i6 HELPING OUR EARS 



curve of the top lobe over the lobe at the bottom, thus 

 closing the passage to sound from one side. 



The question I am concerned with just now is: 

 To what extent does the outer ear in its present 

 condition, glued to the head and diminishing in 

 size, help our hearing ? Some physiologists have said 

 that it helps us not at all, that but for the look of 

 the thing we should be just as well off if our ears 

 were all removed in infancy. 



The light of nature, or experience, shows us that 

 it is not so; that when we listen intently to sounds 

 difficult to catch we almost instinctively put up a 

 finger and push the ear a little forward; and it is 

 possible the movement is instinctive and dates back 

 to the far time when the ear began to lose its freedom 

 of motion. Thus, in Adventures of an Atom, we read : 

 *' Soon as Gotto-mio stood up every spectator raised 

 his thumb to his ear as if it were instinctively." A 

 good observation worth rescuing from the dullest 

 as well as the obscenest " classic " in the language. 

 We have also the habit of holding an open hand 

 behind the ear when listening; the hand thus held 

 open, and the fingers curved forwards to make a 

 hollow pan, is a substitute for the primitive ear 

 when it was swung forward to listen to sounds from 

 the front. It would not be difficult to ascertain by 

 experiments just how far the outer ear does help us 

 in the hearing. Thus the ear could be done away 

 with by sinking it in and covering it smoothly over 

 with wax, leaving the passage free. And it would 

 perhaps be an agreeable experience to face the wind 



