Nathaniel Shaler

The following is an account of how Louis Agassiz trained one of his pupils to see the things that people ordinarily miss.

When I sat me down before my tin pan, Agassiz brought me a small fish, placing it before me with the rather stern requirement that I should study it, but should on no account talk to any one concerning it, nor read anything relating to fishes, until I had his permission so to do. To my inquiry “What shall I do?” he said in effect: “Find out what you can without damaging the specimen; when I think that you have done the work I will question you.” In the course of an hour I thought I had compassed that fish; it was rather an unsavory object, giving forth the stench of old alcohol, then loathsome to me, though in time I came to like it. Many of the scales were loosened so that they fell off. It appeared to me to be a case for a summary report, which I was anxious to make and get on to the next stage of the business. But Agassiz, though always within call, concerned himself no further with me that day, nor the next, nor for a week. At first, this neglect was distressing; but I saw that it was a game, for he was, as I discerned rather than saw, covertly watching me. So I set my wits to work upon the thing, and in the course of a hundred hours or so thought I had done much — a. hundred times as much as seemed possible at the start. I got interested in finding out how the scales went in series, their shape, the form and placement of the teeth, etc. Finally, I felt full of the subject and probably expressed it in my bearing; as for words about it then, there were none from my master except his cheery “Good morning.” At length on the seventh day, came the question “Well?” and my disgorge of learning to him as he sat on the edge of my table puffing his cigar. At the end of the hour’s telling, he swung off and away, saying, “That is not right.” ... Moreover, it was clear that he was playing a game with me to find if I were capable of doing hard, continuous work without the support of a teacher, and this stimulated me to labor. I went at the task anew, discarded my first notes, and in another week of ten hours a day labor I had results which astonished myself and satisfied him.

The most important day I remember in all my life is the one on which my teacher, Anne Mansfield Sullivan, came to me. I am filled with wonder when I consider the immeasurable contrast between the two lives which it connects. It was the third of March, 1887, three months before I was seven years old.

On the afternoon of that eventful day, I stood on the porch, dumb, expectant. I guessed vaguely from my mother’s signs and from the hurrying to and fro in the house that something unusual was about to happen, so I went to the door and waited on the steps. The afternoon sun penetrated the mass of honeysuckle that covered the porch, and fell on my upturned face. My fingers lingered almost unconsciously on the familiar leaves and blossoms which had just come forth to greet the sweet southern spring. I did not know what the future held of marvel or surprise for me. Anger and bitterness had preyed upon me continually for weeks and a deep languor had succeeded this passionate struggle . ...

The morning after my teacher came she led me into her room and gave me a doll. The little blind children at the Perkins Institution had sent it and Laura Bridgman had dressed it; but I did not know this until afterward. When I had played with it a little while, Miss Sullivan slowly spelled into my hand the word “d-o-1-1.” I was at once interested in this finger play and tried to imitate it. When I finally succeeded in making the letters correctly I was flushed with childish pleasure and pride. Running downstairs to my mother I held up my hands and made the letters for doll. I did not know that I was spelling a word or even that words existed; I was simply making my fingers go in monkey-like imitation. In the days that followed I learned to spell in this uncomprehending way a great many words, among them pin, hat, cup, and a few verbs like sit, stand and walk. But my teacher had been with me several weeks before I understood that everything has a name.

One day, while I was playing with my new doll, Miss Sullivan put my big rag doll into my lap also, spelled “d-o-1-1” and tried to make me understand that “d-o-1-1” applied to both. Earlier in the day we had had a tussle over the words “m-u-g” and “w-a-t-e-r.” Miss Sullivan had tried to impress it upon me that “m-u-g” is mug and “w-a-t-e-r” is water, but I persisted in confounding the two. In despair she had dropped the subject for the time, only to renew it at the first opportunity. I became impatient at her repeated attempts and, seizing the new doll, I dashed it upon the floor. ...

We walked down the path to the well-house, attracted by the fragrance of the honeysuckle with which it was covered. Some one was drawing water and my teacher placed my hand under the spout. As the cool stream gushed over one hand she spelled into the other the word water, first slowly, then rapidly. I stood still, my whole attention fixed upon the motions of her fingers. Suddenly I felt a misty consciousness as of something forgotten — a thrill of returning thought; and somehow the mystery of language was revealed to me. I knew then that “w-a-t-e-r” meant the wonderful cool something that was flowing over my hand. That living word awakened my soul, gave it light, hope, joy, set it free! There were barriers still, it is true, but barriers that could in time be swept away.

I left the well-house eager to learn. Everything had a name, and each name gave birth to a new thought.

It was six men of Indostan

To learning much inclined,

Who went to see the Elephant

(Though all of them were blind),

That each by observation

Might satisfy his mind.

The First approached the Elephant,

And happening to fall

Against his broad and sturdy side,

At once began to bawl:

“God bless me! but the Elephant

Is very like a wall!”

The Second, feeling of the tusk,

Cried, “Ho! what have we here

So very round and smooth and sharp?

