Smyrna times., 1893-08-30
NOISE IN A BIG CITY.
PROGRESS FROM BARBARISM MAY BE
MEASURED BY NOISE.

The Higher the Civilization the Greater
the Desire For Less Noise-The Efforts of
City Authorities of Today Are Directed
Toward Reducing 1t.
There always comes a period in the
history of a progressive community when
desire to keep down noise begins to
show itself. In the primitive stages Of
culture-the savage, the barbarian and
the semibar rbarian-the passion for noise
Is always strong. All savages and bar
barians love to make all the row they
can. Their joy and sorrow both express
themselves in yells, walls and shouts
and the beating and blowing of loud re-
sounding instruments, more especially
the drum and the horn. The noise of
primitive savage warfare almost equals
that of the gunpowder engagements Of
modern arms, although it was, as we
might say, almost wholly manual or
vocal.
The din of barbarian funeral, too,
was and is something appalling. The
practice of hiring mourners to make
! loud lament on such occasions has come
| down almost to our own time among
the Celtic Irish. All African travellers
| describe the noise Of little merrymaking
in an African village as something which
no civilized man easily fOrgets. Those
who have passed an evening at Chinese
theater have probably never in their
widest dreams thought it possible to
produce plays with musical accompani-
ments of such awful shrillness and in
tensity.
In fact, it is hardly an exaggeration to
say that the progress Of q race in civ
ilization may be marked by steady re-
duction in the volume of sound which it
produces in connection with its deaths,
births, marriages, feasts, merrymak-
ings, its wars and peaces, trade, COM
merce and manufactures. The more cul-
ture of all kinds it acquires the less noise
it produces. There is no surer sign, in
fact, of an upward movement of the
tribal soul than the appearance of a de-
sire to get along with less uproar. When
it's leading men begin to ask themselves
whether this or that could not safely be
done with fewer yells or smaller drums,
it shows that it is becoming self conscious
and is feeling the throbs of a new life
After this comes a change in the charac-
ter of the musical instruments, a general
lowering of the tones of the voice, the
substitution at funerals of the silent tear
for the half maniacal "keen," and the
exaction Of silence in military drill.
In cities this mental and moral growth
is of course displayed in the repression
of street cries, of street music, of all
noises made for mere amusement, such
as beating Of drums, and blowing of
horns, and purposeless and persistent
shouting and yelling. These are but
rudimentary steps. and we have already
taken them in New York. The next and
most important one, the reduction of the
noise made by the ordinary and legiti
mate street traffic, we are only begin
ming. Its importance has been recog
nized in the modern world pari passJ
with the increasing interest in and cart
for public hygiene.
There is no modern city health board
and indeed no modern city doctor, wht
is not well aware of the evil effects O
incessant noise in the vast and increas
ing multitudes who in all the great cite
r now live, one might say, by their wits
but, more accurately, by their nerves
The amount Of mental operations whicl
require silence, or at all events an ap
proach to silence, for their healthfulnes
in cities like New York, London O
Paris, carried on by merchants, brokers
bankers, bookkeepers, preachers, profess
! ORG
. painters, students, judges, lawyers, ed
itors, ministers, is something enormou
and grows with all our material growth
The performance of this work in th
midst of tremendous uproar Of any kin
!, Of course greatly increases the expend
ture of vital force which accompanie
all mental exertion. Consequently th
reduction of city noise is now one Of th
most important elements in all city n
y forms.
In New York we have as yet onl
!. made beginning on it by the introduC
d ton Of the asphalt pavement, but this
being rapidly extended and must pr
duce a marked effect in sound reductio
before. long. What this pavement do,
u to lessen noise in the streets in which
exists everybody who has passed alon
y them or lived on them knows. 1t max,
conversation in cabs or carriages and |
rooms facing on the street comfortab
q and makes sleep in summer nights wit
open windows an easy possibility-fac
which are really a complete answer
all the complaints Of slipperiness.
/, Better far that an occasional hor
- should come down than that the nerv
of thousands of hardworking men al
women should be continuously set {
edge by clatter which is all the mo
wearing for being intermittent. In Lo
don the hard grinding, soul penetratiI
m noise of the New York stone paveme,
has been suppressed, or rather has be-
largely converted into q subdued, co
tinuous roar or boom by means Of WOO
. asphalt and macadam, and thoul
. horses fall much on them all humani
gains.-New York Post.