The mirror., 1921-02-17

OF inc WOIlu. uCy arc always OCtteI OA
away than at home. They hate home and
love travel, they prefer solitude to the
multitude, and sick of their surroundings,
like souls, they enter other lives.
The desert is the Elysium of the OUT
law, tramp, poet ascetic, nomad, Indian,
anchorite, invalid, miner, as we'll as of
the scorpion, lizard, vulture, snake, jackal,
camel and lion.
have seen deserts that like steel mir
rors reflected the light of sky and earth
on fire. Some seemed like winding sheets
of sand for a dead world. 1t is the ma
jestic throne of Silence and Immensity-
stage with setting of mirage, where
pageants of colored clouds march on for
ever.
In the desert your shadow is your only
companion. Here you wish for nothing,
aspire to nothing and regret nothing. You
are the slave of circumstance, as the desert
is the slave of the sun. The souvenirs
one carries away from this land of Death
are whitened bones. Desert silence is bro
ken by the tinkle of the camel-bell and
screech of the vulture. Far from the mad
ding crowd, the desert encroaches on your
thought until color becomes defed.
In the desert one may be alone but not
lonely. The lover of crowds, banquets, and
balls stays but short time, unless like
Cain he is fugitive. To me, the man is
empty-minded who says that the desert is
empty. One may not have all human COM
forts, yet he may receive Divine consola-
ton. There is no room or fiat except all
outdoors; no decorated ceiling and elec-
trio lights, just Gods sky, sun, moon and
stars; no graphophone, but the music of
wind and sand; no easy chairs and beds,
but Jacobs pillow with divine dreams;
no movies and stage, but an amphithetre
of shifting scenes; no oil paintings, but
sunrise, sunset and cloud; the architecture
is rocks, the library, geology. The mental
horizon is bigger just as the physical one
is. The desert has its blessings-no alarm
clock, or bath, or shave, or newspaper, or
cook, or trolley, or Office, or business, >or
club, or golf, or banquet, or concert, or
lecture, or theatre, or sermon, or war
movie, or problem play, or visits. Man
should be thankful for an occasional
Robinson Crusoe existence. Desert change
is beneficial. 1t is well to leave mans
handmade hell of crowded, smelly, grimy
cities for open, large, clean desert.
The desert is an oven by day and an
ice-box by night. The wells one is sure
to find are the wells of perspiration. In
the desert one finds cacti, carcases and
rattlesnakes, the last being poor toy for
a child.
Artists love nude models--is this the
reason why the naked and bare desert
furnishes them with with so many paint
ings? have seen the desert sand, yellow,
as butter and on my lips it tasted bitter
as death. The dust fires your eyes, fills
your ears and makes your nose bleed.
After the sun has travelled across the
desert all day, have noticed he goes to
bed red-eyed from the dust.
Desert music is diversified, whether it
comes from the Oriental bowling dervish,
the yell of the tiger, the melody of Egypts
Memnon statues, the jingle of the camel
bell, or the wind harping on an animal
or human skeleton.
Solitude and desert are synonymous.
Landor called solitude the audience cham
ber of God. 1t is the meeting place of
living and dead. In the calm rather than
crash, we rightly measure the real value
of the things we strive for. We should
open the eyes and ears of our heart to the
sights and sounds of nature that speak of
the Creator to the soul as teacher of
books can. Silent day here echoes the
airy voices of the dead; slvery night
bathes the soul in holy quiet, in the desert