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.