This small incident started me on a chat about hands, and, if my chat is fortunate, I have to thank my good star. In any case, it is pleasant to have something to talk about that no one else has monopolized; it is like making a new path in the trackless woods, blazing trail where no foot has pressed before. I am glad to take you by the hand and lead you along an untrodden way into a world where the hand is supreme. But at the very outset we encounter a difficulty. You are so accustomed to light, I fear you will stumble when I try toguide you through the land of darkness and silence. The blind are not supposed to be the best of guides. Still, though I cannot warrant not to lose you, I promise that you shall not be led into fire or water, or fall into a deep pit. If you will follow me patiently, you will find that "There"s a sound so fine, nothing lives "twixt it and silence," and that there is more meant in things than meets the eye.
My hand is to me what your hearing and sight together are to you. In large measure we travel the same highways, read the same books, speak the same language; yet our experiences are different. All my comings and goings turn on the hand as on a pivot. It is the hand that binds me to the world of men and women. The hand is my feeler with which I reach through isolation and darkness and seize every pleasure, every activity that my fingers encounter. With the dropping of a little word from another"s hand into mine, a slight flutter of the fingers, began the intelligence, the joy, the fullness of my life. Like Job, I feel as if a hand had made me, fashioned me together round about and moulded my very soul.
In all my experiences and thoughts I am conscious of a hand. Whatever moves me, whatever thrills me, is as a hand that touches me in the dark, and that touch is my reality. You might as well say that a sight which makes you glad, or a blow which brings the stinging tears to your eyes, is unreal as to say that those impressions are unreal which I have accumulated by means of touch. The delicate tremble of a butterfly"s wingsin my hand, the soft petals of violets curling in the cool folds of their leaves or lifting sweetly out of the meadow-grass, the clear, firm outline of a face and limb, the smooth arch of a horse"s neck and the velvety touch of his nose- all these, and a thousand resultant combinations, which take shape in my mind, constitute my world.
Helen Keller, in The World I Live in (Hodder and Stoughton).
Author.-Helen Keller, born in 1880 at Tuscumbia, in Alabama. She lost her sight and hearing from scarlet fever when under two years of age. She learnt the finger alphabet, to read and write, and later to speak, becoming a student at Radcliffe College, and, in 1904, B.A. She published The Story of my Life in 1903, The World I Live In, in 1905.
General Notes.-What is meant by " blazing trail " ? Is the hand of ablind and deaf person really all that hearing and sight are to us ? Weigh the question. A blind person once said that his notion of scarlet was the sound of a trumpet. Can a person born blind ever dream ? Are there spiritual melodies for those born deaf ? Recall the poem of " The Blind Men and the Elephant. " Beethoven became deaf and yet composed.
LESSON 52
WATERlOO
There was a sound of revelry by night, And Belgium"s capital had gathered then Her beauty and her chivalry; and brightThe lamps shone o"er fair women and brave men. A thousand hearts beat happily; and, when Music arose with its voluptuous swell,Soft eyes looked love to eyes which spake again. And all went merry as a marriage bell;But hush! hark! a deep sound strikes like a rising knell.
Did ye not hear it ?-No; "twas but the wind, Or the car rattling o"er the stony street;On with the dance ! let joy be unconfined !
No sleep till morn, when youth and pleasure meetTo chase the glowing hours with flying feet.
But hark !-that heavy sound breaks in once more, As if the clouds its echo would repeat;And nearer, clearer, deadlier than before!
Arm ! arm ! it is-it is-the cannon"s opening roar!
Ah ! then and there was hurrying to and fro, And gathering tears, and tremblings of distress, And cheeks all pale which, but an hour ago, Blushed at the praise of their own loveliness; And there were sudden partings, such as pressThe life from out young hearts, and choking sighs Which ne"er might be repeated; who could guess If ever more should meet those mutual eyes,Since upon night so sweet such awful morn could rise?
And there was mounting in hot haste; the steed, The mustering squadron, and the clattering car Went pouring forward with impetuous speed, And swiftly forming in the ranks of war;And the deep thunder, peal on peal afar, And near, the beat of the alarming drum Roused up the soldier ere the morning star;While thronged the citizens with terror dumb,Or whispering with white lips- " The foe ! they come ! they come ! "And, wild and high, the "Cameron"s gathering " rose ! The war-note of Lochiel, which Albyn"s hillsHave heard, and heard, too, have her Saxon foes. How in the noon of night that pibroch thrills, Savage and shrill ! But, with the breath which fillsTheir mountain-pipe, so fill the mountaineers With the fierce native daring, which instils The stirring memory of a thousand years;And Evan"s, Donald"s fame rings in each clansman"s ears !
And Ardennes waves above them her green leaves, Dewy with Nature"s tear-drops, as they pass, Grieving (if aught inanimate e"er grieves)Over the unreturning brave-alas !
Ere evening, to be trodden like the grass
Which now beneath them, but above shall grow
In its next verdure; when this fiery mass
Of living valour, rolling on the foe,
And burning with high hope, shall moulder cold and low !
Last noon beheld them full of lusty life; Last eve, in beauty"s circle proudly gay;The midnight brought the signal-sound of strife; The morn, the marshalling in arms; the day, Battle"s magnificently stern array!