Patience With Our Next of Kin.

Bush Advocate, Volume XI, Issue 832, 16 September 1893, Page 5

Patience With Our Next of Kin.

If I had known in tbe morning How wearily all the day The words unkind Would trouble my mind I said when you went away, I had been more careful, darliDg, Nor given you needleßs pain. But we vex our own With look aud tone We might nevor take back again ! The homely rhyme sings itself into our memories, burns itself into our tiouls, just because it is so self-evident, so pitifully, everlastingly true. We do vex "our own" in times and ways without number by looks, by tones, by sharp-edged satire, by impatience, by "blunt, almost brutal, candoar, by misunderstanding, by muoh ado about nothing. Our own are always -with us, like tho poor. They are too loyal to make n sign of their suffering to the outside world. They disdain to uncover a single wound, nor do tbey let ub ever observe a scar if they can help it. Blood is thicker than water, and people of one blood, though they may have strifes among themselves, are coreful to prtiserve a decent semblance of peace to dwellers beyond the clan. If we " vex our own," " our own" are also quick to vex us. " 1 could be very good, very amiable," a girl bemoaned herself one day, "if only peoplo were not so | tormenting." Many a one says this to her | own heart in moments of confidence and of ; bitter repentance. We are prone to have I great toleration for ourselves, to be tender I when judging our remissness while we are severe on tho misdoing of others. Yet, to be fair, we must acknowledge that in the family we are of tener rubbed the wrong way than in society. Those whom we meet in reciprocal relations every day are apt to try us, as those do not whom wo encounter only occasionally and in a ceremonious fashion. It mn<ht he well for us to wear as a precaution againr,t hum the ohain-armor, invisible but strong as twisted steel, of a fine, invincible politeness. Think before you i speak is a bit of wisdom most of us wero taught in the nursery. " Five -and-twenty, Tattyooram," said the benignant old philosopher to tho snappy little hody, whose whole nature grew restive as she fretted against wholesome restraint. _ How sho hated the sound of the placid voice, and derided tho sensible Belf-control it inculcated. But it waß good advice, the very best. Half the misohief in the home world growß out of hasty and impulsive speech. Yet, on the other hand, thero is a terrible weapon of silence, which, wielded by our next of kin, is a very Damascus blado. Who does not dread the injured look on a dear one's face, the lips set like a mask, the eyes apart in interest and far away, the dignity veiling with Hb impenetrable fog all appearance of affeotion, the kiss yielded or received like a blackbird's peck or a frozen de wdrop ? Better a thousand times the swiftest rainpatter of anger, the sudden gust of fury, than this dull demonstration of chilling resentment. If ifc were given to us, as it never is, to look down tho futuro and see the coming day of separation, in mere self-defence againßt futuro agony we would probably be more patient than wa are with our next of kin. For we do lovo them more dearly than all the rest of the world. They are life of our life, soul of our soul, and whon they are reft away ouly eternity can cure the heartache. — " Harper's Bazaar.' 1