To me ’tis mighty clear

This wonder of an Elephant

Is very like a spear!”

The Third approached the animal,

And happening to take

The squirming trunk within his hands,

Thus boldly up and spake:

“I see,” quoth he, “the Elephant

Is very like a snake!”

The Fourth reached out an eager hand,

And felt about the knee:

“What most this wondrous beast is like

Is mighty plain,” quoth he;

“’Tis clear enough the Elephant

Is very like a tree!”

The Fifth, who chanced to touch the ear,

Said: “E’en the blindest man

Can tell what this resembles most;

Deny the fact who can,

This marvel of an Elephant

Is very like a fan!”

The Sixth no sooner had begun

About the beast to grope.

Then, seizing on the swinging tail

That fell within his scope,

“I see,” quoth he, “the Elephant

Is very like a rope!”

And so these men of Indostan

Disputed loud and long,

Each in his own opinion

Exceeding stiff and strong.

Though each was partly in the right

They all were in the wrong!

(An Adaptation)

Hans Christian Andersen

Once upon a time there was an Emperor who loved fine clothes. He did not care for any of the duties of an Emperor, all that mattered were his fine clothes. He had a different waistcoat, a different cloak, a different hat, and a different wig for every hour of the day.

One day two men came to the palace. One carried a pair of scissors, the other a long measuring stick. They walked up to the Emperor’s throne and bowed.

“Your Majesty,” they said, “we are weavers. Other weavers have made you rare, beautiful, costly clothes. But we will weave you even more beautiful clothes that are costlier and rarer!” They went up to the Emperor and whispered in his ear. “The clothes we weave have magical power! They are invisible to anyone that is stupid and unfit for his office.”

The Emperor thought that this was a good way to find out which of his subjects were stupid and unfit for his office. So he hired the weavers and gave them a sack of gold for silken thread and any equipment that they might need.

The weavers set up their looms in a high tower and all night they seemed to be working very busily. But they were only pretending. For they were rascals who were only tricking the Emperor to get his gold.

His Majesty was waiting impatiently for days for his new clothes. But there was an uncomfortable thought bothering him. He didn’t think he was stupid and unfit for office. Anyway, he’d send his Lord High Chamberlain to look at the material first.

The Lord High Chamberlain went to the room where the weavers had their looms. He gasped at what he saw — or rather didn’t see — for the looms were perfectly bare! “Oh, my goodness,” he gasped. “I must be stupid and unfit for office, for I can’t see the slightest bit of cloth! But I’ll say I do for no one must know of my stupidity.” So he told the weavers that he thought it was beautiful beyond words and ran off to tell the Emperor the very same thing.

When the Emperor heard this, he was even more impatient than ever. A few days later he sent the Lord High Chamberlain and the Assistant Lord High Chamberlain to see how the work was getting along. Of course they didn’t see anything, but praised the “cloth,” and brought wonderful, glowing accounts of its texture and color to the impatient Emperor.

Soon the whole court was talking about the wonderful clothes. Finally His Majesty got too impatient to wait any longer, and went to see the wonderful material.

The Emperor’s eyes opened wide. Scissors and needles he could see, but not one inch of cloth! Could it be that he was stupid and unfit for office? If so, no one must know. “It’s marvelous, the cloth is wonderful,” he said. “Now make it into my new clothes.” He gave the weavers twenty sacks of gold and named them “High Exalted Weavers to the Imperial Court.” After awhile the weavers said that the clothes would be ready the next day.

“Then let tomorrow be a holiday!” cried the Emperor. “Let there be a court procession; I wish all my subjects to gaze on me in my wonderful, magical clothes.”

Early the next morning the weavers came into His Majesty’s dressing room. They asked him to remove his old clothes and proceeded to “dress” him in the new ones, meanwhile praising their texture and fit. The Emperor called in his Chamberlains, and they also marveled at the “new clothes.”

Finally the procession started. The Lord High Chamberlain pretended to carry the Emperor’s train. Neither would admit to the other that there was no train to carry. The procession marched to the town where all the subjects cheered for the Emperor’s clothes. No one would admit to his neighbor that the Emperor wasn’t wearing anything for they did not want to seem stupid and unfit for office. Finally a little child cried out, “But the Emperor has no clothes on at all!”

“Shhh — of course he hasn’t,” another child said. “Don’t you know? Everyone is pretending!”

The people started to laugh at what the children had said and finally everyone was laughing.

The procession stopped. The Lord High Chamberlain’s face turned beet red. The Emperor looked at his naked body and giving a groan, he turned around and fled back to the Palace.

By the time he got back, the “High Exalted Weavers to the Imperial Court” had disappeared and so had the twenty sacks of gold. His Majesty went to his dressing room and put on his plainest suit. From that day on he never cared for fancy clothes. He cared for nothing except all the important business an Emperor has to do.

^[2] From The Story o f My Life by Helen Keller. Copyright 1908, 1981 by Helen Keller, reprinted by permission of Doubleday & Company, Inc. (pp. 21-24.)