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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.

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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.