Partial compensation for the longing and its denial comes with the music that we hear in dreams. The brain treasures up the desires of our waking hours, and attempts to satisfy them during sleep. I knew of a man who had lived a wild, sunny life in the open air. He was thrown into prison unjustly, and was held in a dark cell for weeks. He was able to endure this because, as he said, he had for years “soaked up all possible sunshine.” The sun’s energy had been “canned in his system,” and it carried him through his trouble. So may the deaf man be cheered after he enters the silent world if in his youth he was able to “soak up” his full share of music. It was my privilege as a boy to serve as “supe” or stage-hand at a theater, where I heard most of the great operas. The memory of that music has remained with me all through these long years. Sometimes I am tempted to sing one of those wonderful songs to my children. I presume there are few objects more ridiculous to a musician than a deaf man trying to sing. My people may well smile at my painful efforts (though the children do not, until they become worldly-wise), but they will never understand unless they become exiled to the silent land what such remembered music really means. But I must wait for dreams, wherein all outside conventions and inhibitions are thrown off, to give me the perfect rendition of remembered melodies. There was an old farmer who used to scold his daughter because she would spend five dollars of her money for an occasional trip to the city, where she could hear famous singers. “Why,” said he, “what nonsense, what folly to spend five dollars for only two short hours of pleasure.” But he did not realize that the money was paying for a memory which would remain with the girl all her life. I would, if I could, have a child soak his soul full of the noblest music that human power can give him.