Middlebury register. (Middlebury, Vt.) 1886-1937, 1892-08-05

And the diagnosis was correct. Medi-
cally he is as interesting subject as the pro
fession could ask, for he is one of the few
born with tubercles in their lungs" as
the saying is, who has completely recov
cred and enjoyed forty years of unbroken
health. The history is highly curious.
Mr. Mitchell was "a son of the famous
jurist, Stephen Mix Mitchell, and brother
of the clergyman and author, Rev. Alfred
Mitchell, and was born in Norwich, Conn.,.
April II, 1872. In spite of his physical
weakness he acquired an academic educa-
ton quite early in life and was graduated
from Yale at nineteen in the somewhat
famous class of II. He was member of
the Alpha Delta Phi and of skull and
Bones" was college editor for his class
and was selected to give the farewell class
address.
He worked three years on n farmland i'm
proved in health but little. He i0urneyed
to England and in few weeks was
warned by the physicians that he must get
out of those fogs. He started to the Isle
of Jersey on a little sailing vessel, which
was blown far out to sea by a storm still
noted on the coast. The old Norman cap
tain afterward said it was a question
whether he should let his sole passenger
die on board or brace him up long enough
to die on land. He braced him up, and
one of the first things Mr.. Mitchell noticed
after a few days rest was that his breath
ing was perfectly free.
The trouble in his lungs was gone for
ever For nearly a week he was 50 desper-
ately seasick that he could not straighten
himself and, as he humorously added, las
everything else came up so did the tuber-
cles." He took long tour on foot and re-
turned home with the health of an athlete
The results appeared in 1916 in his first
book, Fresh Gleanings: or, IA New Sheaf
from the Old Fields of Continental Europe"
He studied law and did not like it, went
abroad again in 1913 and got caught in the
grand revolutionary movement of that
year, the account of his observations 40.
pearing in his The Battle Summer" pub
lished in 1919. He then began The Lor-
gnette" in weekly numbers, but it soon APP
peared in book form.
1t was in 1850 that he published his most
popular work, "Reveries of Bacnelor,"
and this was followed the next year by
Dream Life" written in much the same
strain and almost as popular He con
tinued to write and publish for thirty
years longer, but none of his later works
appears to have attracted the general reader
as did those two.
Mr.. Mitchell has changed his style and
written many things more practical than
would seem possible for the author of
Dream Life" He has become noted as
landscape gardener and his utterances
thereon are authority. The park at East
Rock, n. H., was laid out and adorned by
his directions, and so We're many private
parks and grounds. He has lectured often
IL
of practical farmers. He was one of the
judges of industrial art at the Centennial
of 1876 and United States commissioner at
the Paris exposition of 1869. In short
there is nothing dreamy" in his business
life.
OF his home he gives this description in
one of his works: 81 have quiet farm
house in the country, a very humble place,
tenanted by worthy man of the old New
England stamp, where | sometimes 90 for
a day or two in the winter to look over the
farm accounts and to see how the stock is
thriving on the winters keep. One side
the door, as you enter from the porch, is
little parlor, scarce IL by 10 feet, with a
coy looking fireplace, a heavy oak floor,
a couple of armchairs and a brown table
with carved lions feet Out of this room
opens little cabinet, only big enough for
n broad bachelor bedstead, where | sleep
upon feathers and wake in the morning
with my eye upon saucy colored litho-
graph print of some fancy Bessie. 1t hap
pens to be the only house in the world of
which am bona fide owner"
This is the Edgewood, which leads in
the title of 80 many of his works. May 81,
1853, he married Miss Mary F. Prngle of
Charleston, and soon after sailed with her
to Venice, where he was American consul
for two years. In 1855 he bought the 200
acres near New Haven, and there he has
made the beautiful Edgewood farm,
which is still his home. The pretty uni
versty city is but two miles away, and be-
You'd lies the placid sound, on the other
side of which rise the heights of Long
Island. And in this place, says Mr..
Michel, it is to him always spring.
j. II. BEADLE. d,