THE EFFECT OF LIGHT.

Otago Witness, Issue 3395, 9 April 1919, Page 54

THE EFFECT OF LIGHT.

The attraction of lights is felt by us all. The sight of & bright interior rouses a second's envy in the heart of every passer-by. Outer darkneas is a sj'mbol of

misery which can nover be bettered. Candle-light is a lovely thing. Children are entranced by the sight of a lighted Christmas tree. A room lighted by an extravagant number of candles has an atmosphere of festivity such as cannot otherwise be produced. The points of light excite the sense of enjoyment. The aspect of the room suggests that the art of life has been brought by its inhabitants to a high pitch. It suggests French society, society in France before the Kevolution, and the thought adds just that touch of frivolity which separates us from the work-a-day world and gives us a sense of stolen pi sasure.

But if lights are festive, they are also religious. A lighted altar shining in a dim church rouses some emotion even in a Puritan breast—at any rate, if it is seen in a foreign country. Simple people regard candles as ivotive offerings. They offer a flickering light to the saints who dwell among the stars. Probably they know neither the origin nor the present significance of the practice. There is something beautiful, all the same, in this reflection of the sacred fire shining down the ages. The beauty and attraction of false lights depend upon their number rather than upon their intensity. One intense light in the middle of a room gives little pleasure The truth is that next to the lights we love the shadows. All the evening lights, the moon and the stars, partake of the nature of false lights, only they are never festive. Perhaps there is nothing in the world so beautiful as a star-, lit night; but starlight is not easy to laugh by. A starlight feast would be a solemn affair. A starlight service might be intensely impressive. The heavens (suggest heaven, and will do so to the end of time, let the men of science scoff as they may. The poets have almost worshipped the moon, but simple people have seen in her pale light something sinister, something mentally distressing, some sort of curse. Sailors believe to this day that it is dangerous to sleep on deck m moonlight, and this notion is not confined to the ignorant. Not long ago a distinguished admiral assured the present writer that nothing would induce him to sleep with the moon on his face. He had seen it produce—so he said—facial paralysis, and it was useless for doctors to tell him that the thing was impossible. The belief that lunatics are maddest when the moon 13 full is by no means gone. Mad people take strange aversions. The moon is not the only harmless* sight which rouses aversion in distraught minds, but the present writer can vouch for the case of a feeble-minded boy who is neither to have nor to hold when there is a bright moon. To a good many very sane-seeming persons moonlight is at least depressing. There is something deathly about its pallor. They wake with a sense of fear when they wake to see the room full of pale light. It is not morning, they think with a shiver, nothing so full of hiei as morning ! No I it is "the dead of nighty made visible. "I wish it could be pink, said a little girl the other day who was being adjured to admire "the lovely moon." There is something extinct about it—that even the scientific men cannot deny, we suppose. When the Great War becomes a recollection, and many of its details which now -seem conspicuous are forgotten, we believe that the evening darkness which afflicted London during the latter half of it will tend to. be exaggerated. Ihere can be no doubt that that darkness had a great effect upon the imagination, that for many, many months it was illegal, and indeed, considering the circumstances, morally wrong, to show a light at night is a fact which could not but make a terrible impression. A shadow fell across the city in those days which could not have 'been fdrseen, and may be remembered as long as the pillar of smoke. Now that that shadow lies behind us we wonder that there is not more outcry than there is for cheap light. The rations still force us to a dim economy, but it they were increased to-morrow the price of lio-ht would ensure carefulness. It is not, we- think, to the days immediately -before the war that what we may call lieht-devotees look back with most pleasure. Ever since the general introduction of electricity the practice, of keepbig houses thoroughly illuminated has gone out of fashion. People switched off the lights behind them long before the war, and kept their staircases and passages in darkness. Certainly the electricity was easily turned on, and was deliriously bright, but at the same time the sense that the whole house was_ lighted which we enjoyed in the Victorian era before the majority of people knew eyen the word "incandescent" was a great loss. When the gas was lit at tea-time, and not put out till the last person went to bed the terrors of winter were less than thev are now—at least in many oldfashioned eyes. Would it not add greatly to the amenity of life if indoors we could once more do away with darkness altogether? , , ~ , It is strange to those who love light and sunshine to see how very little the ordinary householder cares about aspect. Houses which face north, and whose best rooms all look in that dreary direction, seem to command as large rents as those opposite to them facing south. There are even people to be found who are uncertain which way the rooms they live in do face. We wonder whether the present dearth of indoor heat will make any change in this strange indifferent sunshine. We should very much like to know how far habitual depression can be traced to living in a sunless or badly lighted house. Perhaps less than one would imagine. There are—or we should say that four years ago there were—no more outwardly cheerful" class of people than domestic servants, who, in London at least, passed the greater part of their time in basement rooms which got no sun at all. Plainly, however, they were less happy than they seemed. We wonder whether this fact, which must have thrown a shadow upon service, throws any light upon the sudden determination of thousands to abandon it.

Suburban and country servants are just as disinclined to return to their domestic duties as London ones, it may be argued. That is true; but then all members of a "Union" tend to act together, and though domestic servants have technically no '•Union," the simultaneous rise of wages all over the country which has been taking place during the last few years shows that their tacit co-operation was complete. A J*reat deal has been made lately of the necessity for air. Open windows have become with some people a matter of conscience rather than taste. Many airhypocrites are to be found nowadays owing to the moral pressure brought to bear upon those who dare to like "fug." Very, very few people will now confess to sleeping even in the worst weather with shut windows. But go down a street in the West End very early on a cold morning in spring and look at the proportion of shut to opan windows! Even in Harley street men do not always practise what they preach—for doctors are but men. One sometimes ventures to wonder, if windows were larger, higher, lower, and there, were more of them, if those hideous dummy windows which mock the sun in the corner houses of London were glazed, whether light would not do as well as draughts, and whether we could not sit at ease as healthily in a warm sunbeam as in a cold current. However, there is no sense of virtue to be got out of being comfortable, so. perhaps after all a small open window is better than a large shut one.—Spectator.