This incapacity of the ear is the fertile source of many of those
false judgments which impress a supernatural character upon sounds that
have a fixed locality and a physical origin.--We know of a case, where a
sort of hollow musical sound, originating within three or four feet of the
ears of two persons in bed, baffled for months every attempt to ascertain
its cause. Sometimes it seemed to issue from the roof, sometimes from a
neighbouring apartment, but never from the spot from which it really came.
Its supposed localities were carefully examined, but no cause for its
production could be ascertained. Though it was always heard by both
persons together, it was never heard when A. alone was in the apartment,
and the time of its occurrence depended on the presence of B. This
connected it with his destiny, and the imagination was not slow in turning
the discovery to its own purposes. An event, however, which might never
have occurred in the life-time of either party, revealed the real cause of
the sound, the locality of which was never afterwards mistaken.
In order to understand what part this indecision of the ear performs in
the feats of the ventriloquist, let the reader suppose two men placed
before him in the open air, at the distance of one hundred feet, and
standing close together. If they speak in succession, and if he does not
know their voices, or see their lips move, he will be unable to tell which
of them it is that speaks.
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