If anyone should ask what you considered the worst thing that could happen to you, you might say blindness.

Think what it means,—to lose the sunlight, the sky and the clouds, the birds and the flowers! Never to see the faces of friends again; never to see kites fly, or dolls shut their eyes; never to be able to read, or play ball or top, or skip rope!

Words could not tell our loss, yet blindness comes suddenly sometimes.

To be sure, there is the bony eye socket like a mountain range around the eyeball to protect it; and it is true that it stands guard like a faithful sentinel by day and by night; nevertheless, every Fourth of July of every year toy pistols and cannon firecrackers blow their way past the sentinels and bring darkness to hundreds of shining eyes.

Scissors, knives, and sticks in careless hands do the same thing. A college student friend of mine even fell on a barbed-wire fence in such a way that a sharp point pierced the eyeball. Since then neither darkness nor daylight has made any difference with that eye. It is stone blind.

On the Fourth of July and every other day let our watchword be "Carefulness." Toy pistols and cannon firecrackers should never be used. Remember that a ruined eye will never grow again.

Bones are not the only guardians of the eyeball, for there are the eyelids besides the most wonderful curtains in the world.

You do not have to pull a string, or lift a latch, or give a command to make them move. On the contrary, they act as if they did their own thinking. If dust blows, the curtain drops low and the fringe of the eyelash falls in such a way that you can peep through it even while it keeps the dust out.

If any light is too bright, the curtain slides down just far enough to let in what you need; if you are sleepy, it shuts down so tight that not a ray of light can get in; while if anything comes quickly toward your open eye, the curtain falls like a flash to protect it.

Think of your eyelids for a moment. Guess, if you can, how many times they rise and fall every minute. They never grow weary; they are always diligent and they teach us that even light itself should be kept out sometimes.

I have never seen an eagle gaze at the sun without winking, although I have heard that he can do it. Not so with us, however. Tears come to our eyes and we grow dizzy when we try the experiment. These signs prove what harm a very strong light does. Japanese mothers do not know this, I suppose, for they carry their babies as if they thought they had the eyes of an eagle.

When a Japanese baby falls asleep strapped on his mother's back, the small head bobs over backward, the face is turned toward the sky, and sunshine streams down on his eyes. Doctors think this is one reason why so many people in Japan have trouble with their eyes.

Notice the first baby carriage you meet on the street. If the sun is shining, the cover should shade the baby's face, and should have a dark lining to keep out as much light as possible.

Babies should not gaze at a bright sky, at a window that is very bright, at a lighted lamp, or at the fire in the grate. Even we ourselves should not do these things for any length of time. A shade over our eyes when we read in the evening, or a shade over the lamp, will keep the light out of our eyes and throw it on our work where we need it.

Yet there is the opposite danger of too little light. Thousands of women ruin their eyes by sewing in rooms that are too dark, while thousands of both men and women injure their sight by reading in the twilight or by dim lamps. It is not safe to do these things. Eyes are too precious to be strained either by too much or too little light.

After all, however, the greatest danger to children's eyes is from microbes. Indeed, some of these microbes can do as much harm as a Fourth of July explosion.

Several years ago, in a city of Germany, there was a great epidemic of eye disease.

The first anybody knew about it was that thirteen children in one schoolroom had the trouble. Then it went from room to room and from schoolhouse to schoolhouse until four thousand children were suffering in that one city alone.

The same disease is found in other cities in different parts of the world, and it always spreads if it gets a chance.

One of these eye diseases is so terrible, and it spreads so fast, that the government of the United States is very strict in trying to keep it out of the country. For this reason there are officers that examine the eyes of every immigrant who wishes to land. If then any man, woman, or child has that particular eye trouble, the officers either send him back at once to the country he came from, or else they see that he is cured before they let him go around among other people.

It is the easiest thing in the world for children, through their ignorance of microbes, to help eye diseases along. One child may have sore eyes in the first place. They feel queer; he therefore rubs them and gets microbes on his hands. Next he takes hold of the hands of other children, or of some book or plaything that they are going to touch, and microbes are left in those places.

Later yet, the well children touch those books and playthings, get those same microbes on their hands, rub their eyes, and leave the microbes there to go to work at once. The only place where these special microbes can do harm is in the eye.

In this way disease microbes may be passed from eye to eye and from schoolhouse to schoolhouse, until there is an epidemic.

In some schools the children all wash in the same bowl and wipe their hands and faces on the same towel. This is most unfortunate, for nothing helps eye disease to spread faster. Always be careful not to use any water, or wash cloth, or towel that anyone else has used.

Teachers are more particular about such things than they used to be. They know the danger, and when they see children with red eyes, or when they notice that the edges of their eyelids look rough and sticky as if they had been fastened together by something, they either send the children to a doctor at once, or send them home lest they communicate the disease to the other children.

"Pink eye" goes in just this way from child to child. It also travels so swiftly that if the first child who has it is careless a whole room full of boys and girls may soon be afflicted by it. He who has "pink eye" should therefore be as thoughtful for others as for himself.

If the doctor says that you have any sort of eye disease, you must be as careful as possible about two things.

1. Don't rub your eyes with your hands.
2. If you have put your hands to your eyes, don't touch anything that other people may touch afterwards until after you have washed your hands.

If others have sore eyes and you want to escape, be careful about two things.

1. Never touch anything they have touched.
2. If you have touched those things, keep your hands away from your own eyes afterwards.

Albert S. Lyons

Copyrighted material; do not reprint without permission.

 

View all articles by Albert S. Lyons