TNE DREAMERS.

Timaru Herald, Volume XIIC, Issue 13979, 14 August 1909, Page 3

TNE DREAMERS.

AND THE LAND OF HEART'S DESIRE. (By Philip Gibbs, in -London " i>aih Chronicle.'; A dream is being dreamt by many hundreds of thousands of people in London and other great cities of oui land. This dream has'conic during recent days to men and women wlic during many months of the year t!c not dream at all, having to keep wid< awake, with keen eyes, facing tin plain facts of life. And it comes te them not iu the night, but in the day, when the sun is shining; when, on tin top of an omnibus, perhaps, tiicy draw in the- breath of a soft breeze; or when standing in a little suburban garden they smell the fragrance of a rose or two, and of the moist mould.

It comes to clerks in city offices. The scratching of their pens in big ledgers ceases for a minute. Their right arms with ,shin.y sleeves and frayed or paper-covered cuffs rest for a little while on the desks; and lifting up their heads they look at the sun's rays glinting through the windows on to the bald heads of chief clerks wh<, sit nearest to the light; and they fal. a dreaming. The dream comes to men seated at luncheon in stuffy city restaurants, where the waiters are calling " roast-beef-and boiled " down the speaking tubes, where there is a sinel 1 of meat and fish and iainroll blended into ail aroma which on a warm day is stifling .and sickening.

The. dream comes every day now to young married couples, sitting before the boiled eggs oil the breakfast table; to husbands and wives who have dreamed the dream many years running; to young people who go through all the day with the joyous vision before their eyes. To all of them there is a voice call-

ing: "Come away! Gome away! Come in a little while to where the green fields and the soft woods creep clown to the sea, where the little waves are dancing. Cdme to where the golden sand lies, inviting to love-in-idleness." "Come, pale-faced drudge of the City desk, to where the wind blows into the lungs of men giving them lite, and into the eyes of men whisking away the cobwebs of doubt and gloom. Come to the little village nestling in the fold of the Downs, where the larks rise -singing out <>t tbe heather, where 'the sheep-bells tinkle with sweet music as the Hocks seek rich pasture, where thero is ,a wide horizon for eyes weary with the narrow streets, and the el-bow-room of nature in which the cramped soul may stretch itself." "Coine, friend, to the East Coast or the West, to the white parade glinting in the sun. where pretty girls ]>ecp beneath their parasols, where merry minstrels sing the haunting melodies which' lieoole without music m then souls curse profanely: where mixed bathing is allowed by enlightened municipalities; where the long pier stretches out to tlio escaping sea: where the German band, and the blind man "with bis concertina, and the ladies ill the black velvet masks, mingle their rival harmonies in oue great anthem of glorious sound."'

Thus to each man and woman comes the message and the dream. Delightful as the vision is ifc has its inconveniences and leads, sometimes, alas, to lamentable tragedies. It is ex-

tretncly awkward when husband .Mid .wife dream differently; when eight yoiing -people in a family have eight 'separate; dreams, each one protesting that according to right and justice and eoniinonsen.se, his or hers must be fulfilled. Worst of all is it, an often happens, that when a dream has weaved its spell upon the imagination of a man, when like the heart that panteth after the waterbrooks lie desires to come close to the land 'of heart's desire, lie finds, after a little conversation over the counter of Cook's, .or after a brief examination of his stocking, that ho has been fooled by idle thoughts, and that instead of tlie llappy Isle of his vision he cannot get nearer to its coral shores than •Southend on-Sea! Most, blessed are they. I think, who have such a gift of dreams that every day "brings to them a different one. MWBMUJUK—MTTWWiHIMUI—IMI