FAREWELL!

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXIII, Issue 19382, 17 July 1926, Page 1 (Supplement)

FAREWELL!

STEAMERS AND STREAMERS.

BY MONA GORDON.

A word that never loses its pathos, a word that in every language and every age holds the same measure of human suffering—" farewell " may be said to have its being deepest in the shadow of the wings of death. It foreshadows in all lesser and trivial partings, in all longer journeys on the great deep—which is still the great deep, however man may have mastered it—in all goings to and fro by rail, road and air—it foreshadows in all of these the last great farewell which is death. For death is an eventuality which may be lurking round the next bend of the road, always the great uncertainty.

And into the word itself and its many variations of form and language has crept that undying element of hope which has ever been a torchlight to the human race. In " Good-bye." and " God be with>you," which was originally its meaning, however lightly we may use itj» there is always an implied significance that one who is going out of sight may have divine protection, lacking the human oversight of those who care. "Au revoir," say the French—" till we meet again " they will not have it that there is anv permanent separation; or " Adieu," again with religious meaning. However we look at it, there is an element of fear and a corresponding one of hope about all human partings; and because the last and greatest is beyond mortal control, divinity has become associated with the word even in its lesser meanings. It is not among us " the „ thing " to show much emotion over partings or anything else painful, and the more painful it is the more we hide it beneath a cloak of nonchalance. In some it takes the form of reserve; in others, "devil may care;" but in the mass we may say that it takes the form of a paper streamer! Paper streamers are to some absurd, the very epitome of the age of jazz, colour and other nonsense. To me they are pathetic. Lovers Parting. Go down to the wharves at the departure of any of our ocean-going steamers—the Royal Mail steamer for preference—go as an onlooker, and let there be no single one of all her passengers in whom you have any interest. If you are seeing anyone off you will not be able to watch other, people, nor to pick up half the impressions which are to be gathered from coloured streamers. Your mind must be a blank as far as personal emotion is concerned. Then, simply watch.

You see a girl, a pretty girl, leaning out over tho rail. She has at least thirty streamers in her right hand, masses of violets in her left, and a box of chocolates tucked away under her arm. Follow down the streamers with your eye and you will find numerous admirers on the other end of 1 them—not of course. She smiles at them, kisses her hand to all; a flirt, surely, or perhaps just "a jolly good fellow." Let your eye run along the row of faces. It rests upon that of a bashful young man. He has three streamers sliding through his fingers and looks as if he hardly knew how to hold them. Follow down each streamer with your eye. There is an orange one—on the end of that you will find his maiden aunt; there is a blue one—on that you will find his equally bashful sweetheart; there is a green one—attached to that is the mother of his sweetheart. Miss Orangestreamer is locking through a pair of lorgnettes at the passengers on the upper deck—her nephew inhabits the lower; Mrs. Green-streamer is a poor little thing with a hook nose and an expression of agitation; Miss Blue-streamer is shingled, but—she has two big tears welling out of her eyes and one half-way down the cheek. Let us look away—we must be discreet even .if we are spectators. There are times to look and times to look elsewhere. The Family Farewell. We look elsewhere. Mr. and Mrs. Well-to-do are taking a nine-months' holiday to America. Their family are spread out on the wharf below as much as they have any room to spread. Mrs. Well-to-do's hands are full of streamers which her children' have flung up to her, but papa Well-to-do has no streamers—men, that is, real men, not bashful young men —are not partial to such things; they are a feminine or childish weakness. He smiles happily, surveying his children from a height—never saw them from a height befoie, their house being one storey. Five children, all nearly grown up now, boys at school doing well—Mr. Well-to-do metaphorically pats himself on the back when he looks at them thus, and their mother, how young she looks, and how those children love her —see, her hands are full of streamers. The Final Eustle. But there are some to whom streamers will not suffice even though they serve as pulleys whereon tiny notes with parting words of love are hauled from wharf to deck. You may watch with interest two people who are saying good-bye after this manner. He, by dint of leaning dowh from the lower deck and putting a hand through the lower railing, and she, by dint of standing on the raised edge of the wharf and stretching upward, can just clasp hands. And she is still standing there, her eyes yearning upward, unconscious of time and signals of departure, when tho boat makes her first movement, causing a chasm of dark water to yawn where late was the firm, green side of the Royal Mail; steamer. She recovers her balance, but then comes the first realisation of the gulf of separation. Oh, for a streamer to hold them yet a little longer—and she has not one! Streamers, streamers, many thousand coloured streamers, and the ship moving off slowly, slowly. The wharf gives a shudder, cranes swing back into place, ropes creak, and, listen—an undertone, a soft, lingering rustle. It is the rustle of all those coloured streamers breaking —an end on shore, an r .nd aboard, many floating, drowned. Farewell!- The whistles scream " Farewell." She is out into the stream now; the crowd hurries off into the street; and left behind are the rags and tatters of trodden, soiled and trampled streamers. Are they pathetic? Certainly not, so much waste paper for the wharf cleaners to sweep up. Coloured streamers, and their broken,' trampled ends, and the ship gone with their other ends floating from her decks or drifting out astern, and all their work is done, their meaning fled—Farewell.