but finally became complete. When I told him you were to write “Adventures in Silence,” he said, ‘Why not the wonders of silence and darkness?’ That has been his attitude all through these burdened years. These are but a small portion of the misfortunes and trials which have befallen us, but as he guides himself by lines hung from one point to another just high enough to take the crook of his cane there comes never a word of discouragement or despair. Here let me say that an educated, trained mind is the finest gift you can give to your children. It is the possession of a wonderful mind well trained by a splendid education that has been next to God’s love that has kept ‘my man’ upright and strong through the darkened and silent valley.”

We may all of us readily understand that no human or material power is strong enough to sustain a man through such a fate.

CHAPTER XVI
“Such Tricks Hath Strong Imagination”

Imaginary Fears, Stuffed Lions and Bogus “Wild Men”—Sound as Stimulating Emotions, Even of Animals—The Brazen Courage of the Deaf—The Rum-crazed Men—The Overflowing Brook—The Drunken Prizefighter Challenged by a Deaf Man—The Terrors Lurking Within—Demons of Depression—The Deaf Man and the Only Girl.

Most of our fears are imaginary. I am convinced of this after a long study of deaf people, and a careful analysis of my own experience in the silence. I believe that physical fear is almost invariably induced by sound. We all see lions in the way. The man with good ears hears the roaring and hesitates, or turns aside. The horrible sound does not reach the deaf man, and he feels more inclined to go ahead and investigate. Most frequently the frightful object turns out to be a stuffed lion, a creature without effective claws or teeth, with nothing but wind in its roaring!

With a little thought every man can remember incidents which tend to prove this statement, but in time of threatened danger he is likely to forget them. Years ago in my boyhood days a couple of us youngsters went to a circus in the country town. In one of the side-shows was a fierce-looking creature labelled “The Wild Man of Borneo.” It appeared to be a human being of medium size with long claws, rolling eyes, and a dreadful, discolored, hairy countenance. His most frightful characteristic was his voice, which was exhibited by a horrible roar, a sound well calculated to chill the simple hearts of the country people who listened to the “manager’s” tale of a thrilling capture. There had been a bloody fight in which the wild man had killed several dogs and wounded a number of hunters. He would never have surrendered had they not first captured his mate; he followed her into voluntary slavery—“Thus proving that love is the primal and ruling force of the universe. The love-song of this devoted couple, ringing over the hills and dales, would have daunted the stoutest heart.” In proof of which the two caged creatures started a chorus of roars which would have sent the country people home to shudder in the darkness, had not a very practical deaf man been moved to investigate. He heard nothing of the explanation, and but little of the roaring; he only saw a couple of undersized creatures, exceedingly dirty and not particularly interesting. The “love song” gave them no glamour for him. So he idly lifted a curtain which hung at one corner of the tent, and, lo, the fountain of sound was revealed at its true source. A hot and perspiring fat man was working industriously at the pedal of a “wind machine,” a device resembling an old-fashioned parlor organ. Here was the real explanation of those primitive cries proving the deep affection which the “Wild Man of Borneo” felt for his mate. The deaf man pulled the curtain completely down and exposed the humbug.

Well, it broke up the show! Next to the fury of a woman scorned is the wrath of a crowd of country people who have paid their money for a thrill only to find themselves served with a very thin trick. They see no humor in the situation, and an exposure of this sort is a cruel blow at their pride and judgment. People with humor and philosophy would have laughed at the joke and polished it up for the benefit of their friends, but this hard-headed, serious folk could only find relief by pulling down the tent. In a far larger way this is what the solid, unreasoning and unimaginative element of a population will do to a state or a national government when some political trick has been exposed.

It was the “wild man” himself who saved the situation in the circus tent, and tamed the outraged audience. He pulled off his wig and beard and shed the claws which were fitted to his fingers like gloves. Then there stood revealed a small Irishman with a freckled, good-natured face.

“Sure,” he said, “the game’s up and I’m glad, because it’s a tiresome job. I’ve worked on a farm in my day, and I’d like to do it again. If any of you farmers here will give me a job, I’ll take it.”

“And me, too!” said the “mate”; when “her” frowsy head dress came off there was a red-haired young fellow of pleasant countenance. They both got farm jobs and lived in that community for several years. The “mate” finally married a farmer’s daughter!

It has been said that the primary effect of sound is the creating of moods; psychologists have spent much time in analyzing the connection between sound and fear and kindred emotions. It is easy enough to realize that sight must inform or directly affect the intellect. Theater managers prove the necessity of supplementing sight with sound when they obtain a full play of emotion by giving the audience appropriate music, which they stress during emotional passages. Perhaps what we are is determined by what we see, while what we feel is decided by what we hear. The deaf are frequently termed hard-hearted and even cold-blooded. I have known deaf persons actually to smile at cases of grief or injury which seemed tragic to those who could hear what the unfortunate victims were saying. They saw only the physical contortions. Suppose you with good ears and I in my silence, walking together, meet a little crying child. I can only observe the outward signs of distress; I see her tears and watch the little chest rise and fall with her sobs. My sympathy can be only vague and general—I may even smile to myself over the shallow sorrows of childhood. It will pay you to stoop over and hear the whole story, to catch every tone of the little, grief-stricken voice. I have no means of offering intelligent consolation, perhaps you can explain the trouble away or offer a quick diversion.

There are hundreds of instances where the deaf have undergone battles, shipwrecks or other frightful adventures with composure, while their companions were stumbling or jabbering with fear. These latter would tell you that the most horrible part of their experience was the cries of the suffering who faced death in agony and fear. The mere spectacle of the suffering did not upset the cool judgment of the deaf.

It seems evident that sound also has a greater stimulating effect upon the emotions of animals than do the other senses. A friend who has studied this subject says:

“I have imitated different animals many thousand times, and can easily deceive them at their own game, but cannot long deceive the average person. A dog relying on sight, smell and hearing—and maybe a little, a very little reasoning—although he may be very brave—can easily be made to flee in terror by the right sort of growling and noises connecting first wonder, then anger or terror. He hears a very ferocious dog, but can neither see nor smell him; here is something new, which he cannot reason out—he curls his tail, gives a frightened yelp, registers fear in other ways and runs with all his might.

“Recently I was out hunting wild turkeys, and had nearly induced one to come near to me when a stick fell from a tree, and without waiting to reason, away he went. My call would not deceive a person, but any sort of an amateur squawk easily deceives a gobbler. Not long ago, a friend of mine, while calling a gobbler, called also a wildcat who was trying to get the gobbler for breakfast. Animal sight may be ultra-human, but I am very sure that animal hearing is not.”

