A WIND SYMPHONY 17 



for the first time in this practically earless condition, 

 to find that it had lost its sound, though still possessed 

 of its full fury. 



The noisiness of the wind when it blows in our face 

 is a defect in us. Has it not been made so or aggravated 

 owing to the ear having become fixed? Our ears, 

 which we are incapable of moving at will, are like 

 the iron guttering, the loose tiles and slates and 

 weathercock on the roof of some high exposed house 

 on a windy coast. The wind beats unceasingly on 

 the exposed roof with a succession of blasts or waves 

 which vary in length and violence, causing all the 

 loose parts to vibrate into sound. And the sounds 

 are hissing, whispering, whistling, muttering and 

 murmuring, whining, wailing, howling, shrieking — 

 all the inarticulate sounds uttered by man and beast 

 in states of intense excitement, grief, terror, rage, 

 and what not. And as they sink and swell and are 

 prolonged or shattered into convulsive sobs and 

 moans, and overlap and interwave, acute and shrill 

 and piercing, and deep and low, all together forming 

 a sort of harmony, it seems to express the whole 

 ancient dreadful tragedy of man on earth — man and 

 the noble intelligent brutes he warred and preyed 

 on — a story told in a symphony by some unearthly 

 Tchaikovsky or wandering spirit of the air, so 

 fascinating that one can lie awake long hours listen- 

 ing to it, as I have on many nights in rough winter 

 weather at the Land's End. 



But there is no fascination in the noises made by 

 the wind in our ears when it beats upon the loose 



B 



