The daily silver state. [volume] (Winnemucca, Nev.) 1903-1907, 1903-08-21
The Story
of a Life
By BOB BURDETTE

light.
And he did not know what light
was. An effort to cry. And he did
nof know that he had n soice.
He opened his eyes land there was
light He had never used his eyes be-
fore, but he could see with them.
He parted his lips sand hailed this
world with a cry for help. A tiny
craft in sight of new shores; he want
ed his latitude and longitude. He
could not tell what port he had clear
ed; he did not know where he was;
he had no reckoning, no chart, no
pilot.
He did not know the language of
the inhabitants of the planet upon
which providence had cast him. So he
saluted them in the one universal
speech of Gods creatures a cry. Ev-
erybody. every one of Gods children
understand that.
Nobody knew whence he came.
Some one said: HE came from heav-
en- They did not even know the name
OF the little life that came t~hrobbiug
out of the darkness into the light.
They had only said: IF it should be
a girl" They did not know.
And the Daby himself knew as lit
tie about it as did the feared people
gathered to welcome him. He heard
them speak. He had never used his
ears until now. but he could hear
them. "A good cry some one said.
He did not understand the words, bu.
he kept OF crying.
Possibly he had never entertained
any conception of the world into
whose citizenship he was now receiv-
ed, but evidently he did no like il.
The noises of it were harsh to his SEN
sitive nerves. There was a mans
vclce-the voice of the nurse. And one
was a mothers voice. There was none
other like it. 1t was the first music he
had heard in this world. And the
sweetest.
By and by somebody laughed soft
ly said in coaxiEg terms:
Observation-Disclosures him his
dinner"
His face was laid against the fount
OF life, warm and white and tender.
Nobody told him what to do. Nobody
taught him. He knew. Placed sudden
ly on the guest-list of this changing
Ole e-aravansary, he knew his place
az once to two places in this bed
room and the dining room.
He looked young, but made himself
at home with the easy assurance of an
old traveller, knew the best room in
the house, demanded it., and got it.
Nestled into his mothers arms as
though he had been measured for
them.
Found that gracious hollow that
God made" in his mothers shoulder
that fit his head as pillows of down
never could. Cried when they took
him away from it when he was a tiny
baby, with no language but a cry.
Cried once again, twenty-five or thirty
years afterwards when God took it
away from him. All the languages
he had learned, and all the eloquent
phrasing the colleges had taught him.
could not then voice the sorrow of
his heart SO well as the tears he tried
to check.
Poor little baby. Had to go to school
the first day he got there. He had
to begin his lessons at once. God
praised him when he learned them.
God punished him when he missed
them.
Bit his own toes and cried when
he learned there was a pain in this
world. Studied the subject forty years
before he learned in how many ways
suffering can be self-inficted.
Reached for the noon and cried be-
\ cause he couldn't get it. Reached for
the candle and cried because he could.
First lesson in mensuration. Took
him fifty or sixty years of hard read
ing to learn why God put so man
beautiful things out of our longing
reach.
By and by he learned to laugh.
That came later than some of the
other things-much later han crying.
Il is a higher accomplishment. 1t is
much harder TO learn and much hard
er to do. He lever cried unless he
wished and felt just like it. But he
learned to laugh many, many times
when he wanted to cry.
Grew so that he could laugh with
a heart so full of tears they glisten-
Ell in his eyes. Then people praised
his laughter the most-"it was his
very eyes," they said.
Laughed, IN baby day, to see the
notes race in the sunshine, Laughed
at them once again. though not quite