sound if it is not heard!"

"No," they both returned, "not in the least clear."

"It's clear enough what he's driving at of course, "pursued the first
boy. "Until the waves of sound or light or what not hit us through our
senses, our brains don't experience the sensations of sound or light or
what not, and so, of course, we can't know about them--not until they
reach us."

"Precisely," said the tutor. He had a suave and slightly alien accent.

"Well, just tell me how that proves a thunder-storm in a desert island
makes no noise."

"If a thing is inaudible--" began the tutor,

"That's mere juggling!" vociferated the boy," That's merely the same
kind of toy-shop brain-trick you gave us out of Greek philosophy
yesterday, They said there was no such thing as motion because at every
instant of time the moving body had to be somewhere, so how could it get
anywhere else? Good Lord! I can make up foolishness like that myself.
For instance: A moving body can never stop. Why? Why, because at every
instant of time it must be going at a certain rate, so how can it ever
get slower? Pooh!" He stopped. He had been gesticulating with one
hand, which he now jammed wrathfully into his pocket.

The tutor must have derived great pleasure from his own smile, for he
prolonged and deepened and variously modified it while his shiny little
calculating eyes travelled from one to the other of his ruddy scholars.