Tropic Days | Page 2

sensitive to the

processes of the universe, which, though incessantly repeated, are
blessed with recurrent freshness.
The sun rises, travels across a cloudless sky, gleams on a sailless sea,
disappears behind purple mountains gilding their outline, and the day is
done. Not a single dust-speck has soiled sky or earth; not the faintest
echo of noisy labours disturbed the silences; not an alien sight has
intruded. What can there be in such a scene to exhilarate? Must not the
inhabitants vegetate dully after the style of their own bananas? Actually
the day has been all too brief for the accomplishment of inevitable
duties and to the complete enjoyment of all too alluring relaxations.
Here is opportunity to patronise the sun, to revel in the companionship
of the sea, to confirm the usage of beaches, to admonish winds to
seemliness and secrecy, to approve good-tempered trees, to exchange
confidences with flowering plants, to claim the perfumed air, to rejoice
in the silence--
"Not learning more than the fond eye doth teach, Which pries not to th'
interior."
How oft is the confession that the fullest moments of life are achieved
when I roam the beaches with little more in the way of raiment than
sunburn and naught in hand save the leaves of some strange,
sand-loving plant? Then is it that the individual is magnified. The sun
salutes. The wind fans. The sea sighs a love melody. The caressing
sand takes print of my foot alone. All the world might be mine, for
none is present to dispute possession. The sailless sea smiles in ripples,
and strews its verge with treasures for my acceptance. The sky's purity
enriches my soul. Shall I not joy therein?
Though he may be unable to attain those moments of irresistible
intuition which came to Amiel, when a man feels himself great like the
universe and calm like a god, one may thrill with love and admiration
for Nature without resigning sense of superiority over all other of her
works or abating one jot of justifiable pride.
Even in tropical Queensland there is a sense of revivification during the
last half of August and first of September, and the soul of man responds
thereto, as do plants and birds, in lawful manner. Perhaps it is that the
alien dweller in lands of the sun, when he frisks mentally and
physically at this sprightly season, is merely obeying an imperative
characteristic bred into him during untold generations when the winter

was cruelly real and spring a joyful release from cold and distress. The
cause may be slight, but there is none to doubt the actual awakening,
for it is persuasive and irresistible.
The lemon-trees are discarding the burden of superfluous fruit with
almost immoderate haste, for the gentle flowers must have their day.
Pomeloes have put forth new growth a yard long in less than a fortnight,
and are preparing a bridal array of blooms such as will make birds and
butterflies frantic with admiration and perfume the scene for the
compass of a mile. The buff-and-yellow sprays of the mango attract
millions of humming insects, great and small. Most of the orchids are
in full flower, the coral-trees glow, the castanospermum is full of bud,
loose bunches of white fruit decorate the creeping palms, and the
sunflower-tree is blotched with gold in masses. The birds make
declaration of attachment for the season.
Great trees, amorous birds, frail insects, perceive the subtle influence of
the season, and shall not coarse-fibred man rejoice, though there be
little or nothing to which he may point as special evidence of
inspiration? He may feel the indefinable without comprehending any
material reason why. He may confess, although there is but a trifle
more sunshine than a month ago--and what influence a trifle where
there is so much--and scarcely any difference of temperature, that
Nature is insisting on obedience to one of her mighty laws--the law of
heredity. Why, therefore, refrain from justifying the allusion? Why
persist in declining the invitations of the hour? Far be it from me to do
so. Is sufferance the cognizance of this Free Isle?
All my days are Days of the Sun. All my days are holy. Duty may
suggest the propriety of contentment within four walls. Inclination and
the thrill of the season lure me to gloat over the more manifest of its
magic. Be sure that, unabashed and impenitent, shall I riot over sordid
industry during the most gracious time of year to hearken to the
eloquence and accept the teachings of unpeopled spaces.
Such is the silence of the bush that the silken rustle of the butterflies
becomes audible and the distinctive flight of birds is recognised--not
alone such exaggerated differences as the whirr of quail, the bustle of
scrub fowl, and the whistle and