Page:The further side of silence (IA furthersideofsil00clifiala).pdf/21

 which gives the title to this volume—"The Further Side of Silence." Mr. W. H. Hudson himself in "Green Mansions" has not given us a lovelier "belle sauvage" than Pi-Noi as she first blossoms on the eyes of her future lover, Kria, from the primeval forest, while he paddles up the Tělom River one fateful day:

"A clear, bell-like call thrilled from out the first, so close at hand that the surprise of it made Kria jump and nearly drop his paddle; and then came a ripple of words, like little drops of crystal, which made even the rude Sâkai tongue a thing of music, freshness, and youth. Next the shrubs on the bank were parted by human hands, and Pi-Noi—Breeze of the Forest emerging suddenly, stepped straightway into Kria's life and into the innermost heart of him."

The story is here for the reader to enjoy and study for himself, for it is worth studying as well as enjoying for the subtle, modulated treatment of the wild soul of little Pi-Noi, for whom the creatures of the forest and the forest itself are more her comrades and intimates than any human beings, and whose necessity to play truant with them at intervals even from her lover makes so piteous a tragedy.

One other observation suggests itself—how the "civilizing" work on which Sir Hugh Clifford was engaged inevitably destroys the romance which he thus perpetuates; for alas! that romance can only live so long as the superstition and cruelty which it was the British Commissioner's business to