30 
PROCEEDINGS OF SOCIETIES. 
original impulse of the air must be sustained ; thus, the last echo of two or three 
(which are generally heard) ought to be the faintest, and physically it must be so ; 
but the apparent effect is the contrary; the first echo returns a strong sound, and 
it diminishes by striking against a great rock at an angle in the deep ravine; the 
sound momentarily subsides, but every ear is now fixed in acutest attention, when 
suddenly rolls out the sound again, as it were of a small cannon, with the seeming 
power of thunder, startling the listeners, who believe, from their own sensations, 
that the noise is wonderfully increased by its travels. This, however, is only the 
result of sensitiveness, produced by the deepest attention which is given to it. 
The next effect on hearing to which I shall request consideration, is the different 
states of susceptibility which the same person experiences in differing states of 
health. I do not here refer to such extreme perceptivity of sound as often afflicts 
fever patients, or other well-marked valetudinarians, sufferers from nervous dis¬ 
eases, &c.; but I allude to the different susceptibilities of persons in good, average 
strength, but in differing states of robustness and powers of resistaney. Cannoniers 
can stand the report of a six-pounder without a start; and some of their 
power to do so arises from mental pre-occupation in the duty which engages 
them ; but it is probable that if these men were suddenly, and without an occupy¬ 
ing duty, placed by a ship’s seventy-four-pounder, the discharge would cause 
them to start, as most civilians do now, who come close to the firing of light artil¬ 
lery guns. Some ladies, perhaps, indulge in startings at sudden noises, and do it 
for effect; but sensitive nerves, at times, leave people no power to resist; so that 
what is uncontrollable is sometimes deemed unjustly to be affectation ; still, a 
habit of effort in subduing the practice of starting, when only produced by usual 
noises, is a good, moral training of the physical powers. We know that reflection 
and preparation make horses steady in field-firing, and these methods applied to 
nobler creatures may be equally true. So much for our normal conditions with 
respect to sudden sounds; we now come to certain morbid states of the nerves, 
under similar influences. A gentleman who was capable of bearing, without in¬ 
convenience, the noise of gun and pistol firing (which was usually so much the old 
habit here at times of public rejoicing), was surprised and annoyed at finding 
himself, when walking the illuminated streets with some ladies, continually start¬ 
ing at the explosions all around; this was somewhat unlike the constitutional 
firmness proper to a man; the noises gave him real pain ; but the ladies themselves 
being able to stand the firing without a bounce, their escort was not a little discon¬ 
certed at his irresistible susceptibility. The matter was capable of easy expla¬ 
nation ; the gentleman was about a month recovered from a bilious fever ; all the 
parts of his system which had been tested before had indicated perfect restoration ; 
but the undue sensibility of the auditory nerves proved that these organs were still 
only convalescent. The sufferer had fears that his pristine firmness, under such 
trials, might never return to him; but he soon attained his resistaney and good 
endurance, as perfect as they ever had been. It is known that sudden noises make 
young children cry with painful alarm, when the pitch only reaches that which 
healthy adults could bear without inconvenience ; this results, of course, from the 
greater sensibility of the hearing nerves of children. 
It would not properly belong to this short memoir to describe the morbid sen¬ 
sibility to sounds which ignorant alarm inflicts on some people; how loud the 
cricket’s chirp is to the superstitious listener, or how the shrinking of the timber of 
an old press or cupboard can seem, at times, to some terrified night-watcher, to be 
the tearing down of wainscots, and bursting open of doors. The exaggerations 
of acuteness in the perceptions of self-deluders are too numerous to record at pre¬ 
sent, but strange facts sometimes do try the courage and the judgment even of 
steady observers. A young gentleman was engaged in a manufactory, and it some¬ 
times happened that processes had to be continued all night; on these occasions 
the workmen who had to sit up were permitted to go home for an hour or so, and, 
during their absence, our young manufacturer had charge of fires and furnaces, 
which called for all his attention. After the men went away—say, about eleven 
o’clock at night—he used to lock the gate of the factory inside, and, for some time, 
he had the whole lonely concern to himself. On one night the work to be done 
was in a hurry; consequently, the fires, under the boilers, had to be urged ; and, 
