Sight in Savages. 167 
gress in life they are not conscious of decadence in 
it; from infancy to old age the world looks, they 
imagine, the same, the grass as green, the sky as 
blue as ever, and the scarlet verbenas in the grass 
just as scarlet. The man lives in his sight; it is 
his life; he speaks of the loss of it as a calamity 
great as loss of reason. To see spectacles amuses 
and irritates him at the same time; he has the 
monkey’s impulse to snatch the idle things from his 
fellow’s nose; for not only is it useless to the 
wearer, and a sham, but it is annoying to others, 
who do not like to look at a man and not pro- 
perly see his eyes, and the thought that is in 
them. 
To the mocking speech he had made the other 
good-humouredly replied that he had worn glasses 
for twenty years, that not only did they enable him 
to see much better than he could without them, 
but they had preserved his sight from further 
decadence. Not satisfied with defending himself 
against the charge of being a fantastical person for 
wearing glasses, he in his turn attacked the mocker. 
‘How do you know,” he said, ‘‘ that your own 
eyesight has not degenerated with time? You can 
only ascertain that by trying on anumber of glasses 
suited to a variety of sights, all in some degree 
defective. A score of men with decaying sight may 
be together, and in no two will the sight be the 
same. You must try on spectacles, as you try on 
boots, until you find a pair to fit you. You may — 
try mine if you like; our years are the same, and 
