EXTRAORDINARY WORK.

Temuka Leader, Issue 1972, 21 November 1889, Page 4

EXTRAORDINARY WORK.

One of the most extraordinary cases of work done by a cripple is that of John Carter, a velvet weaver, who fell from a trea, broke his neck, and yet survived, paralysed Irom his collarbone downward. He had no feeling in his body or limbs, and could even bo pinched or bruised without knowing anything about it. Per fifteen years he lived in bed, at first reading, and then painting, holding his brush in his lips. His copy was hung by tapes from the roof of his bed ; and after a time he had a desk made by a friend under his own directions, on which his drawing paper was secured by pins. > It stood besidejhis right shoulder, about six inches from his face. The pencil with which he drew the outline was placed in his mouth, and guided by his lips. The rest of the work was carried out by very fine camel's hair brushes, the cheap ones which may be bought in a country shop. After years of patient endeavour he could copy accurately, line for line, the finest engravings; and these fetched very good prices even in America, whither; many of them were taken. Considering that no line once made could be erased, and that he could not measure or space out his work, the accuracy which distinguished him was wonderfull. His masterpiece was a cosy of a "Virgin and Child," after Albert 1 Durer, in which every line is as if it were photographed, true in the direction, weight, and swell, and delicate as silk, particularly in the veil, which loses nothing in the transparency. To draw such lines on the hard metal is not easy, but to draw them with a brush held between the lips, on papers resting on a little desk in bed, is enough to make us wonder of what humanity is capable, if only directed with perseverance. Surely the moral is that those who have all their powers ought not to be discouraged by the little obstacles or even the greater ones which they are sure to meet.