The Birmingham age-herald., 1911-05-07

Wherever the English tongue is read or spoken "Tbe Reyeries of a Bachelor have a place asad a standing. It estab- lished Mitchell's reputation in a high place and justly so. MT. Mitchell livei to a green old age and wrote much. But it is "The Reveries of a Bachelor" by which he was known. and it is by this work that his fame will be perpetuated. One of the greatest charms about the work-and there are many charms. is that 1t is, as he says in the preface to the first edition, nothing more nor less than what It pretends to be, col lection of those floating reveries which from time to time drifted" across his brain. And" says Mitchell, q never met with a bachelor who had not his share of such floating visions. The only difference between us is that I have tossed them from me in the shape of a book" But to bachelors and ben edicts alike the ''Reveries' will always appeal--to the bachelor because in them he can find set forth in print what ha himself has many times imagined. To the married man because he can find there a picture of what he has fulfilled in fact and not in fancy. The Eng fish of the Reveries is easy and poetic the play of imagination is forceful and graceful at once. The general tone Of tI-e work is not morbid-but it is very sad.
 Y HAVE a quiet farm house in the
 country, very humble place to be sure, where sometimes go for a day or two In the winter to look over the farm accounts and see that the stock is thriving. It is tenanted by -orthy enough man of the old New England stamp, and in the little par Tor, which Is at one side as you enter the door, I sit and muse over the wood fire of nights, my tenant and his wife multiplying contrivances to put two babies to sleep. This happens to be the only house in the world in which I am bona fide owner, and I take a vast deal of comfort in treating it Just as I please I manage to break some ar ticle of furniture almost every time I visit it and if I cannot open the window reaoily of morning I break out pane of glass with my boot
 l leon against tLe walls in a very old armchair and scarcely fail to worry such hole in the clustering as would set me wn for a round charge for damages in town or make prim house. wife fret herself into raging fever laugh aloud when I think that I am afraid of neither one nor the other. As to the fire, I keep the hearth so hot as to warm half the cellar below and the who$e place between the jambs roars for hours together with white flames which I supply from huge pile of oak and hickory placed beside the hearth. And there I sit and muse (for l am a bacheloD over past days and what might have been.
 "A wife?" I think-"yes, a wife, and vhy?" And pray, my dear sir, and why not-Dhy? Why not doubt, why not hesi- tate and why not trembe? Does a man buy a ticket in a lottery-a poor man whose whole earnings go into the securing of the ticket-without tremblings, hesi- tating and doubting? Shall man who has been free to chase his fancies over all the world without let or hindrance shut himself up to marriageship within four walls called home that are to claim hom, his time, his trouble and his tears thenceforth forever more without doubts coming thick and fast as smoke? And yet I remember as I sit over my fire remember with deep longing to bring back the past-to live it all over again, perhaps to change it. think of those old loves whise wings are furled in the abyss of things that can never be re- called except in thought and melancholy fancy. Sad it is but sweet to look into the fire and bring back from the gulf those old dreams, those old fancies. There was my earliest love, my little cousin Bella. We grew up together and once, when she fell into the water and nearly drowned, I remember that as she sat on her mothers knee afterward I ran to her and, throwing my arms around her, cried out: "Oh, I do love you Bellap Then there were my school days and my col lege days-and through them all Bella
 Then I see myself upon the ocean bound for my youthful travels in foreign lands end full Of the inspiration and the TO- nance of it all On board the ship there was girl to whom was much attracted Within the floating world of ship sym pathies are narrowed down-they cannot range, as on land, over thousand ob- [ Jects. Hopes and fears seem to knit them- selves pleasantly together upon the ocean. Each day seems to revive them; your [ morning salutation is like a welcome after an absence upon the shore each 'good night" has the depth and full ness of land farewell" And beauty grows upon the ocean.
 I cannot say. certainly, that the face of the fair girl voyager was prettier than the face of Isabell-oh, no-but am cer tain that cast innocent, honest glances upon her as I steaded her walk upon deck far oftener than at first She would finger of an eyening-pleading with her mother first and standing beside me-her whole hand not so very far from my hand upon the rail, looking down to where the black ship flung off whole garlands of emeralds. or she would look up (thinking. perhaps, that was looking the same way) into the skies In search of some stars which were her neighbors at home. And lots of old tales would come up as If they rode upon the ocean quietude; and fragments of half-forgotten poems tremulously uttered, either by reason of