Those Times and These

by Irvin S. Cobb

“Oh, that?” he said, and again he halted for an instant. “That was done largely on my account. I think the surgeon wanted the test to be complete at one time and not developed in parts. You understand, don't you?”

She nodded. And he continued, watching her face intently as he proceeded:

“So, first of all, we led him into a partly darkened room and sat him down at a table; and we gave him food—very simple food—a glass of cold water; a piece of bread, buttered; a baked Irish potato, with butter and salt upon it—that was all. We stood about him watching him as he tasted of the things we put before him—for it was really the first time he had ever properly tasted anything.

“Madam, if I live to be a hundred years old, I shall never forget the look that came into his face then. Even though he lacked the words to express himself, as you and I with our greater vocabularies might conceivably have expressed ourselves had such an experience come to us, I knew that to him the bread was ambrosia and the water was nectar.

“He didn't wolf the food down as I had rather expected he might. He ate it slowly, extracting the flavour from every crumb of it. And the water he took in sips, allowing it to trickle down his throat, drop by drop almost. And then he spoke to us, touching the bread and the potato and the water glass. Mind you, I am reproducing the sense of what he said rather than his exact words. He said:

“'What is this—and this—and this? What are these delicious things you have given me to eat? And what is this exquisite drink I have swallowed?'

“We told him and he seemed not to believe it at first. He said:

“'Why, I have handled such things as these often. I have taken them up in my hands a thousand times and I have swallowed them. I should have known what they were by the touch of my fingers—but the taste of them deceived me. Can it be possible that these things are common things—that even poor people can feast upon such meals as this which I am eating? Can it even be possible that there is food within the reach of ordinary mortals which has a finer zest than this?'

“And when his friend, the surgeon, told him 'Yes'—told him 'Yes' many times and in many ways—still he seemed loath to believe it. When he had finished, to the last scrap of the potato skin and the last morsel of the bread crust and the last drop in the glass, he bowed his head and outspread his hands before him as though returning thanks for a glorious benefaction.

“Perhaps I should have told you that this took place late in the afternoon. We waited a little while after that, and then just before sunset we took him outdoors into a little shabby garden on the asylum grounds; and we freed his eyes and we unmuffled his ears. And then we drew back from him a distance and watched him to see what he would do.