FROM DARKNESS TO LIGHT.

Manawatu Herald, Volume XXIX, Issue 3750, 12 February 1907, Page 4

FROM DARKNESS TO LIGHT.

Sight Restored after Five Years. The Rev. James Boulton, who is in his 93rd year, and one of the Fathers of English Primitive Methodism, has just recovered his sight after five years’ blindness. The loss of sight was due to cataract, brought on, Mr Boulton believes, by attending a funeral in wind, hail and rain. A few weeks ago he submitted to an operation by Dr A. Emrys Jones, of Manchester. Only one eye, the left, was operated upon, the oculist declaring that it was useless to touch the other.

Interviewed, Mr Boulton, who is staying with his son-jn-law, the Rev. J. S. White, Norwich, gave a few impressions of what blindness and sight mean. Speaking of the former, he said : ‘‘ I was never downcast nor depressed, but I missed my books, and it was strange that while I could recall with vividness the happiness of my childhood and of my subsequent life, I could form no impression of my children. M> r memory, however, seemed to be intensified. I remembered the tuneral of George 111., and the roasting of the ox at the Accession.

“After the operation my eyes were bandaged for a fortnight, and when the bandage was slowly lifted I saw. It was like being born into a new world. As I journeyed home I wept when I saw the green fields —the first green fields for five years.” ' » Mr Boulton has received many letters of congratulation, but there was one pathetic note. It was from a blind nun, aged 70, She had been operated upon, and the operation appeared to be successful, but she again lapsed into blindness. She now wrote for advice.