MR FAWCETT’S BLINDNESS.

Ashburton Guardian, Volume V, Issue 1469, 20 February 1885, Page 2

MR FAWCETT’S BLINDNESS.

It is probable that Mr Fawcett will leave a history as the ideal blind man. The expression of blindness was all over him, and in every smallest movement, contrasting at every moment with the tokens of his triumph over it. His habitual loud voice in conversation, that of one who cannot measure the distance of thoM to whom he is speaking ; his unaltered look as one approaches, until his hand is touched or he is spoken to, and the suddenness of his smile then ; his- intent eir, as of one concentrating all other means of perception to make up for the absence of sight; and, more than all, perhaps, the absence of those small conventionalities of tricks of manner which people unconsciously copy from one another.' These have more and more become the visible characteristics of Mr Fawcett .as his .cqal and intellectual mastery increased, SO that he was as unique among tbs blind iu actual powers as he was outwardly among the seeing. - He had few equals in fly-fishing, was a capital skater, and knew all the flowers and vegetables in his garden aa well as his gardener, in all their stages of growth. Not long ago he was walking with Sir Joseph Hooker in Kew Gardens, and talked about the trees.and ponds and paths with such appreciation, expressing the wish that the public may enjoy them oftener, that -Sir Joseph forgot that he was taking to a blind man, and told him that he (Fawcett) was welcome to enter the gardens at any time of the night or day. His wife had been such.eyes to him that he constantly spoke of having “ seen in the papers ” this and that. He went home from Parliament, across many streets and turnings, and if a cabman drove a yard beyond the door hi was at once checked. He failed to name the person who spoke to him, however long since their meeting.