THE HORRORS OF NOISE.

Northern Advocate, 13 August 1913, Page 4

THE HORRORS OF NOISE.

In London, Paris, New York,, and most of the big cities of the world medical experts have of late turned serious attention to the subject of noise. It is claimed that more than the rush and hustle of modern business and the keen competition of the present-day world, unnecessary noise is at the root of half the nervous disorders that afflict mankind. In the big cities of the world the din of life never ceases. Night and day goes on with what someone has aptly termed " the infernal cacophany of civilisation." Motor-buses snort and rumble, lighter cars rush recklessly in and out the . traffic with strident hoots, trains flash by on the overhead railways with roar and shriek. Under foot the trains, in the subways, pass with dulled thunder, like the ominous mutterings that prelude the outburst of a volcano. Telephone bells, heard clearly through jerry-built office walls, fill the air with clamourous jangle. Factory whistles shriek. Electric trains flash by with jangling rattle, and to it all must be added the ceaseless hum that rises from the stirring millions and the never-ending tramp of their myriad feet. All cities, too, are in a constant state of reconstruction and expansion. Steel girders for building sky-scrapers must be erected, and the sharp clack-clang of the pneumatic riveter hits the ear with maddening monotony. Night brings little relief. Modern Babylon never sleeps. A fierce commercialism has expunged " rest " from the dictionary. The men of the day shift come off, but those of the night shift take their place. Thus the hideous discord continues, scarce interrupted, through the hours of darkness. It is this multitudinous din of modern civilisation that is troubling the minds of scientists. Is there no relief? it is asked. None!

say one section of men. " However distressing, however injurious, the din that murders sleep, it must be looked upon in the light of a discordant symphony proclaiming the majestic advance of humanity." Nonsense! say those on the other side. " All this noise, so much of it unnecessary, is a symptom of barbarism rather than of advance." They

demand edicts and by-laws that shall put a stop to it. They point with concern to the alarming increase of shattered nerves, the growth of insanity, and countless other ills that beset the modern man; all of which they claim are traceable to " noise." They say that civilisation would advance more surely and sanely if it made less fuss about it. They claim that real restful sleep is being banished from the world by the ceaseless din of living—that, unless the evil is checked, the world in a few more centuries will contain only a spineless, nerveless humanity doomed to perish by its own din. The discussion is interesting to the unlearned laity, but, meanwhile, arises the question (which, by the way, will hardly concern the citizens of Whangarei) will the reformers carry the day? Will they succeed in clapping a universal muffler on the world's exhaust pipe? Or, shall the historian of, say, A.D. 2500, write the epitaph of modern civilisation— " Killed by noise."