New-York tribune. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1866-1924, 1903-12-06

hood? For children the slumber songs are writ
ten and the Poppy Lady waits. For children the
dark has terrors and dreamland is their refuge.
1t IS the child who lies in his white bed, quite
alone, and hears. he describes it.
s.,;, ,, the gT0wp up p peoples s,piet feet
and wonders at the sound, 1t is the child who
hears the wind go "you-ou'' till terror and re-
pent@nce grip it's soul. II IS the child on whom
foil softly the shaken petals of the dreamland
tree till total slumber wraps him body and brain,
and only his mild breathing is heard in the
chamber. where his mother steals to extract
the perforated stocking from the little heap of
garments in the chair. child. at least would
SUI pose that he alone knew any delight in
trip to Nod. that the grown up peoples feet
when they cease going by in the street. bear
their owners to the bedside. and there's an end
In tumble the grown ups and sink at once into
dead slumber, else, If they lie awake, they
have no joy of it, but just keep on thinking
those silly, stupid thoughts which make them
by day so embarrassing. OF course, nothing of
the sort is true. It is high time that the grown
ups were defended, if only to preserve some
shreds Of a reputation with the youngsters; that
their delights in the trip to Nod be set forth
and made manifest
The fact of the matter is that grown up peo-
pie are grown up only in stature and a certain
degree of experience. The children Of mem
beautiful phrase that it is. deeply suggestive of
the Christian ideal!-has something more than
o religious significance, limiting that in very
literal sense the best and wisest of us are only
children STILL and the more childlike. perhaps.
in proportion to our virtue and wisdom.
The petty chickering's and jeaousies. the vain
ambitions and shallow disappointments that vex
our adult hours-what they but manifesto
tons of childishness, signs that we are all far
from the calm philosophy of true old age? The
Intellectual alertness. the eternal "How?"
and 'Whther?' of our sobered mentaltties,
what are they but the boys questionngs. the too
frequently rebuked, But why, papa?" And the
kind. inscrutabe Father of US all spreads His
answer in our hearts and in His heavens for us
to see; and we, like children often scamper
away and forget that we have asked for it!
Finally, if indeed, there can be any fnality in
this search for childish characteristics of the
grown man, what shall be said of those first
affections those shadowy recollections." except
that in so far the adult retains them he re-
tains his chidshness? And retain them every
man does who is worthy of confidence and love
In greater or less degree; first affections for
trees and rocks and natural places for stories
and fairies and wonderland people. well as
for the dear, familiar faces of home; shadGwy
recoIIections of an imaginative life that made
misty the border line between the real and the
ideal $50 that ofttimes in the memory of a man
the ffctions of his childhood the most gen.
uine facts in his Ife) as well as recollections of
the spirit land whence we came.
And it is in the silent, dark hour when the
brain is sinking to slumber that the superficial
marks which distinguish the adult from the
child are most obliterated. should be most
obliterated and the man becomes again most
nearly as a little child Indeed, unless ye be-
come as one of these ye shall not pleasantly en-
ter the Land of Nod! Never, it is true, does an
experience an emotion, come twice the same to
any mortal. The memory of the first experience,
the first emotion. the interplay of incident and
reflection that followed, shaking down into new
combinations the brain cells. come in to make
the second experience emotion a new and
different thing. In the course Of years the
Poppy Lady may well change to a more human
figure, warmed with the love of the sleepers
heart; the patter of hurrying feet beneath his
window may bear different. though hardly
sadder import to the man than to the little boy
whom Stevenson knew. But the principle Is
there to be held fast-that there shall be some
Poppy Lady, that the hurrying feet shall say
something to the imagination. that the childish
Quickness of fancy shall be alive to keep one
company on the trip to Nod With this prin-
ciple held fast going to sleep remains pleasure
till the hair that falls the pillow, golden
once or brown, is indistingushable in the dim
ness white blending into white The child is
-ho hat he