16 



ACCOUNT OF A BOY 



Answers to some Queries addressed to a Clergyman in the Conn-' 

 ty of Moray, by Mr Professor Glennie of Marisclial Col- 

 lege, Aberdeen, with respect to James Mitchell, a lad six- 

 teen years of age, who was born blind and deaf. 



" The subject of this brief notice is the son of the Reverend 

 Donald Mitchell, late minister of Ai'dclach, a Highland pa- 

 rish, Ivin"; on the banks of the Findhorn. He was born 11th 

 November 1795, and is the sixth child of his parents, being 

 the youngest except one. All his brothers and sisters, (as 

 were also his parents), are perfectly free from the deficiency of 

 sight and hearing, which occurs in his case ; and are healthy 

 and well formed. His mother, who is an"^intelligent and sen- 

 sible lady, very early discovered his unfortunate situation : she 

 noticed that he was blind, from his discovering no desire 

 to turn his eyes to the light, or to any bright object ; 

 and afterwards, (in his early infancy also), she ascertained 

 his being deaf, from the circumstance that no noise, how- 

 ever loud, awakened him from sleep. As he grew up, 

 he discovered a most extraordinary acuteness of the senses 

 of touch and smell ; being very soon able, by these, to di- 

 stinguish strangers from the members of his own family, and 

 any little article which was appropriated to himself, from 

 what belonged to others. In his childhood, the most notice- 

 able circumstance relating to him, was an eager desire to strike 

 upon his fore-teeth any thing he could get hold of; this he 

 would do for hours ; and seemed particularly gratified if it was 



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