Some years ago we planted a hedge at the end of my lawn. For years I could sit at the dining-table and look over it. At night I saw my neighbor’s window-light, and by day I could see him or some of his family moving about the house or the fields. As the years went on I became aware that the hedge was growing. Finally there came a Spring when the bushes were filled out with foliage so that all view of the neighbor’s house was lost. I could not see the light at night. While I knew the people were moving about during the daytime, I could not see them. The hedge had shut me away from them, yet it had grown so slowly and so gently that there was no shock. Had my neighbor shut himself suddenly away from view by building a spite fence, the loss would have been far greater. This instance somewhat resembles the difference between sudden loss of hearing and its slow fading away. I know of the curious case of a woman who could not be made to realize that her hearing was going until the common tests of everyday life convinced her that she was going deaf. What are these common tests? The usual ones are inability to hear the clocks and the birds. Very likely you have been in the habit of listening to the clock at night when for some reason sleep was impossible. It has been a comfort to you to think how this constant old friend goes calmly on through sun or storm, through joy or sorrow, gathering up the dust of the seconds into the grains of the minutes, and forming them into bricks of the hours and days. Or you may have been alone in the house on a Winter’s night. You heard the house timbers crack, and gentle fingers seemed to be tapping on the window pane. Then there came a night when you lay awake and missed the sound of your old friend, who seemed to have stopped checking off the marching hours. Many a deaf person waking in the night, missing the sound of the clock, has risen from bed and brought a light to start the old timepiece going. Not one of you can realize what it means when the light falls upon the face of the clock, revealing the minute hand still cheerfully circling its appointed course. The clock is still going, but something else has stopped. We have endured another test in watching the birds. Most of us can remember when the morning was full of bird music. One day as we walk about it comes suddenly home to us that the birds are silent or have disappeared. At least, we can no longer hear them. We look about and notice a robin on the lawn. We see him throw back his head, open his mouth and move his throat. He is evidently singing—but we did not know it. I cannot tell you in ordinary language how a chill suddenly passes over the heart as we realize that as long as life lasts music is to become to us as unsubstantial as the shadow of a cloud passing over the lawn.