Doubtless we all rely on hearing to keep us informed concerning the fear instinct. Children hear a great deal subjectively, aided by their fears plus imagination. I am almost prepared to state that deafness is connected with fearlessness above the average, but I am not yet sure of my ground. Any defect of the five senses strengthens in a measure the remaining channels, and deafness cannot but assist concentration in those persons of studious contemplative habit, since it closes one avenue of interruption. I have noticed that with those of a philosophical turn plus strong will—or won’t—deafness saves nerve fatigue, from hearing many noises or remarks.

I have observed the habits of several deaf cats and dogs, and have noted instances of exceptional bravery, and evidences of a new sense, probably the substitute for the one they have lost. Some of my own experiences also show how sound dominates physical fear.

During my Winter in a large lumber camp of Northern Michigan I found how far life can swing from the ideal republic even in this country. The snow had shut in our little community for the Winter. The majority of our choppers were French Canadians and Swedes, strains of humanity which are completely unlike until whiskey breeds in both a desire to fight and kill. In some way the Canadians had obtained a supply of “white whiskey” (a mixture of grain alcohol and water) at Christmas, and the entire outfit prepared to celebrate gloriously. The boss prepared to follow Grant’s famous plan of campaign. He cut off the enemy’s base of supplies by locking the door of the cook’s shanty and refusing to feed the rioters. This brought the revolution to a head. A crowd of savage men gathered in front of the buildings with their axes, and threatened to cut the doors out and to kill the few of us who were left on guard. After it was all over I was told that the cursing and the threatening of these rum-crazed men was frightful, but as I could not hear a syllable of it I walked up to them, entered the group and talked the situation over with French Charlie, Joe the Devil and the Blue Swede. The rest of my side expected to see me chopped into pieces, but most men who threaten before they act will talk a full dictionary before they kill. These drunken men were so astonished at a deaf man’s disregard of their threats that they were diverted from their anger, and I was able to make terms with them. I probably should not have dared to go near them if I had received the curses and threats direct.

Years later a sudden cloudburst in the hills above our farm filled the streams to overflowing. The little river near our home jumped out of its bed and spread over the road—a rushing, roaring, shallow sheet of water. I had to cross that part of the road in order to get my train, and I took a steady horse, with one of the little boys in the buggy with me. At the edge of this overflow we found a group of excited men who were listening to the roaring, and were afraid to venture over. I used my eyes calmly and observed that the bridge was quite sound, and the water was too shallow to be really dangerous. So in I drove with my boy—who was white with terror—while most of the men tried to stop me. The old horse waded calmly and safely, and we crossed without trouble. The water never reached the hub of the wheel! Yet on the other side men stood half paralyzed because they heard the roaring water and stopped to listen. On the other side my boy said, “But you never would have done it if you could hear that water!”

As I look from the silent land out into the busy world I see men hesitate, falter and fall back at terrors which appear to me imaginary. They stop to listen—and are lost. Like my boy on the edge of the river, they hear the roaring water and become unfit for calm judgment, or keen analysis of actual danger. Most people with good hearing stop too frequently to listen. A scarecrow may have been making a noise like a fighting man! If you listen long enough to the tales of a liar you will come to regard him as a lion.

A friend of mine relates a strange adventure which befell him on a New York subway train. He was a “strap-hanger” in a crowded express car rushing up town. As is the habit of the deaf he forgot the throng around him and let his mind become absorbed in the business he was engaged in. This is the privilege of us deaf; we may be near enough to a dozen men to touch them with our hands, yet the mind can take us miles away from all distractions. This man was rudely shaken from his oblivion by a great commotion in the car. The passengers rushed forward past him, stumbling over each other in their eagerness to get away to the front of the train. Two so-called “guards” fled with the rest. The deaf man did not join the stampede because he had no idea what it was all about, and long experience of the vagaries of people who can hear had taught him the wisdom of keeping out of the rush. He glanced over his shoulder and saw that the back of the car was empty save for one man, who stood quite near to him. This was a thick-set individual with a small, bullet-shaped head, set firmly on a bull neck. He had a heavy red face, and small, deep-set eyes, but his most singular feature was his right ear—it did not look human at all, but resembled a small cauliflower. The eyes of the deaf are quick to seize upon the most unusual or conspicuous part of an object—my deaf friend noted first of all that cauliflower ear.

Its owner advanced and shook his fist menacingly, shouting words which only served to increase the confusion of the stampeders. The deaf man merely hung to his strap and over his shoulder shouted into the cauliflower ear:

“Oh, shut up! Give us a rest!”

The “guard” who was trying to jam through the door nearly fell with astonishment. As the man continued to approach from behind, the deaf man turned and pointed a finger at him.

“I can’t hear a word you say, and I don’t know who you are—but shut up, and stop your noise!”

The antagonist glanced sharply at him—then the deaf man read on his lips:

“Don’t you know who I am?”

“No, and I don’t care!”

“Can’t you hear what I say?”

“No, and I don’t want to! Mind your own business!”

The bullet-headed man uttered one short expressive word and sat down. At Forty-second Street two good-sized policemen appeared, but they waited for reinforcements before arresting the disturber. However, he went willingly, casting back a look of mingled fear and admiration at the deaf man. My friend did not know he was a hero until he learned that the belligerent gentleman was a champion middle-weight boxer, very drunk and very ugly. He had threatened to clean out the crowd—hence the sudden stampede. This deaf man tells me that if he had really known to whom the cauliflower ear belonged he would have been the first man out of the car. As it happened he gained a reputation for being the only man who ever told a “champ” to shut up, and then cooled him off by shaking a finger. I have known many deaf men who have escaped from such situations most marvelously uninjured.

Yet while the deaf man is smiling at most of the terrors which approach him from without, he falls an easy prey to those which attack from within. Imagination will often lead a sensitive man into untold misery. Our hardest struggles come when we must strangle the imps of depression, our personal devils. They come with evil suggestion, frequently with actual voices, eager to poison the will and paralyze the courage. I have no doubt that Whittier’s great poem beginning:

“Spare me, dread angel of reproach”

was written as the result of subjective audition. I suppose the average person can never know how close the deaf are driven to temporary insanity in their struggles to overcome doubts and imaginary fears. Sometimes the fear concentrates upon the idea that they will lose sight as well as hearing! Or perhaps doubt of wife, children or friends will present itself forcibly. Little incidents, a feeling that people are laughing at their expense, some unintentional slight, a misunderstanding or a rude nervous shock, any of these may start the hateful imps which live in one part of the brain at their fearful work of poisoning the mind and the will. At times the deaf man finds it almost impossible to wrench free from these accursed influences.

