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The Little Sign for Friend 167 The Little Sign for Friend NOW, THERE ARE diversities of gifts, even in a school for deaf children. There was Everett Dwight, for instance, who, in the modeling class, always specialized in pigs— most engaging pigs, with expressively cocked ears, and tails of an unbelievable curliness . There was little Mary Logan, who had learned to say, “I know,” long before any of the other children in her class, and who said it upon all occasions, in season and out. And again, there was great awkward Christopher Adams who could make grotesque wooden snakes. But to Charlie Webster,—little old Webster, as all the teachers called him in sheer affection, or “W-on-the-eyes,” as his sign went among the deaf children, for a reason to which has been explained elsewhere—to him was the gift of friendship. From what enchanted source had a little deaf boy of nine drawn this miracle of affection that bubbled forth to enrich every new acquaintanceship? At Lomax he was friends with every one,—high and low, black and white, deaf and blind,—and his hands were forever flying together to form the little sign for friend, which is made in the deaf language by locking the forefingers first in one direction and then in the other; and by this sign he conquered. “Certainly it takes little old Webster to be friends with Christopher Adams,” Miss Evans, one of the teachers, sighed as her mind’s eye presented the picture of the latter ’s awkward shambling figure, and his dumb bewildered face. Christopher Adams was a great lumbering deaf mute of nineteen, sent to school years too late, and so homesick and confused and unhappy, and with a mind so long neglected, that he was well-nigh unteachable. “You should have let us have him years ago,” Mr. Lincoln, the Superintendent of Lomax, had cried reproachfully when Christopher’s father had brought him to school. The boy’s agonized glance flickered about the unfamiliar room, alighting here and there, on the bookcases, the typewriter, the desk, then fled back to his father’s face to cling there in desperate question. His body was that of a man almost six feet tall, but the spirit of childhood, like a captive Ariel,* looked forth from the dark tragic eyes, terrified by the unknown, and caught so fast in its prison of deafness, that it might never give place to maturity. “The Little Sign for Friend” is from Closed Doors: Studies of Deaf and Blind Children (Boston: Houghton Mifflin Co., 1915). Reprinted in 1934. *Ariel is the spirit controlled by Prospero in Shakespeare’s The Tempest. Ariel desires freedom.— Eds. 168 Margaret Prescott Montague “I allus ‘lowed he ought to go to school,” his father sighed. He was a little, shabby, discouraged man from the backwoods of Lupin County. “But his mammy said she wa’n’t agoin’ to have her afflicted child sent among strangers. But this fall we heard you was teachin’ deef children to talk, so I got her persuaded to let me bring Chrissy.” “But your boy is so old—” Mr. Lincoln broke off, hunting for the kindest words; but the little man’s fear caught him up sharply. “You mean—you mean my boy can’t learn?” As Mr. Lincoln hesitated, Charlie Webster pushed open the study door, his dancing eyes asking permission to enter, while his fingers signed a request for some writing paper. Mr. Lincoln, however, shook his head over the signs. “You must speak,” he commanded. And little old Webster, who believed with all his small soul in articulation for deaf children, flung back his head obediently, and, through somewhat embarrassed by the presence of strangers, made a buoyant attempt to control his stubborn lips. “Ples’ gif me som’ paper,” Webster repeated, reading the words from the other’s lips and beaming with excitement. And when Mr. Lincoln complied, he said, “Thank you,” pressing his finger to the side of his nose, as he always did to be sure that the vibration was right; flashed his engaging smile once more upon every one, and departed. “Why, he’s a-talkin’!” Mr. Adams burst out in great excitement. “He’s a-talking an’ he’s deef, ain’t he? Why can’t my boy learn good as him?” “Because your boy has been kept from school too long. However,” Mr. Lincoln went on kindly, “perhaps we can give him a little speech even yet...

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