One of them took the responsibility on herself.

She put her lips close to my ear; the horrid words struck me with a sense of physical pain: 'Your illness has left you in a sad state, sir.

You are deaf.'" VII "As soon as I was able to leave my bed, well-meaning people, in and out of the medical profession, combined to torment me with the best intentions.
"One famous aural surgeon after another came to me, and quoted his experience of cases, in which the disease that had struck me down had affected the sense of hearing in other unhappy persons: they had submitted to surgical treatment, generally with cheering results.

I submitted in my turn.

All that skill could do for me was done, and without effect.