Some readers become so completely absorbed in books that they cannot take the mind from a sad or an exciting story. I have known deaf men to enter into such a story as George Eliot’s “Mill on the Floss” so that they lived through the lives of the various characters and found that they could not shake off the depression. Usually I can tell when the author is deaf by the general character of the story. The dialogue is as a rule unnatural and the tone is apt to be gloomy. Music, or light, aimless conversation would clear the mind and make the reader remember that it is only a story—but to the deaf man, deprived of these aids, the tragedy depicted on the printed page becomes shockingly real. The best remedy for me is to “read in streaks.” Whenever I find that a book is liable to have this powerful effect on me I do not read continuously, but after a few chapters I take up something in lighter vein, or even a serious volume of solid thought. Some of us deaf acquire a morbid desire to read sad or sombre literature. This mistake should be overcome even if it requires a supreme effort. If one can acquire faith in the Bible and reverence for its teachings it will give greater comfort to the deaf than will any other book. I place Shakespeare next, then Milton and the other great poets. But let a deaf man read what interests him, if it be nothing but the local paper. If he lives in the country let him become a correspondent for his local paper, and join the hunt for local news. He should leave out of his list all tales of depression and sin. The deaf person should make a point of reading half a dozen of the “best sellers” each year. They are likely to be stories of human nature, and they will undoubtedly contain natural dialogue; these elements are sadly needed by the deaf, yet they are the least likely to come into the silent world.

Of course you will contend, and truly, that it is supremely foolish for grown men and women to give way to imaginary fears and doubts. Yet the very absurdity makes it harder to bring cool reason into the fight against these imps. As Claude Melnotte in “The Lady of Lyons” puts it:

“It is the sting of such a woe as mine

To feel I am a man!”

Again, my best remedy is to force the mind backward into familiar incidents which clearly show that these fierce lions of the imagination are at best mere scarecrows. There is one favorite adventure which usually serves to lift the spell.

Many years ago a certain young man met a certain young woman, and the young man was soon completely certain that here was “the only girl”. Ever since the world began young men have singled out young women by a process of selection, not usually scientific or always safe or sane; yet life has continued for many centuries with upward tendencies as a result. This young man’s ancestor, the cave man, would doubtlessly have taken a club (if he had been big enough), knocked down the male members of the family, and dragged the young woman off to his own hole in the rocks. The race has progressed since then, and the family must be approached in a more gentle manner. This young woman had a wide choice. She was bright and lively and pretty, with a long string of attendants. The man was serious-minded and poor, with prospects far from the best. His hearing was failing, and he knew that deafness was inevitable. He had reasoned out the whole situation with the greatest care. Here was the “only girl,” but the cold future lay on ahead. Have the deaf a right to marry? Is it fair to ask anyone to share the results of such an affliction? What he did was to go straight to the “only girl” with the truth. Probably the imps of depression had begun to talk to him even then. No doubt he made his future chances seem harder than he might have done. It is said that John G. Whittier made the same blunder of exaggerated honesty when he offered marriage to another “only girl.” The girl rejected him and Whittier never married. But in our case the “only girl” said that she would “think it over.”

Then came the lawn party. The young man was a little late, and dancing had begun when he came and looked through the window. Those were the good old Southern days when we swung about in the old-fashioned waltz; the happy days before the war were still in mind, and we danced to such plaintive tunes as “Old Kentucky Home,” and “Nellie Was a Lady.” The young man outside saw the “only girl” dancing with Henry. Henry was a good fellow, bright and clean; his mother was the richest woman in town. When the music stopped the couple came out onto the lawn. The waiting young man saw them find seats under a tree, back from the lights, where they sat down to talk earnestly. The watcher could think of but one probable topic for conversation. Once as he walked down a path under a lamp they looked at him and he saw the “only girl” smile. He lost all interest in the party. He walked on out along the lonely country road, and like Philip Ray of Enoch Arden, “had his dark hour alone.”

The imps came to him in the dark, but he mastered them and reasoned it out to a great peace. “It is better so. Henry can give her an easier life. She will be happier here in her old home town. I must fight for a place in the world, and she is not a fighter. I am handicapped. In the years to come, as a deaf man I shall be worse off than a man with one leg. I really have no right to ask her to share an uncertainty with me. Henry is the better man—and yet, she is the ‘only girl.’ I cannot stay here. I’ll go back North!”

The deaf spend less time on regrets after the struggle than do those who can hear. So the young man walked back to the house with a great peace in his heart. The “only girl” was sitting on the steps, one of a group of happy young people. And Henry came walking across the lawn straight to the deaf man. The latter braced himself and held out his hand to the rival—for what did it matter after all if the “only girl” could be satisfied? But Henry got in ahead. He put out his hand impulsively and said:

“Old man, I congratulate you! She has told me all about it. She’s not for me. She says she admires a self-made man, and that’s more than I can ever be. Mother took the job off my hands too early!”

This is undoubtedly the best antidote for my fears and imaginary vagaries, and I like to pass it in mental review. And this lady who sits at the other side of the fire! I wonder how much of it she remembers? Does it have the effect of an antidote for her? She is writing something for me now. No doubt she is remembering that night long ago—the music and the moonlight and all the rest of it. Here is proof of the power of mental communication. The good lady passes the message over to me. Let me rub my glasses a moment in pleasant anticipation. I read:

“You went away this morning without leaving me any money. I must have ten dollars to pay a few little bills!”

Remembering happier days appears to be a special privilege of the deaf!

CHAPTER XVII
“The Terror That Flieth by Night”

The Terror that Flieth by Night—’Gene Wilson in the Dark Silence—How He Fought off Insanity—Childhood Fears—The Cat in the Garret—The Blind and the Deaf at the Dark Railroad Station—A Georgia Experience.

