SILENCE.

Otago Witness, Issue 2209, 2 July 1896, Page 43

SILENCE.

"Silenoe is golden." There is not a sound in the room save the soft hissing of the wood fire, the tinkle of a falling cinder, the crack-

ling of a breaking 1 log. The firelight dances on the wall and floods the room with its eofb radiance, bringing out strange, fantastio gleams of colour from rioh bangiDga and silken cushions, flashing back cheery re-

regres at the trouble, anxiety, and fatigna which we entail on those around us." • " One would almost imagine that you regret coming back to those who love you. Is not Lo?e stronger than Death 1 " " Love and Death are not always at war, dear 1 Nay, you know I was glad to come -back, osily iv that time of complete prostration 1 must have learnt new beauties in silence." " Then you must have learnt a new charm in your husband. How often I have heard you laugh at him for his silence." " Yes ; when I was feebly struggling baok to life no words can express how restful his presence was to me— the firm, cool clasp of his hand, the tenderness of his eyes, his love, and— bis silence. " But hia was the silence of perfect love. There are so many different kinds of silence." " And all are stronger than speech." " Surely not I Fancy a silent lover I One could never bestow what was not asked. No, I cannqt realise* the power of a silent lover." v "Or a silent enemy 1 Rsalise the awful oppressiveness, the force and yet mystery of the silent enemy, who, having once declated his malignity, took shelter in silence. He would utter no word— but from time to time, in the averted look 3of a friend, in the 1 estrangement of a lover, in the titter collapse of a business venture, in the doom of failure and disgrace whiob daily draws nearer, your [ dying courage would realise the allI encompassing force' of the silent enemy. Did yoa read " The Imaginative Man," dear 1 No t It lies on the table beside you ; let me read you jnsfc a few lines, for I never met an author so fascinated by the oharm of silenoe before : " Silenoe beoame in his heart a carious religion. In the noley day he longed with an unutterable longing for the voioeless

sponaes from brase and brotze and mirrorsHere we li&ve sat, my friend and I, watching the splendours of the gorgeous sunset that fhmßd' behind the great leafles3 trees till the last gler/ paled, and all the world was grey. Then we tamed to the cheer of the firelight, aad oar desultory talk eiowly fell to silence — for silence is golden. ( . , We know each other so well that we are nob afraid of being misunderstood ; we love i each other so well that the silence is perfumed with the fragranca of calm faith and entire sympathy. Do you remember that sweet, friend of whom I told you long ago?— she who gave my cousin Jane the opinion of; an expert ou ".compliments" last year, and who last autumn give me the keynote to " Ksyfl." At that time I spoke of her sadly, thinking that I saw in her lovely eyes the far-off look of the vision that fixes itself upon the " City Beautiful." Bat that look has passed, and the lovely eyes are brilliant as ever, though in these months she has been face to face with death. All around her rebelled and grieved, wept passionate tears, and kept night watches, besieging Heaven with their prayers: she aloce was silent, patient, grieved for them, calmly expectant for herself. "It is a mistake to talk of the terrors of death," she says. " Physical agony or physical exhaustion make the thought of physical extinction a welcome one. There is euch .rest in the sitence that enwrap? one in the Valley of the Shadow. Voices no more vex one, nor laughter jar, nor tears sadden. There is no sound upon the atillaess; a far away murmur, like the waves of Time rolling against the strong shore of Eternity, ia the last earthly sound one hears. Then comes a strange sensation of floating on a soft atmosphere of unrealised love and hope •. the infinite love of the Father, the immeasurable hope of eternity. "It is a pang to come back to earth, to awaken to the hushed voices of the sick room —the whispers just too low to be distinguished, just too loud to pass unnoticed — the incessant worry of being nursed baok to the life that was so easily slipping away ; tho

night. . . . He pictured tn himaelf the world without words, full of silent men and womeu going about their business, their pleasure, with a, dignity, a calm, elevating and uplifting. . \ .All quarrels drowned, themselves in that sea cf silence, all evilspeaking was swept away. The cynic, unable to manifest his disease, gradually was cured.' of if. The fool, unable to express his folly, seemed to learn a solemn wisdom. The lovers' were happy as before. When did thsy ever want words to express the most beautiful thing in life 1 The old, learned in silence, ceased to fear the last great silence any more, aDd tha sting of death was plucked, out of it." • " Very floe dear, but; very crazy, I think. Lst us be practical; let U3 return to the silent lover. Draw him for me." 11 Toe force of the silent lover is most strongly felt, my darling, before that memorable outburst of speech whioh has made him your lover. It is then, in that suspenseful stage, that bis silent love manifests itself in a thousand sweet and tender cares, more eloquent and more convincicg than any words could be. You remember that line in j 'Enid and Gsraint': 'And compa3sed her with sweet observances ? ' Do you remember, too, how strong a part silencs plays in that idyil? Enid's silence when she hears of Geraint's love. Nor did she lift an eye, or speak a word, Rapt ia the foir and wonder of it ; So moving without answer to her rest. Then, on a later day, when speech has so played her false, there is Geraint's stern command : o I charge thee on thy duty as a wifeWhatever happens, not to speak to me, No, not a wora 1 Great writers, both of prose and poety do recognise the forcefulness of silence." " It may be that my soul is only a ' paltry little soul,' as the American girl said, but I confess it could not live upon silence. I see j no pathos in the silent lover." j " You are not thinking— is there not pathos in the love that muit be silent for duty's sake, the love that 1b silent because it is unrequited, the love— laddeat of all— that j comes too late in a life, so late that for bis

ovrn ftrith/and your honour it must live and die slu-at love?"

I had no answer to give, she always has, the best of our arguments, this sweet friend of mine. I could only pray her not to lei; her new found oraze for silence steal upon our friendship, and by changing her 'to a silent friend, rob me of many an hour of dear delight. "Nay, dear," she answered, "think of the restful hoars of silenoe whioh we two have spent. If we have cheered cne another with Bpeeob, it is but silver—- only the small ohange of life. But when we recall the silent spacea— your head upon my knee, your hand in mine— have not our aching hearts our puzzled brains our wounded sympathies, been soothed and calmed by the silenoe that is golden 2 " II To know when to be silent— is that it 1 " >

" That is the secret, sweetheart— a secret that can only be taught by entire sympathy and perfeot love." i

So we had. talked through the waning afternoon and the shadows of the gloaming until gradually, as we turned from the greyness of the gathering night .without, to the cheer of the glowing firelight within, there fell upon us the spell of that peace whioh finds its expression— a quaint paradox— in th& " silence that is golden."