“A HAPPY NEW YEAR.”

Motueka Star, Volume II, Issue 41, 3 January 1902, Page 4

“A HAPPY NEW YEAR.”

[by- MARIANNET- FARSIN'GUAm] We spend our years. We cannot save in one sense no thrift is possible. The bill for the day comes in each night, and it has to be paid whether we wish it or not, for there is-no keeping back part of the price,- At-first the wealth of our years seems-very, great, and almost as if it wouldilast for ever. We need not be economical when there is so much to spend, and we can do as well with our own, Se merrily sing the hours away, and the hours pass to days and the days to years, and it is only when we find how few are left that we really awake to the fact that we are, all too quickly spending our years. Then, indeed, because they are rare they become precious, and we begin to count them, to husband them, to make them go as far as we can, and to part from each with reluctance. If only we could keep a few of them back from the relentless collector, Time, or, if he would only return a few when our residue is so small ! But no ; we cannot have and hold our years—we spend them.

As a tale that is told. That is all, but it is a great deal, for the story is vividly interesting, and it is. instructive, too. 'lt has in it all the elements •of a true romance —comedy, tragedy, humour, solemnity, fact and fiction. In some parts there is ringing laughter, and in some there is the sound of tears. There are gains that grow in the telling, and losses that no w\>rds can describe. Love and passion fill some chapters, and make them glow with ruddy light ; and others are dull and grey and emotionless as a winter’s day. S ome are full of the singing of birds and the happy laughter of children, and some are silent with the desolation of the withered leaf and bare bough. But the story goes on, the tale is told, and if its movements and swell become slower as it advances, it does not altogether lose its interest until the word “Finis” ends it, —and not even then. As a tale that is told do we spend our years; and if the serial be a long one, we forget only apart of it as it goes. Seldom does it weary us, and even when some would write “Conclusion” over it, we write between the lines, “To be continued.”

An Iso when we wish one another “A Happy New Year, ” we wish that another chapter of the story of life may be added, and that it may prove a fair one, worth the telling.