The sense of utter helplessness and the heart chill which envelop a deaf person suddenly plunged into darkness are indescribable. For example, of course, I know perfectly well that the darkness does not of itself carry evil or extra danger; I have come through it repeatedly without harm, yet in spite of all that I can think or do I invariably experience an instant of paralyzing fear. Persons who have never known perfect hearing do not feel the full terror, I think, but there is tragedy in the sudden withdrawal of light for those who have gradually, perhaps imperceptibly, come to substitute eyes for ears. They may recover their mental poise after a moment of mental struggle but for a brief space, before they can adjust the mind, they will come close to insanity. I can assure you that at such a time the moments are hours.

I know of at least one deaf man, a farmer, who will vouch for the truth of my statements, though you with good ears may contend that it is fantastic to be so affected. ’Gene Wilson had come to depend on his wife and children as interpreters in his communications with others. Many a deaf person has lost the habit of listening, of paying close attention, through his perfect confidence in the family interpreter. In any case, many men of middle-age are inclined to shirk the responsibility of effort if they can find some one willing to assume it. The deaf man loses his will to hear if not his actual hearing, the man of middle years thus is inviting old age; both by effort could extend the “years of grace.” ’Gene Wilson had sent a car load of potatoes to the city and had followed to sell them, with his wife and little girl. During the crowded noon hour he attempted to cross Broadway at Forty-second Street. A policeman stood on guard to direct the traffic, but ’Gene did not understand the signals. He tried to run across just as a big car started uptown—of course the policeman shouted, but ’Gene could not hear him. The driver could not stop in time and the deaf man was smashed to the ground, where he lay stunned and bleeding. There was the usual call for an ambulance, and ’Gene was hurried to a hospital. The deaf do not cry out when injured or frightened; probably they lose the habit of this form of expression since they do not hear others use it. Instead there comes a whirling, a roaring of the head and a sort of mild paralysis of the brain, but when this clears away it leaves the mind most acute and active. ’Gene Wilson lay in this half-dazed condition, conscious only of a fearful pounding at his brain. The doctors questioned him, but he did not hear. They finally put him down as idiotic or at least half-insane. Several deaf friends have told me how this label was attached to them when they met with accidents while among strangers. One can scarcely blame hurried, over-worked hospital doctors and nurses for paying scant attention to such cases, and the afflicted must suffer.

So they bandaged poor ’Gene’s head in such a way that his eyes were covered. What difference could seeing make to a half-wit? How were those doctors to know how much more the blessed sunshine meant to this deaf man than it could possibly mean to them? And then ’Gene’s mind suddenly cleared. His head was racked by pain and the roaring still sounded in his ears, but he remembered back to the moment before the accident—and now he found himself suddenly helpless, in the darkness. He forgot the usual caution of the deaf and shouted! The nurses came running and tried to make him understand, but a new terror possessed him. He tore at the bandages which covered his eyes, but strong hands held him back; he fought with all his power, lying there in the darkness and the silence, but how were the nurses to understand that he was only fighting for the sunshine? None of their explanations pacified him, so they strapped his arms securely to the bed and held him a prisoner. Who knows what their report might have been?

’Gene Wilson tells me that a full thousand years of torment were crowded for him in the next half-hour. He thinks that Dante missed one act in his description of life in the infernal regions! ’Gene says that frightful shapes stepped out of the shadows and seemed to lead him along a lonely road, up close to a great house with transparent sides through which he could look upon the grotesque shapes which dwelt therein. Part of his mind seemed to know that it was the home of insanity. Faces peered at him through the windows; some stared in a stupor of melancholy, others showed grinning deviltry or hateful sneering, and all were waiting to welcome him! And all around poor ’Gene were kindly souls eager to help him and to draw him away from the awful place, but he could not make them understand that he was not insane—only deaf.

“You may believe it or not,” says ’Gene, going on with his story, “but as I stood there struggling to get rid of those shapes at my sides my mind searched for a strong, sane picture which should counteract the spell of the evil ones. Suddenly there came to me the Twenty-third Psalm, which as a boy I had committed to memory. It had been lying forgotten at the back of my mind, but at that awful moment it returned complete and distinct. I lay there quietly, repeating the words over and over.

“The Lord is my Shepherd; I shall not want. He maketh me to lie down in green pastures, He leadeth me beside the still waters. He restoreth my soul; He leadeth me in the paths of righteousness for His name’s sake. Yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil, for Thou art with me. Thy rod and Thy staff they comfort me.”

I told ’Gene that here was evidence of the subconscious mind throwing up something which had been buried deep into it years before.

“I know nothing about that,” said he; “but as I lay there repeating those words over and over a great peace came to me. The shapes at my side disappeared, and I could walk away from that frightful place. Then I felt a hand on my head which somehow I recognized, and another smaller hand caught at my thumb. They loosened those hateful bandages and let in the light. Then I saw—as I seemed to know I should—my wife sitting beside me, and the little girl holding my hand.”

I could assure ’Gene that I completely believed his story, for I have also felt the strong emotions and imaginings which stir the deaf at such times. Always the head noises grow louder when light is withdrawn from our hearing eyes, and the voices which go with subjective hearing become more pronounced. Probably the deaf are more sensitive to subconscious thought than are those who hear well; we are deprived of much of the sound which stimulates many trains of conscious thought. Also we deaf must naturally deal with the past where most subconscious thought is buried. I believe that the deaf hold very closely to memories and associations of childhood—our long, quiet hours of reflection are largely filled with remembering the most vivid impressions we have received.

Perhaps this accounts for some of the terror which the darkness brings. Many of us remember the horrible shapes which peopled the black night around our beds, and lurked in shadowy corners, often emerging to dance grotesquely in the moonlight. When I was the “boy” on a New England farm there was only one room in the house which was reasonably warm in Winter, but at eight o’clock the old farmer would point with unmistakable significance to the tall clock in the corner, and there was nothing for me to do but to rush through the cold parlor, up the colder stairs into the still colder attic, where my bed was in the shadow of the great central chimney. Needless to say, I undressed in bed. Then down under the covers I lay and trembled at the snap of the frost. Once a piece of plaster fell from the unfinished wall above me and struck my shoulder; again “Malty,” the gray cat, crawled in through a hole in the roof and sprang upon my bed, striking terror to my soul, though she really came as an old friend. The appearance of this unknown crawling thing on my bed inspired a frenzy of fear—but I knew that it would do me no good to scream or call for help. My aunt was deaf, while my uncle slept like the proverbial log; both log and deaf ear are alike, unresponsive to sound. Also, I realized that the journey downstairs with my story would have been unprofitable (and freezing!). I should have been sent back with a scolding and perhaps a blow. My own little children sometimes waken in the night with some of these vague terrors, and I have known them to run through the dark to their mother’s bed, where they are always taken in. My old folks were not cruel or even consciously unkind; they merely lived in an arid region where understanding and imagination could not come. They knew nothing of ghosts and goblins, so why should a child fear them? Darkness was really a good thing, if one didn’t waste lamp oil. So I lay alone with the terrors until sleep banished them. I could not see that they must be futile, since such an unsubstantial foe as sleep could master them.

