The herald and mail. [volume] (Columbia, Tenn.) 1873-188?, 1874-05-01
TIE MAN OF FORTY-FIVE.

The discovery of a gray hair wher
you are brushing ont your whiskers O.
a morning first fallen flake of the
coming SHOWS of age-is a disagreeablt
thing. So is the intimation from youl
old friend and comrade that his eldest
daughter is about to be married. So
are flying twinges of gout, shortness oi
breath on the hillside, the fact that
even the moderate use of your friends
wines at dinner upsets you. These
things are disagreeable because they
| tell You that you are no longer Young
that yOu have passed through youth,
are now in middle age, and faring on,
| ward to the shadows in which, some
| where, grave is hid.
Thirty is the age of the gods-and
the first gray hair informs you that you
are at least ten on twelve years older
than that. Apollo is never middle
aged, but you are. Olympus lies seve-
raj years behind you. You have lived
for more than half your natural term 4:
| and you know the road wkich lies be-
fore you is very different from that
which lies bel ind. You have yourself
changed. In the present man of forty
five you can barely recognize the boy
of nineteen that once was. Hope sang
on the sunny slope of life's hill as YOU
Gscended she is busily singing the old
song in the ears of new generation
but vou have passed out of the reach of
hervoice. YOu have triedvou strength: ::
you have learned precisely what Won
can do vOu have thrown the hammer
so often that you know to an inch how
far you can throw it-at least you are a
great fool if you do not. The world,
too, has been looking on and has made
mp her mind about you. She has ap-
prised and valued you as an auctioneer
apprises and values an estate or the fur
niture of house. "Onee you served
Prince Florizel and wore three pile"
but the brave days of campaigning are
over. What to YOU are canzonets and
love songs? The mighty passion is
vapid and secondhand Cupid will
never more flutter rOsilyover your head:
at most he will only futter in an unin-
spired fashion above the head of your
daughter-in-law. You have sailed round
the world, seen all its wonders, and
come home again, and must adorn vour
dwelling as best you can with the rare
things you have picked up on the way.
At life's table you have tastel of eyery
dish except the covered one, and of that
yOu Will have your share by-and-bv.
The road over which you are fated to
march is more than half accomplished,
and at every onward stage the scenery
is certain to become more somber, and
in due time the twilight will fall. To
you, on your onward Journey, there will
be little to astOnish, little to delight.
The interpreters house is behind where
Won first read the poets so is also the
house beautiful with the three damsels
where you first learned to love. As YOU
pass onward You are attended by your
henchman, Memory, who may be either
the cheerfulest or glOomiest OF COM
paniOns. You have come up out of the
sweet smelling valley-fowers vou are
now on the broken granite, scanned and
wrinkled, with dried up er-cOursea
and before you, striking you full in the
face, is the broad disk of the solitary
setting sun.
The man of forty-five or thereby is
compelled to own, if he sits down to
think about it, that existence is very
different from what it was twenty years
previously. His life is more than half
spent to begin with. He is like one
who has spent seven hundred and fifty
pounds of his original patrimony of a
thousand. Then from his life there has.
departed that " wild freshness of morn
ing" which Tom Moore sang about. In
his onward journey he is not likely to
encounter ANYTHING absolutely new.
He has already corrugated every tense
of the verb To Be. He has been in
owe twice or thrice. He has been mar
ried-only once, let us trust. In all
probability he is the father of fine
family of children he has been i'll, and
he has recovered he has experienced
triumph and failure: he has known
what it is to have money in his purse,
and what It is to want money in his
purse. Sometimes he has been a debtor,
sometimes he has been q creditor. He
has stood by the brink of half a dozen
graves, and heard the clol falling on
the cOffin-lid. All this he has expert
enced the Ouly new thing before him
is death, and even to that he has at va
rious times apprOximated. Life has
lost most of its unexpectedness, its
Zest, its novelty, and become like a
worn shoe or a thread-bare doublet
To him there is no new thing under the
sun. But then this growing old is a
gradual process; and zest, sparkle and
novelty are not essential to happiness.
L ll6 Lldl WIZ Has 1OdCLGNl lN6-dQu-
forty has learned what pleasue there
is in customariness and use and won't
in having everything around him famil-
lar, tried, confidential. Life may have
become humdrum, but his tastes have
become humdrum too. Novelty an
noys him, the intrusion of an unfamil-
lar object puts him out. A pair of new
~ embroidered slippers would be much
more ornamental than the well-worn
articles which lie warming for him be-
fore the library FIRE; but then he can
not get his feet into them so easily
He is contented with his old friends-a
new friend would break the charm of
the old familiar faces. He loves the
hedgerows and the fields and the brook
and the bridge, which he sees every
day, and he would not exchange them
for Alps and glaciers. BY the time q
man has reached forty five he lies as
comfortably in his habits as the silk
worm in its cocoon. On the whole /
take it that middle age is happier pc
riod than youth In the entire circle OF
the year there are no days so delight
fUl as those of fine October, when the
trees are bare to the mild heavens, and
ths red leaves bestreW the road. and