THAT COUNTRY IDYLL

Evening Star, Issue 21636, 3 February 1934, Page 2

THAT COUNTRY IDYLL

PERFECT PEACE [Written by M.E.S., for the ‘ Evening Star.’] “ I do hope,” said her hostess brightly, that you will sleep well. It’s a curious thing, but some visitors actually complain of the quiet of the ibush. They say the stillness gets on their nerves.” “It won’t on mine,” said the townswomen briskly. “ That’s what I’m looking for.” And she had found it, she thought happily, when, having blown out her solitary candle, she lay on her narrow stretcher and luxuriated in peace. No steps on a pavement below her window; no passing cars; no wireless loud speakers; hot even a gramophone or a distant band. How wonderful and how soulsearching was the peace of the backblocks. That was her first impression; later she was inclined to correct it. Was the country so quiet after all, or did the general stillness serve only to emphasise a hundred little teasing sounds? She was tired, she admitted, and her nerves jaded with the rush of town life and the strain of the journey. Everyone said the greatest charm of the bush was its complete and perfect silence. Now was the time to enjoy it. She turned irritably on her narrow bed. But there was no ignoring that curious little sound, something like a minute saw at work upon the beams above her head. As she lay and listened wide-eyed there was a sudden rustle and a scamper, of tiny feet. With a hastily-suppressed squeal the woman switched on her torch and peered over-; head; a frenzied scrutiny reassured her ,on one point! at least they were not in the room with her. But above her head in the curious papered ceiling there was a round black hole. She watched it trembling, half expecting to see a wicked little eye glaring down at her. How horrible to think that the rats could watch her while'she slept; then she laughed at her own resentment, threw a cushion at the hole, and prepared for slumber. NIGHT SOUNDS. But a hundred little sounds seemed to take the place of the perfect silence for which she had longed. Somewhere in a paddock close at hand a horse stirred and whinnied gently, and, roused by the sound, a dog rattled its chain and barked sharply. Then a soft and mysterious call several times repeated startled her! it was some night bird calling to its mate in the bush that lay just beyond the garden. Yet it sounded surprisingly near! surely her hostess did not possess an aviary? For an hour the dog, the horse, and the bird kept up a discreet but determined trio, but it was the bird’s call that irritated the woman the most. At last tired nerves could bear it no longer, and with a shrug at her own idiocy and a groan for the peace she had dreamed of, she put on a wrapper and stole quietly along the verandah and down the path. Standing in the shadow of the hedge she watched and listened. Yes, the bird was actually sitting upon the gatepost; she could see a dim shadow lurking there. She moved cautiously nearer and then almost screamed. This horrible thing was like some phantom bird, some unearthly visitant—for it was headless. Acting on some primitive instinct, she took off her slipper and flung it blindly. In a moment the phantom came to life and produced a small round head! softly, noiselessly, dark wings opened and it swooped off into the shadow of the bush. From that dark security the melancholy and mysterious call of the ruru floated back triumphant. The woman hobbled back to bed, one bare foot biterly resenting the rough cobbles. From the kennel in the yard the dog’s startled bark clamoured angrily. How many hours had. this perfect stillness reigned ? Her watch told her that it was only midnight; after all, the night had scarcely begun: plenty of time for ireep.

COUNTRY NOISES. Bat sleep would not come. Her senses seemed extraordinarily alert, and within the thin shell of the backblocks house every sound was startlingly clear. She could hear the heavy breathing of the farmer in the next room, the weary tossing of his wife, and the incoherent murmur of a sleeping child somewhere. Then came the franctic scurrying of the rats in the ceiling. Yielding to weakness, the woman switched on her torch again—and then almost shrieked with terror. From the hole in the ceiling a long thin tail protruded dreadfully. She flung the remaining slipper wildly, and was relieved by the scurry of small retreating feet. After that, sleep was impossible. “ After all, I’m lying still and soaking myself in the perfect peace of the country,” she told herself grimly, and was startled by the sudden loud creaking of the old and ill-built house. The dogs also must be suffering from nerves, for they began presently to howl in a dismal and maddening symphony. The woman resisted the temptation to join in, and heard the farmer’s snoring stop suddenly. The next moment he was cursing softly and politely as he clambered ponderously out of bed. Then, as he leant from his window came his voice, elaborately lowered for her sake, but loud enough to wake the dead and quell the dogs. “ Lie down, Spot.” “ Get inside, Spring,” and a long and passionate description of the dogs’ weak points and those of their ancestors through countless generations, all spoken in a bloodcurdling whisper. The dogs sank to protesting quiet. Two o’clock, said the luminous dial of the visitor’s watch—and rest not even begun. THE DAWN HOURS. From a restless doze she woke with a start. She had been dreaming of childish history lessons and the saving of the Capitol. Suddenly she understood why, for beneath her window a bevy of ducks quacked explosively. It was still dark, but the farm would soon be stirring. She could hear a wakening and sleepy movement., all about her. 1 The stirred restlessly, and again the dog’s * chain rattled. There was a loud and heartrending bleat from a calf just taken from its mother; from the cow paddock outraged maternity replied sonorously, and for an hour the most maddening of all farm duets went merrily. And then the pet lamb roused itself in the shed and cried shrilly, insistently, for its morning meal; it was answered enthusiastically from the fqwlhouse, where the rooster crowed with silly triumph at the dawn of another day. For an hour there endured a perfect farm concerto in the modernist style; cow, calf, horse, dog, duck, rooster, lamb all filled their parts, as the reporters say of an amateur concert, with, immense energy and enthusiasm. In the brief interludes there came the light relief of the riro’s trill and the soft full fluting of the tui. These were the bush birds of which the townswoman had heard so much; at the moment she thought them overrated.

And at last, just as wearied nerves were becoming hardened to it all and jaded eyes were closing, there came the blare and shriek of an alarm clock, and all. the house was roused to a secret, muffled activity, most irritating of all to the listener. “No need to ask how you slept,” said the farmer’s wife briskly at V o’clock; as she looked in with the long-desired cup of tea. _ “ But how tired you look! Never mind, a few nights like, this will cure all that. Just lying still and letting yourself sink into the stillness, as the poets say.”. But the townswoman said something quite different.