Of course, thousands of grey-haired persons can recall just such terrifying childhood situations. Usually as we grow older the memories fade away, though they are never entirely lost; they are probably waiting in the subconsciousness for darkness and a worried mind to bring them forth. They are clearer to the deaf, and nearer to the surface of consciousness; hence they are more easily roused to play their strange tricks upon us. It seems strange to me that novelists have rather neglected this strong emotion of fear, and it is particularly remarkable that they have seemed to slight the mighty struggle to overcome it, which all deaf people know.

Some years ago I planned to visit a New England town to attend a college celebration. I had never been in this particular locality before, but I supposed I should find a large town with full hotel accommodations, so I took a night train. At about eleven I alighted at the railroad station, and, to my astonishment, found myself in complete darkness. The train made but a brief stop; it hurried off like a living thing, glad to escape from the lonely place. I watched the last glimmer of its rear light disappear around a distant curve, and then I was completely wrapped in a dense, inky blackness, through which I could feel the moist fingers of a thick, creeping fog. They seemed to clutch at my face and throat. For an instant the old wild terror seized me, and then there came an impulse to rush through the blackness desperately—anywhere—to escape the clinging things which seemed to be reaching for me. But I stood still, and finally there came to me a sort of amused sense of adventure—I remembered the night in the hotel when I wandered about the dark passage and ran into a drunken man. The fight sobered him, and as he led me back to my room he thanked me, for he said that his wife was waiting up for him.

Now my first thought was to locate the railroad station. That would at least prove a starting point; but I had absolutely no idea in which direction to start, for I could not even tell whether any buildings at all were near. The last light on the train had traveled east, but I had turned around several times since I watched it out of sight. I dared not call out; I remembered the deaf man who was shot and nearly killed under similar circumstances. Being lost in the darkness, he called for help, not knowing that he was near a farmhouse. The farmer heard him and pointed a gun from the window, calling:

“What do you want? Stand still or I’ll fire!”

The deaf man continued to advance; the farmer fired at random and shot him down. I knew better than to call out in the darkness. I did not even dare walk freely about, for I know of a man who in the darkness about a railroad station ran into a mowing-machine; another became entangled in a roll of barbed wire. These incidents stayed in my mind quite vividly, and I will confess that I got down on my hands and knees and crawled carefully in what I hoped was the direction of the station. Foot by foot I crept along, and at last I came up against what I took to be a picket fence. Then a dull light began to glow down the track. The midnight freight rumbled by, and its headlight showed the station behind me. I had crossed the road in my travels, and now I slowly recrossed it. With arms outstretched, I ran into the building. I carefully groped my way around it, much as a blind man would have felt his way along a wall. But he would travel with greater confidence, trusting to his ears to warn him of approaching danger. I passed one corner and proceeded to the other side, but suddenly there came to me a feeling that someone was near me in the dark! I cannot describe the uncanny, “crawly” sensation which envelops a deaf person when he senses an unseen presence. I suffered acutely until I actually ran into a man who also seemed to be feeling his way along the wall. He told me afterward that he had spoken to me several times, but, of course, I did not answer. Happily he had no pistol or he would have fired. As it was, each clutched the throat of the other, and we struggled like two wild animals. I had the stronger grip, and I think I know the vulnerable point in the throat. At any rate, his hand dropped, and I knew from the quiver inside his throat that he was gasping for breath.

Then I told him who I was and what was my trouble. After a little fumbling I got my hearing device into working order and held up the mouthpiece to his month. At first he thought it was a pistol, but I reassured him, and he told me his story. Like myself, he had come on the late train, expecting to find a town, and a good hotel near the station. And it happened that he was nearly blind; he retained only part of the sight in one eye. He told me that he had heard me walking about in the dark and had called loudly. There we were—a man nearly blind and a deaf man, stranded in this lonely place. If ever two human beings had need of each other, we were the men, yet a moment before both of us were ready to fight when co-operation was the only possible hope for us. This is not unlike the larger struggles that go on in the world.

We agreed to graft the blind man’s ears upon my eyes, and together we made our way slowly along the road. Our hope was to start up some dog at a farmhouse, rouse the family by any means, and plead for lodging. Finally, far down the road I saw a moving light. I judged it to be a lantern in the hand of a farmer going to the barn for a last look at the cattle before retiring. I know that New England habit. So I called and the blind man listened. The light stopped moving at my call, and a big voice roared back:

“What do you want at this time of night?”

I explained as best I could, but it was hard to convince that farmer.

“Too thin! I’ve heard such tales before! Stop where you are till I come back.”

The lantern moved back to the house, and we waited in the road. Soon three lights appeared and moved towards us. That farmer had called up his son and the hired man, and as they moved down the road in our direction I thought of “The Night Watch”—a fine picture I had seen at an exhibition. The farmer carried a shotgun, the boy had an old musket, and the hired man brandished a pitchfork. When we came within range of the lantern, the farmer ordered us to hold up our hands while we explained; the hired man meanwhile advanced with his pitchfork extended as if to throw half a haycock on a wagon. These men could not be blamed for their caution, for, as we later learned, thieves had been busy in the neighborhood. We finally convinced the belligerents that we were harmless. The farmer left us under the guard of the hired man while he went to his barn and harnessed a horse. Then he carried us to the distant town, where we routed out a sleepy landlord and ended our adventure. But the farmer gave us a bit of homely advice.

“If I was a deaf man, or if I had only half an eye, I’d stay at home when night comes.”

“But in that case you would miss a good deal of life—many adventures, and many new friends.”

“Well, maybe that’s so; I hadn’t thought of that.”

He departed shaking his head over the advantages of adventurous blood, but I think he possessed a dash of it himself.

A friend of mine tells a Georgia experience of deafness and darkness.

