Look at our silent railway and horse-cars, steamboat-cabins, hotel-tables,
in short, all our public places where people are thrown together
incidentally, and where good-will and the habit of speaking combined would
create an atmosphere of human vitality, quite unlike what we see now. But
it is not of so much consequence, after all, whether people speak in these
public places or not. If they did, one very unpleasant phase of our
national life would be greatly changed for the better. But it is in our
homes that this speechlessness tells most fearfully,--on the breakfast and
dinner and tea-tables, at which a silent father and mother sit down in
haste and gloom to feed their depressed children. This is especially true
of men and women in the rural districts. They are tired; they have more
work to do in a year than it is easy to do. Their lives are
monotonous,--too much so for the best health of either mind or body. If
they dreamed how much this monotony could be broken and cheered by the
constant habit of talking with each other, they would grasp at the
slightest chance of a conversation.
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