MONOTONY.

Daily Southern Cross, Volume XXIV, Issue 3358, 21 April 1868, Page 4

MONOTONY.

There was ft gentleman whom I well knew who wa« indefatigable in hii business, regular in his, habits, living in the debatable ground between town and country, eating well at breakfast, heartily at dinner, and duly taking "forty winks" after it, comfortable in bis circumstances, and sleeping soundly, at night. Yet this very man,, as soon as the heats of summer came round, began to be "fractious ;" everything in the house seemed to go wrong — every dinner time was a course of wrangling ; tbe meat was always overdone or underdone, the potatoes ill-boiled, the , puddings too sweet and the pies too sour. Instead of home-being a nest to which tbe iu mates flew with delight, it became a haunt from which to fly ; and, after a certain time of endurance, a flitting followed, and the old bird left its mate and its young ones to their own devices. When the man had fairly ) turned his back upon his business, the town, and his j home, hesoonregainedhisappetiteandhisequanimity; and a fortnight's tour brou*hthim back again as pleasant as if be bad really returned to a bed of roses. Be 1 who had beeu unintentionally fractious now recognised that his wife was bo ; and to give her the same measure as he had meted to himself, she was seDt away with the children to the seaside. But the advantage reaped by him was not the same as that which he had gained. There is an old adage, , "animam non mutant gui trans mare currunt;" or a sail in a steamboat does not make a person change lor mind. And* person who takes her family with her to a marine villa carries with her the same daily thought for dinner, the same trouble with servants, the same domestic duties as she had at home. For a wife, or any other woman who has housekeeping duties to perform, the advantages to be derived from change of air are not fully experienced until there is a rest from these. To tbe majority of men, who hare only to select their dinner beforehand on Tare occasions, the duty is felt to be a bore : how much more, then, must it be for a woman who has, in middle life at least, to look after every meal, and to inspect the meat before it is cooked. I have heard more than one lady remark that the greatest pleasure of hotel life and of a visit to one's friends is to be able to lit down to dinner without any knowledge of what is coming. This doubtless, will recall to many the I pleasant story of La Fontaine, in which a prince who was much addicted to gallantry treated a domestic who rebuked him for his inconstancy to his lovely I wife, iv the following fashion. He ascertained from I htm what dish of all others be enjoyed the most ; and finding it was partridge pie, he confined him to I the delicaoy entirely ; but when he who had before I so much relished tbe dainty had nothing else to live I on he soon tired of it, and would have been glad to I live on the most ordinary food. So it is with man ; I a perpetual round of duties has a depressing effect I upon the senses and tbe mind. It wearies us to see day by day the same faces, to see the same things, to hear tbe same voices, to smell the same odours, and to talk the same platitudes. After long experience you know exactly how the tea will taste, how the sirloin of beef is likely to be cooked, the probability that the mutton will be burned and the beefsteak too rare— you know what your wife will say, and the tone in which she will say it— you are aware that your company must be as monotonous to them as that of your family is to you. Unable to find subjects for profitable conversation there arises a propensity to find fault, and one who in high good health and good humour can revel in the boisfcerousness of childish pastimes becomes embittered by a laugh, and has his temper ruffled by the sight of infantile pleasures. The man or woman who feels thus may not seem out of health, and they may be totally unconscious of anything having occurred to blight their happiness ; yet they are out of sorts — they have beea feeding on partridge pie too long. It is quite possible for us to have too much of a good thing. The poets may talk of eternal raptures and never-ending bliss ; but the most enthusiastic of mankind would tire of embracing if every time they clasped some loved one in their j arms the links were not to be unwound for an hour, and the most charming of kisses would be irksome if the process were prolonged enough to interfere with respiration, or for each to ascertain what the other had for dinner on the previous day. Now, monotony such as we have described can best be met by change of air ; with change of air comes change of scene ; with that comes change of thought, with that again new trains of idea and expansion of mind. Whilst, on the other hand, there is a cessation*. from the feeling of oppression which stagnation induces. t There is no longer the partridge pie to affect the senses, the same platitudes to pall the spirit, the same compound of gas-ey, house-y, kitchen-ey, and town-ey odours to offe«d the nostrils. To go for a change of air is, or ought to be, an expedition in quest of information, a search for something new. From it a man should return with a fresh fund of anecdotes, a new collection of stories, a fuller repertory of experiences, and an addition to that atore of illustrations by which he makes the dull realities of life seem brighter to his children or dependents.— The Preservation of Health. By Thomas Inman, M. D.