Long after dark he reached the small town where he was to spend the night. However black true “pitch” may be, there never was anything darker than that portion of the atmosphere which surrounded the railroad station as this deaf man stepped off the train. Finally a light appeared from behind the station. It proved to be a dim lantern in the hands of a colored man so black that his face seemed to make a shadow in the dark. Conversation with the deaf regarding details is not satisfactory under such conditions. The colored man held his lantern up near to his face and talked, but his mouth was too large and open to make lip-reading easy. The deaf man did finally grasp the fact that this agent of the night represented the leading hotel in town. So, under his guidance my friend found his way to an old closed carriage. The colored man hung his lantern on a spring, roused his sleepy mule, and off they started over a succession of humps and mud holes. Finally, after one tremendous bump, the lonely lantern went out and the carriage halted. The deaf man could distinguish ahead only two luminous spots of light; they were the eyes of the mule, who, instead of running as a horse might have done, merely looked reproachfully at his driver. The colored man had no matches, but he drove on through the blackness, placidly trusting to the mule for guidance. Now there are times in the life of every deaf man when he must either aspire to philosophy or retire into insanity. My friend, inside of that rickety carriage, smiled at the thought which entered his mind. Ages before one of his stone age ancestors had crouched far back on his bed of leaves, shrinking in terror at the evil spirits which the darkness was hiding. Here he was in the silent darkness after all the long ages, but he was serene in soul because hundreds of years of artificial light had brought to him their message of courage and faith.

The “hotel” proved to be an old-fashioned Southern mansion, rambling and shaky, fronted by large unpainted columns which sagged a bit, with windows that rattled and big echoing halls in which old memories congregated. My friend was tired, and after a light supper he asked to be taken to his room. The landlord, a grave and dignified man, who limped a little from a wound received at Gettysburg, took up a lighted candle and led the way to a big corner room at the back of the house on the first floor. He put the candle and the matches down on the bureau and then pulled out a revolver, which he placed beside the candle.

“We have been having a little trouble with some of our niggers,” he said. “They steal. Keep your windows fastened, and put your watch and money under your pillow. If anyone should get in, fire first and inquire afterward. That is our plan. Good-night.”

This deaf man hardly knows how to fire a modern revolver. It is doubtful if he could come anywhere near to a barn door in sunlight, to say nothing of the inky blackness which encompassed that house. However, he obediently put his valuables under the pillow, placed the big revolver carefully on the chair beside his bed, blew out the light and retired. In such a situation it seems to me that keen, quick ears would have been a misfortune. And this deaf man, being philosophical as well as very weary, fell asleep before he could fully realize the surrounding conditions.

How long he slept he cannot now tell, but he suddenly woke with a start and sat up in bed, knowing that someone was within a few feet of him. I know that both the blind and the deaf have a curious faculty of divining the presence of others in the silence of the darkness. My friend knew that somewhere in the silent darkness human beings were going through some stealthy performance. He reached for the revolver, but the chair upon which he had placed it was not there! As quietly as possible he groped his way to the bureau and found the matches. But it was impossible to light them. He scratched at least a dozen until they broke in two, but they would not ignite. The candle was in his hand, but the light within, which he craved, could not be produced. Alone in the silent blackness, a numb terror fell upon the heart of the deaf man. He was as helpless as his remote ancestor, shrinking into his primeval black cave. He was even in a worse situation, for the cave man had hearing with which to note the approach of his enemy. The modern man would not know how near was the lurking enemy until he felt the clutching hand. He dared not cry out or grope for help through that rambling house—the landlord had stipulated that questions be asked afterward! Finally, urged on by that mysterious instinct of the deaf, he groped his way along the hall until he reached the corner window. This he opened, and he stood there waiting for the terror to reveal itself. Suddenly he perceived that someone had passed close to him through the outside darkness—he even felt a slight movement of air as something passed by; he thought a human hand was laid on the window sill for an instant. With eyes strained to the limit of tension and ears quickened a little by terror, the deaf man realized that a door near him had gently opened. Then came a dim sound and the air waves of a struggle, and the deaf man knew that someone was creeping back past him through the darkness. As startling as would have been a nail driven into his heart came the thud and the shock of a quick blow on the side of the house nearest him—a low, stifled cry penetrated even his dull ears. Then off again crept a human form, feeling its way along the house.

No, the deaf man did not dream all this. It all happened just as I relate it. Out in that silent blackness a tragedy had been enacted.

After a time the deaf man cautiously put his hand out of the window down toward the place where that quick blow had fallen. His reaching fingers slowly crept down past the sill to the wooden post upon which the house was built. There they encountered a soft, warm, sticky smear, which coated the top of the post. The fingers did not dare to close. The horror-stricken, lonely man held his right hand rigid and suffered one of those crises when either philosophy or insanity must come to the aid of the deaf. He determined to keep his mind clear. Finally he became aware that light was coming; off in the east a crimson streak appeared along the sky; the wind was blowing the mists away. Little by little the light gained. The man looked at his hand, and, as he had feared, it showed a red stain. The light grew, and he finally gained courage to look out of the window. The post was covered with blood. There was still visible the mark of a blow of an axe. Just back from the corner was a small house, within which a rooster was crowing—half a dozen hens were on their way out for the day’s wanderings. In the door of a small cook-house in the backyard a fat colored woman was picking a Plymouth Rock chicken. The deaf man glanced once more at the house post and saw on the ground beside it the head of a rooster!

It was a thoughtful man who washed his hands and looked about the room. The revolver still lay on the chair where he had placed it; he had evidently put his hand out on the wrong side of the bed. There was the candle and there were the matches—untouched; near at hand was a box of toothpicks, half of them broken in pieces, with scratches on the box.

Later the deaf man sat out in the gallery, watching the sun rise, his mind busy with strange matters as he waited for breakfast. At length the landlord appeared.

“I hope, sir, you rested well. I feared you might be disturbed. We wanted to give you a taste of fried chicken, Georgia style, so the nigger killed one this morning. I hope it did not disturb you, sir.”

