Silence is 【B1】 to man. He begins life with a cry and ends h in stillness. In the 【B2】 he does all he can to make a noise in the world, and there are few things of which he 【B3】 in more fear than of the 【B4】 of noise. Even his conversation is in great measure a 【B5】 attempt to 【B6】 a dreadful silence. If he is introduced to a fellow mortal, and a number of 【B7】 occur in the conversation, he regards himself as a failure and a 【B8】 person. He knows that ninety-nine percent of human conversation means no 【B9】 than the buzzing of a fly, but he longs to 【B10】 in the buzz and to prove that he is a man and not a waxwork figure. The object of conversation is not, for the most 【B11】 . to communicate ideas. It is to keep up the buzzing sound. He would be a foolish man, 【B12】 . who waited 【B13】 he had a wise thought to take part in the buzzing with his neighbors. Those who despise the weather as a conversational 【B14】 seem to be 【B15】 of the reason why human beings wish to talk. Very few human beings join in die conversation 【B16】 the hope of learning 【B17】 new. Some of diem are 【B18】 if they are 【B19】 allowed to go on making a noise into other people’’s ears. At the end of an evening during which they have said something, they just plume themselves 【B20】 their success as conversationists.