reported to her principal that a certain little boy in her room was so
hopelessly dull and perverse that she despaired of teaching him anything.
The child would sit with open mouth and look at her as she would talk to
the class, and five minutes afterward he could not or would not repeat
three words of what had been said. She had scolded him, made him stand on
the floor, kept him in after school, and even whipped him--but all in
vain. The principal looked into the case, scratched his head, stroked his
whiskers, coughed, and decided that the public-school funds should not be
wasted in trying to "teach imbeciles," and so reported to the parents. He
advised them to send the boy to a Home for the Feeble-Minded, sending the
message by an older brother. So the parents took the child to the Home and
asked that he be admitted. The Matron took the little boy on her lap,
talked to him, read to him, showed him pictures and said to the astonished
parents, "This child has fully as much intelligence as any of your other
children, perhaps more--but he is deaf!"

Harriet Martineau from her twelfth year was very deaf, and she was also
devoid of the senses of taste and smell.

"Oh, these are terrible tribulations to befall a mortal!" we exclaim with
uplifted hands. But on sober second thought I am not sure that I know what
is a tribulation and what a blessing. I'm not positive that I would know a
blessing should I see it coming up the street. For as I write it comes to
me that the Great Big Black Things that have loomed against the horizon of
my life, threatening to devour me, simply loomed and nothing more. They
harmed me not. The things that have really made me miss my train have
always been sweet, soft, pretty, pleasant things of which I was not in
the, least afraid.

Mother Nature is kind, and if she deprives us of one thing she gives us