CHAPTER XVIII
“Grouch” Or Gentleman

When a man becomes convinced that he is definitely headed for the silence, he must make up his mind whether he is to be a grouch or a gentleman. The word “grouch” has not yet been fully accepted by the guardians of good English, but it seems to me one of the most expressive words in the language. Perhaps that is because I have spent much time in trying to escape from the condition which might probably carry this label. The deaf man may, if he will, excel all others in playing the part. Here is one case in which he may certainly pose as a star. It is hardly possible for a grouch to be a gentleman, and it is quite inconceivable that the gentleman should wish to be a grouch. Yet, if left to himself, the deaf man will naturally come to play the part, and it is certainly the one part in the great adventure of life which he can handle to perfection. The grouch wraps himself in a mantle of gloom and tries to throw the skirts of it all around his fellow-men. The gentleman, when under the spell of affliction, struggles to light a candle of faith and hope within him that will make his whole life luminous as he walks among men. It costs most of us a struggle in our efforts to throw off depression and appear content with life, and the struggle will be long and constant, but it is worth while, and so in this last chapter I would like to briefly review some of the rules of life which have come home to me during my sojourn in silence. I have found in my own case that I paid very little attention to the rules and regulations of the trouble, but, at any rate, those of us who have been over the ground like to nail up the danger signal when we can.

The deaf should remember that they are in a way abnormal. We cannot be like other men. It could not well be otherwise when we realize that we are deprived of what is perhaps the most important of the senses. It seems to me far better to face the fact that we cannot well conceal our handicap. Usually when we mingle with others in everyday life every person within 100 feet of us will know sooner or later that we are deaf. Some of the worst blunders which the deaf man can make are those which come from pretending that he can hear. We shall receive better treatment and be freer from disappointment if we frankly admit our handicap and throw ourselves upon the generosity of our friends, or even of strangers.

I suppose that curiosity causes more real torture to the deaf man than anything else. Some of the deaf are exceedingly curious. They must know what others are talking about, and they often pester their companions almost beyond endurance in an effort to learn all the trivial details of small conversation. They bring themselves to believe that most conversation going on about them refers to something in which they are vitally interested, and in this way they come to imagine all sorts of disagreeable things. This idle curiosity leads to endless grief and trouble. Forget it! That brief advice is peculiarly applicable to the deaf, for it is much harder for them to forget things than for those whose minds are constantly diverted by sound. One of the greatest troubles of the average deaf man is that he cannot forget the things which annoy except by driving them out of the brain by new suggestions, or by forcing himself to think of happier and more interesting things. That is why every deaf person should have some harmless or interesting hobby which he can always mount and spur into speed whenever the imps of the silence come out of their holes. Yet, there is such a thing as riding a hobby so hard that the rider loses his hat, and the deaf man makes a very ridiculous John Gilpin when his hobby runs away with him.

Above all things, we must believe in the loyalty and affection of our family and companions. Remember that they are human, perhaps more so than we are. We can easily become a nuisance to them. They may perhaps show their annoyance for the moment, but at heart they are true, and we should never lose faith in them, if we can possibly avoid it. I think, too, it is a mistake to allude to our trouble as an affliction, as too many of us are tempted to do. It is a handicap, and often a very serious one. Yet, we may easily find people with real afflictions, worse than ours, and we well know that we would not readily change our identity if such a thing could be done. I find that successful teachers of lip-reading insist that deafness should never be spoken of as an affliction. It is a handicap, perhaps, but the surest way to make it worse is to go about classing the deaf with afflicted people; and the intelligent deaf scarcely, if ever, speak of those who are deaf and dumb. That is a term to be avoided, for education or scientific treatment is ending that condition. The entire life of the deaf, if they hope to enjoy even ordinary happiness, must be built on the sunshine theory; always search for the bright side. In all our life there is nothing so destructive of character as self-pity. Far better look about for undoubted advantages of life in the silence, and train our rebellious spirits to work patiently under the yoke. In that way we may easily gain new strength of character and greater power from our trouble. I like to repeat the statement over and over that I have found this a good world. It is well filled with kindly people, who on the whole are ready to give every man with a handicap a fair start if they can only be made to realize that he is willing to fight the good fight with cheerfulness and without complaint.

I have found it well to go out among my fellow-men and take my chances on getting through. Some people seem to think that deafness should shut them away from travel or society. I cannot agree with that. I think we should move about among people. It is, I grant, a peculiar sensation at times to realize the appalling loneliness of a crowd. You stand in groups of people, see them move about, know that they are talking and laughing; you can reach out your hand and touch them; yet, for all that, you are living in another world apart from them. It gives one at times an uncanny feeling to realize such a situation, yet I think it is well for us to seek our fellows in this way, and live among them. It gives us opportunity for the finest study of character, and if we would only think so, there are few things more interesting or exciting than the attempt to locate strangers in occupation or habit by their appearance. Some deaf people seek to hide themselves, and shun society and travel through fear of ridicule or accident. This is, I believe, a mistake. So long as one has eyes of reasonable strength which may be trained for quick and close observation, it is far better for the mind and spirit to get out among men. When you go on a journey, always plan to carry a flashlight lantern and an abundant supply of paper and pencils. You are quite sure at some point of your travels to find yourself in darkness along the way, and there is little hope for the deaf man in the dark. Unless you are expert at lip-reading, my advice would be to insist upon having the message written out. With the very deaf attempts to make them hear or to communicate by signs are little better than wide guesses. In all my experiences I have never found but two people who refused to write the information when I called for it. One was an impatient, selfish man, and the other a woman, who evidently feared that certain young men would laugh at her if she made herself conspicuous with a deaf man. In one of these cases a bystander, seemingly ashamed of the discourtesy shown me, volunteered to help me, and was ready to fight the man who had refused. Oh, I shall have to repeat it once more! I have found this a good world to live in. It is filled with people who at heart are kindly and sympathetic. Many of the fancied rebuffs which we experience are due to the fact that people do not understand how to communicate with us. Above all things, the deaf man should never lose his nerve. He should always believe that he is the favorite “child of fate,” sure to come through every obstacle. Then let him go bravely and confidently on his way, supremely sure that he will be cared for.

The problem of occupation is the vital one for the deaf. What can we do to earn a living when our hearing fails? There is without question a prejudice against the deaf which it is hard to overcome. We who live in the silence cannot quite understand why people seem to fear us, and are evidently uncomfortable when we come near. We are as harmless as anyone, and we are capable of giving good service, but we realize only too well that society in general seems to class us among the undesirables. I know of one woman who is struggling to support and educate two children. She is an admirable cook, good housekeeper, clean, quick and efficient, yet no one wants to employ her because she is deaf. One would think that her condition would be something of an advantage in a household where there are family secrets to be kept. But, no matter how capable this woman may be, most people seem afraid to employ her. The fact is that the condition of deafness is a distinct advantage in many cases—for example, the faithful deaf helper will not be liable to change frequently. He will stay by his employer, yet most deaf people come face to face with prejudice which society shows them.

