I am guided and governed more by the ear, however, than by either of the other organs of sense.  If I wish to cross the street it tells me when teams are coming, how far they are away, at what rate of speed they are traveling, and when it will be safe to cross.  If I find a group of men conversing, it tells me who they are.  If I wish to enter a store, or any place, it tells me where the door is, if open, by the sounds that issue therefrom, but in this I have sometimes been misled by going to an open window, which always makes me feel awkward.  Sound to me is as important as light is to the seeing, and brings to the mind a great many facts that are gathered through the eyes when sight is made the prime sense.

Much of my information, however, is received through the fingers.  They are properly the organs of touch.  Although this sense is distributed over the whole body, even to the mucous membrane that lines the mouth and covers the tongue.  When the finger’s ends have been hardened by labor, or from any cause, the lips and tongue are the most sensitive, and are often used in threading needles, stringing beads, etc, very innocent uses surely to put the tongue to.  This sense of touch is of necessity cultivated by the blind until it often reaches a state of perfection seldom, if ever, found in the seeing.  Of course its development is gradual, as is the growth of all the faculties.  When I was quite a little child, and my fingers were soft, I could readily distinguish all the variety of flowers that grew in my sister’s flower garden, and could call them by name.  From touch I knew all the common fruits, from the peach with its velvet skin, to the strawberry in the meadow, for which I used to search diligently with my fingers, and sometimes find, as I remember, thistles, which were never quite to my taste.  One thing among my childish sports and amusements, for they were limited, always gave great pleasure; and does even now.  I loved to play along the brook or lake shore, to feel for smooth and odd shaped stones, for pretty shells, etc.  Their beauty to me existed only in the great variety of shapes they presented, and in their smooth, pearly surfaces, as they never suggested to my mind any idea of color.  Winter afforded me few opportunities for cultivating my love for the beautiful.  Summer was my heaven, with its singing birds, its tinkling brooks and its fresh and delicious fruits.

I took great pleasure in examining, with my fingers, flowers, leaves and grasses, because their great variety of shape and texture fed an innate longing after something that I could not then comprehend.

When but an infant, I am told nothing amused me so well as a branch of green leaves.

My early boyhood was spent in rambling through the woods, hunting nuts, squirrels, chipmunks, etc., with other boys of my own age, in climbing trees, digging for wood-chucks, skating, coasting, and in performing all the feats common to boyhood, such as standing on my head, hopping, jumping, whistling, shouting, &c.  I shall regret to have this page come under the eyes of my boys, for in noisy mischief they already exceed my most sanguine expectations, and need not a record of their father’s boisterous childhood to encourage them.