The Salt Lake herald. [volume] (Salt Lake City [Utah]) 1870-1909, 1905-09-04
CLondon Globe.)

The praise of sleep has ever been
favorite theme OF the poets, ranking
with the return Of spring and the flow
ers that bloom therein. and many very
beautiful and well deserved things
they have written about 1t. Every
young student of polite learning has
had his or her attention called to such
passage as Maebeth's
"Sleep, that knits up the ravelfd
sleave of care,
The death of each days life. sore
labor's bath,
Balm of hurt minds, great natures
second course,
Chief nourisher in lifes feast"
or to the famous and exquisite opening
lines of Shelleys "Ianthe.' or the lines
In THE Ancient Mariner" And surely
he were a rascally, yea, forsooth,
knave. to quote Sir John. and mon
strous ungrateful dog withal, who
would think To sneer at the poets
praises as exaggerated. Be such a
one condemned to insomnia and the
drug bottle until he mends his man
ners.
But all these abundant poetic
praises have for their object, we may
safely assume. that formal and neces-
sweetness and efficacy of which there
is no need that we should here en-
large. Put pTosaically, their theme is
the orthodox sleep which is COM
monty accomplished in bed. Here II is, 4
then, that our -plaguey but we'll mean
ing friend, the man of science, steps
up, wagging a warning finger, and bid
ding us not 10 OVerdO the thing. He is
formal and precise himself. and would
have our sleep formal and precise too.
He has a store Of wise saws on the
subject. usually on the lines of that
old Latin distich, translated by Sir
William Jones. and amended by him
TO the beWilderment of Mr.. Croker:
Six hours to sleep, to laws grave study
six:
Four spend in prayer, the rest on ma
ture fix.
Six hours to sleep! Well. well. far
be from US TO dogmatize and lay DOWN.
the law as TO the number of hours
necessary. But we have a shrewd sus-
picion that some small portion Of the
time which Sir William assigns to ma
ture would be spent, by the weaker
followers Of his plan, as George Bor-
rows publisher spent, unless we are
sadly mistaken, his Sunday afternoons.
And now, sir said that eminent and
outspoken gentlemen. permit me 10 |
inform you that I wish TO be alone. !
This is Sunday afternoon, sir; l never |
go 10 church, but l am In the habit Of !
spending part of every Sunday after |
noon alone-profitably / hope, sir-in |
musing oil the magnificence of nature |
and the moral dignity of man."
Sunday afternoon! Sunday after /
m al ell
is in the air. irresistibly insinuating, |
wooing you-something of the Spirit /
of Sleep, privileged to work its will be- /
tween the hours of lunch and tea, |
Paterfamilias slips away unostenta- |
tiously to his study with the current |
number of the first review or neWspa- |
per that comes to hand: much of it he |
Will read, Materfamilias fetires to /
mediate on the dear reetor's sermon |
and Nine. Mantalinfs account for the |
dear girls new frOcks: peaceful be !
thy meditatiOns, dear lady. One by one |
the rest of the household steal silently /
away to muse on the moral dignity of /
man. Seductive drowsiness turks in |
every sympathetic chair. and against /
its wiles the lightest of light literature /
is Vainly pitted. Here in the drawing |
room two fair daughters of the house |
are breathing audibly with closed eyes. 1
and on the floor by the side of each /
lies a work from Mr.. Nudes Let us /
go hence on tiDtoe; how beautiful is /
sleep Here in the smoking room. deep /
in one big chair with his legs on an /
other. the gallant son of the house is
extended, trumpeting; how very bois-
ferrous is sleep. You will not be of the .
company of informal sleeDers? Why.
then. arise and take hat and staff, and 4
go a-walking instant; look not behind /
thee. Out OF doors and on the move
you will be free from the entertainments
of Dan Morpheus: in the house you will |
be powerless TO resist them. But why.
after all, resist? His godship is a right
pleasant fellow in his informal vista
lions. Stay and be subtly tempted.
Here you have the chair Of chairs for
Sunday meditations; and here is a
pretty volume of minor poetry, wherein /
the LotOs blooms abundantly.
Well. of course no one can sleep in
formally on a Sunday afternoon. for,
whatever be the season, the day un-
doubtedly invites il. Most persons,
too, of twenty years old and upward, !
can easily acquire the habit of the
gentle siesta on week day afternoons. /
But surely they are the elect who can
deal with Dan Morpheus as though
he were a slave of the lamp. so to
twenty minutes and then depart, doing
this, too at any hour of the day and in
any place. Was it not the
great Duke of wellington who once
asked how long it would be before the
French could appear, and on hearing
that he has half an hour or so to spare,
rolled himself up in his cloak and then
and there took his forty Winks? The
Fat Boy in ''Pickwick" was the great
est artist in this respect of whom we
have any record, at least in that fic-
ton which is less strange than truth.
But i'm real life there are highly gifted |
Informally 10 their aid. By this means
you may see and hear them beguiling
the tedium Of a journey or "a musical |
Not seldom. too, does some /
great mind call i'm the help of informal !
sleep to deliver him from the tongue or
the babbler and the WearisOme reitera-
ton of dull arguments. So ii is that /
great statesmen have been known to
drop off to sleep on the benches of both !
houses of parliament, and great |.
judges close eyes upon their bench and
county magnates at political meetings
nod sapiently while the local member |
IS eXpOunding high policy 20 the yokels.
So it is. too. that sometimes when our I
good curate's sermon is Just the least
bit --. But no; that is not sleep: il /
is surely no more than meditation: for
see, the rector's wife herself, a good
lady who is absolutely above suspi-
eion, has fallen into the same attitude.
Few things are more horrible and de-
icious al the same time than TO be at
tackled by sleep at a time and in a
place when and where you have no
business whatever. on any grounds. to
give way 10. it. When you are sitting
with your wife, for instance. on the
in the early days of your
honeymoon, you are not wholly i'm
nune from an attack. and if you sue
cumb you are liable to be most woe