I know of a clergyman who filled his pulpit acceptably until deafness drove him from it. One might think without bitterness that a man of God with a trouble of this sort might in his daily life come closer to what his people need, but his congregation would not have it so, and he was retired. For some years the old man lived in the town, sawing and splitting wood for a living. The woodpile he built was a sermon on neatness and honest labor, and he went happily on through life. Someone asked him how he could be cheerful at such labor, and his answer was: “I put joy in my job.” There are deaf men in all walks of life. Some are highly successful as teachers, editors, salesmen, watchmen and other lines where one would suppose that perfect hearing is more than a necessity. In general a deaf man must take the work that comes to him. He cannot always choose, but he can usually dignify any job, and excel at it if he will keep his courage and put his mind to it. He should remember that spirit of the old minister who, when retired from his pulpit, took up the saw and axe, and was cheerful because he put joy in the job.

The moving picture show is a wonderful help to the deaf. Here he is on terms of equality with all men. In this remarkable world of the movies, where the villain is always punished and the virtuous always emerge with roses and a crown, the deaf man may find much of that optimism which seems like an electric light to the soul. It is the height of enjoyment for him to see pictures illustrating some favorite book thrown on the screen, and that enables him to make a mental comparison with his own conception of the characters in the story. The fact is that the life of the ambitious deaf is one long effort to keep cheerful and bright-minded, and thus steer away from depression. To that end he should soak his mind with all possible poetry and humor and good literature. In fact, let him take in anything that will frame pleasant pictures on the walls of his mind, and it is a blessing ranking close to a godsend to be able to sleep when other aids in the struggle against depression fail. There will surely come times after the work has been laid aside when all the wakeful philosophy will fail to keep the spirit bright. Then the ability to lie down and sleep becomes a genuine heavenly gift; for in sleep the head noises and troubles are forgotten, when we may even hear music and voices of friends. And do you know that in that thought lies one of the most curious and pathetic things connected with the life of the deaf? We wonder just how the voices of wife and son or friends actually sound. In real fact they may croak like ravens or scream like a door that needs oiling, but to us in imagination they are musical and full of sympathy. I think that of all the curious, mysterious things which come to us in this world of silence there is nothing sadder or more remarkable than this unsatisfied desire to listen to the actual tones which ring in the voices of those we love.

It is without doubt true that the deaf are closer to subconscious thought than those who have perfect hearing. It seems to be easier for us to go back to childhood or to raise into the mind memories of other days. It often becomes a wonder to me that old friends forget so many of the scenes and sayings of youth. I presume they have more to distract their attention. It seems to me that the useless or trivial conversation which most people indulge in must in time dilute or distort memory and drive away the pictures of youth. With the deaf these pictures seem to grow clearer with each year, and this, I take it, is one of the compensations which accompany the trouble. For as we march along the road and reach a hill from which we begin to see the end, I think it must be a lonely road which those must travel who have forgotten the pictures and companions of their youth. It is practically impossible for the deaf to weep as others do. They are for the most part denied what I may call the healing balm of tears, unless there can occur some great shock, some volcanic eruption of emotion which breaks down the dam and lets in the flood upon a dry desert of lonely years. But the deaf man who has kept his mind cleanly occupied and his spirit bright may find in happy memories a joy of life which others rarely know.

“Sometimes when night pulls down the shade after a weary day,

I sit beside my open fire and watch the shadows play.

Then memory takes me by the hand, and happily we go

Back to the kindly days of youth—when I was Mary’s beau.

Oh! Mary! In those golden years, when you and I were young,

When all the symphonies of youth by hopeful lips were sung,

When every avenue of life led out to rosy skies,

And fortune’s fingers dangled there the gifts that all men prize!

Old Time is kind. He hides the years which bear the loss and stain,

And only those which shine with love and happiness remain.

As one may find a violet beneath the Winter’s snow,

I go back to the kindly years—when I was Mary’s beau.

I was a chunky farmer boy—her father lord of lands.

She was a little village queen—I only had my hands.

Yet in the pure democracy of our New England town

Youth never could be quite denied—love beat the barriers down.

Yet she was wise—to reign a queen—one must keep step with wealth.

And Mary knew full well that I had nothing but my health.

To me she played a sister’s part—but settled down with Joe,

I went out West with but a dream that I was Mary’s beau.

I’ve journeyed East, I’ve journeyed West—I’ve had my hour of life.

I’ve lingered in the pleasant ways—I’ve faced the storm and strife.

Fame, wealth, have missed me and yet they will envy me I know,

Those days back in the golden years—when I was Mary’s beau.

No, no, dear wife, deny me not these fair old dreams of youth,

You well may smile, for life has taught the patience and the truth.

Time tried, long tested, up the hill we’ve journeyed side by side,

Or drifted in the ebb and flow of fortune’s fateful tide.

The years may come, the years may go, yet love will find the test.

Youth’s dreams are good, yet that which lives on life’s hard road is best,

And so you grant me my romance—perhaps I do not know,

You, too, are thinking of the days when you were Henry’s beau.

And so I sit beside the fire when night pulls down the blind,

And wander back to youth once more with all my cares behind.

The winds of trouble rage outside, we care not how they blow,

Back in those golden days of youth—when I was Mary’s beau.”

Transcriber’s Notes.

1. Silently corrected simple spelling, grammar, and typographical errors.

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Table of Contents

- ADVENTURES IN SILENCE
- INTRODUCTION
- CONTENTS
- CHAPTER I Terrors That Are Imaginary
- CHAPTER II On the Road to Silence

- CHAPTER III Head Noises and Subjective Audition.

- CHAPTER IV Facing the Hard Situation
- CHAPTER V “A Heart For Any Fate”
- CHAPTER VI Memories of Early Life
- CHAPTER VII Experimenting With the Deaf Man
- CHAPTER VIII Companions in Trouble
- CHAPTER IX The Approach to Silence
- CHAPTER X Mixing Word Meanings
- CHAPTER XI “The Whispering Wire”
- CHAPTER XII “No Music in Himself”
- CHAPTER XIII Silence Not Always Golden
- CHAPTER XIV Cases of Mistaken Identity
- CHAPTER XV All in a Lifetime

- CHAPTER XVI “Such Tricks Hath Strong Imagination”

- CHAPTER XVII “The Terror That Flieth by Night”

- CHAPTER XVIII “Grouch” Or Gentleman

- THE FULL PROJECT GUTENBERG LICENSE