hone from my pocket, and
laid it on the table beside us.

"'What's that?' she exclaimed. 'You don't mean to tell me you have
become hard of hearing?'

"'Oh, no,' said I; 'my hearing is just as good as it ever was.'

"'But that is a thing deaf people use,' she said.

"'Well, yes,' I answered; 'it could be used by deaf people, I suppose,
although I have never tried it in that way. It is my latest and, I
think, my most important invention. It would take too long to explain
its mechanism just now--'

"'Indeed it would,' she interrupted quickly.

"'But what I want to do,' I continued, 'is to make a little trial of it
with you.'

"'If you mean you want me to speak into that thing,' she said, 'I do not
want to do it. I should hate to think you are deaf and needed anything
of the sort. Please put it away; I do not even like the looks of it.'

"But I persisted; I told her that I greatly desired that she should
speak a few sentences in Burmese into my instrument. I had a certain
reason for this which I would explain afterwards.

"'But you do not understand Burmese,' she said in surprise.

"'Not a word of it,' I answered. 'I do not know how it sounds when it is
spoken, nor how it looks when it is written. But there are certain tones
and chords, and all that sort of thing, in the foreign languages which
are very interesting, no matter whether you understand the language or
not.'

"'Oh, it is a sort of musical thing, then,' she said.

"'I will not say it is exactly that,' I replied. 'But if you will simply
speak to me in Burmese for a minute or two, that is all I ask of you,
and afterwards we can talk about its construction and object.'

"'Oh, I do not want to talk any more about it,' said she; 'but if it
will satisfy you, I will say a few words to you in Burmese. Do you speak
into this hole?' she said as she took up the instrument.

"I arranged the ear-piece very carefully, and covered my other ear with
my hand. Immediately she began to speak to me, and every word came to me
in clear and beautiful English! But I knew, as well as I knew that I
lived, that the words she spoke were Burmese, or belonged to some other
language which she knew I did not understand. The proof of this was in
the words themselves.

"'I think you are perfectly horrid,' she said, 'and I am glad to have
an opportunity to tell you so, even though you do not understand me. I
cannot imagine how anybody can be so stupid as to want to talk about
h