Essex County herald. [volume] (Guildhall, Vt.) 1873-1964, 1875-10-16
FIVE AND A HALF--.PATCHED.

1 am bachelor, an old bachelor; at
least that's what my nieces-pretty,
saucy, clever, lovable girls-call me-
and no doubt they're right, though ]
can't go so far as to agree with them
when they declare man owning to five.
and-forty years and dozen white hairs
decidedly venerable" and fearfully
gray"
However, an old bachelor I am dub
bed, and I must confess, if to acquire
that distinction one is obliged to be
made much of by lovely women and
charming maidens, as am, have no
serious objection to the title.
In the first place, my home is home
in every sense of the word, although
without mother, or even a mother-in-
law.
occupy, and have occupied for the
past year, a suite of remarkably pleasant
rooms, the front windows looking on a
city park, and the back on a garden
made delightful by two fine old peach
trees, heavy grapevine, and sweet
smelling wistaria The latter has climbed
to my windows, and twining in and out
of the Stats of the shutters, effectually
prevents my closing them, but gives me
in recompense great fragrant punches Of
purple flowers.
These cheerful rooms are part and
parcel of Mrs. Midget's boarding house.
No, I am wrong. Mrs. Midget-Mr.
Midget was lost at sea five years ago
does not keep a boarding house, but
takes few select boarders, of whom she
is pleased to intimate she considers me
the selectest.
Wonderfully comfortable the few
select find it in Mrs. Midget's shady,
old-fashioned, neatly kept, three-story
brick house.
Everything like wax" my eldest
sister says when she comes to visit me,
which is about once in four weeks-a
day or two after my magazines have
arrived.
And the landlady," I invariably re.
ply, "isn't she awful cunning $50 de.
mMe in her ways and speech for such @
wee thing, and so pretty, with hel
bright blue eyes and yellow hair l''
But Maria, can't divine why, pre-
tends not to hear me, or else repeats,
with scornful emphasis: "Awful cum
ming
The fact is, I'm SO much among my
kinswomen that I often find myself,
when wish to be particularly emphat
ic, borrowing their queer adiectives and
peculiar forms of expression.
"Indeed, uncle" said Charley to me
the other day-named for me, Charlotte
(Charles, as near as they could get at it,
--"you're beginning to talk like girl
and at your time of life too l'' And ]
didn't feel at all insulted for if all girls
talk as well as my nieces, consider
Charleys remark rather a compliment
than otherwise.
Mrs. Midget knows how to furnish 6
table, too: all sorts of little delicacies
and unexpected tidbits, stews and hashes
above reproach, bread and pies marvel'
of culinary skill, and tea and coffee
well, really coffee and tea.
AS for Mrs. Midget herself, she's sucl
tot of woman that 1 feel like laugh
ing outright every time I look at her
perched on pile of music-books placed
on chair-the chair itself taller thar
any of the "few selects at the heat
of the dining table. Indeed, only thC
other day, when she asked, in a solemn
manner, fixing her blue eyes on my
face, and lifting large soup ladle in he
mite of hand, if I would have som'
soup, I did burst out laughing, sh'
looked SO very like little girl playing
dinner with her mothers dinner set.
The miniature woman laid down tn
ladle and gazed at me in surprise.
I" Mrs. Midget, I beg your pardon,
said I 81 suddenly thought of a NAL
saw at the circus"
"Ohl" said Mrs. Midget, and return
ed to the soup.
I'm romantic old fellow-there, yol
f-I1