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“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: