The Barre daily times. (Barre, Vt.) 1897-1959, 1917-12-31
Age without Old Age.

In a New England town two ladies
says that both deaths were due to old
age But one of the ladies had reached
; the age of l04, and the other only that
/ of seventy four. Thus, though 'old age
is said TO have carried them both off
there was in the difference OF years be.
tween them space enough TO include the
entire span of the existence of a Keats
or Shelley The incident proves the
extreme variability OF that diseaseor
that fruition aud privilege, according as
we view (which we call old age, If
age is, as Browning, Walt Whitman and
certain other poets would have us re-
gard il, sort of feast of reflection and
harvested experience which rewards us
for all our struggles and pTivations-th he
last and best of life, for which the first
was made"-it is undoubtedly movable
feast Moyable-but not TO be moved by
all
Most of Us have known old men, and
even old women, who never could have
! died of old age, because they never had
any. They succeeded in moving age
along ahead of them, keeping il always
lat bay with the genial lastingness of
their youth, and dying young at last.
though full OF years. In that sense old
age is indeed a disease, but a durable
one. With regard to it, the theory of
the psychic cure is right; you resolve
not to have old age. and YOU do not
have il. And that does not mean that
you will not be old The wears are
bound to be notched on the stick wheth |
er they show or not. Nor do the con
qucrers of the years themselves have
any occasion TO deny them We had
among us, here in Boston. in the per
son of Colonel Thomas Wentworth Hg I
glnson, man who, when more than so
years had rolled over his head was
still young IN spirit and N speech, in the
quick and keen response Of his eye and
his tongue, youth always; yet lie eouG
not deny his four score Years, and was
rather fond Of recalling the DAYS OF the
past. He was demonstrably old but |
without age. Another and Il more re.
markable case OF the same sort was that
of John Bigelow OF New York, who al
~ attended metropolitan receptions
alone, in faultless dress and moved about
among the youngsters, giving them tit
FOR Ia, and proving that his wits were
rs nlmble as theirs, while spinning his
yarns Of remote past. More amazing
still was the case of Michael Chevreul |
one of the most distinguished of French |
who at the age Of one hundred 4
years had NOT vet felt the touch. of "old L
ige, and who died at one hundred and +
wo in the freshness OF his powers pre-
erably the associate OF young men to
he last, and the joyous seourge of every I
ort Of charlatansim, yet in 1858 jealous
# his fame of 1913.
Such cases prove that though years
an not be escaped nor forever dssim-
llated, old age may nevertheless be !
verted ii we will but make up our mind 3
ot 10 have IT, 1t would be interesting.
n passing, TO compare the lives and the
Ways Of the two old ladies who died in 3
he village to which we have referred. y
The who persisted Of old age at seventy x
our must have induced her own maladv. =
We can see her repnlng. and in her fem 2
line way cursing her old age, even as a
lark Twain cursed his at seventy to =
lie at seventy five, No doubt she had 2
OF the grace which enabled Higginson. q
r a Bigelow or a Chevreul, to proroeue =
Id age from year TO year. from decade Y
} decade II was stronger than her spir q
and at seyentyfour she died of it. =
ut we will venture the presumption Y
nat the other old lady. she Of the l0i Z
ears. did not die of old age at all. The .
agnosis was false. She had kept the Z
sease off so long that she must have q
ltgrown It. 1t was something else. un- =
pretended by her physician that car. y
ed her off at last Boston Transcript a.