Page:De Amicis - Heart, translation Hapgood, 1922.djvu/184

156 They know if there is more than one person in a room, even if only one speaks, and the rest remain motionless. They know by their touch whether a spoon is more or less polished. Little girls distinguish dyed wool from that which is of the natural color. As they walk two and two along the streets, they recognize nearly all the shops by their odors, even those in which we perceive no odor. They spin top, aad by listening to its humming they go straight to it and pick it up without any mistake. They trundle hoop, play at ninepins, jump the rope, build little houses of stones, pick violets as though they saw them, make mats and baskets, weaving together straw of various colors rapidly and well—to such a degree is their sense of touch skilled. The sense of touch is their sight. One of their greatest pleasures is to handle, to grasp, to guess the forms of things by feeling them. It is affecting to see them when they are taken to the Industrial Museum., where they are allowed to handle whatever they please, and to observe with what eagerness they fling themselves on geometrical bodies, on little models of houses, on instruments; with what joy they feel over and rub and turn everything about in their hands, in order to see how it is made. They call this seeing!”

Garoffi interrupted the teacher to inquire if it were true that blind boys learn to reckon better than others.

The master replied: “It is true. They learn to reckon and to write. They have books made on purpose for them, with raised characters; they pass their fingers over these, recognize the letters and pronounce the words. They read rapidly; and you should see