But when I said I should die a bachelor, I did not think I should live to be married.

Vantine was about fifty years of age, the possessor of a comfortable fortune, something of a connoisseur in art matters, a collector of old furniture, a little eccentricthough now that I have written the word, I find that I must qualify it, for his only eccentricity was that he persisted, in spite of many temptations, in remaining a bachelor.

" "Sir," said the commodore with a tone of warning, "we, who have lived bachelors so long, and are wedded to the water, ought never to speak lightly on so grave a subject.

"Old maids always know most about rearing children," he remarked; "so I suppose old bachelors, looking down on life from the top shelf, think they know most about marriage.

Under the plea that his conscience does not allow him to live with a lady whose first husband is still alive, he has taken a bachelor flat in London, and only pays afternoon calls on his wife in Brighton.

Most decided old bachelors they were, with large, leathern, hanging cheeks, sleepy grey eyes, and round shoulders.

And so he driftednot such a bachelor as Beethoven, yet quite as wifeless.

One thing is quite certain, though, Captain Lane was still a bachelor, and had resisted all the advances of beautiful women, until no one doubted that he would end his days a bachelor.

The women did not sit down, because mostly occupied in the service; but the hetairæ, Miri, Caroline, and Maraa, entertained the bachelors without criticism or competition.

I never felt a confirmed old bachelor till I heard that awful "Which way?" The roads round about in all directions are admirable; not so if you cross the river to the Falls of the Chaudière; but the abomination of abominations is the ferry-boat, and the facilities, or rather obstacles, for entering and exiting.

The chief of these laws were those made by the Romans, and consisted of fining the bachelor, and various other penalties: the most celebrated one was that of Augustus, which was entitled the "Lex julia de maritandis ordinibus" by which the bachelor was made incapable of receiving legacies, or of holding inheritances given by a will, unless they were bequeathed to him by a near relation.

Our old city firm, then, which, I am happy to say, still flourishes under the able direction of our active successors, I will calladopting the nomenclature appropriated to us by imaginative ladies and gentlemen who favor the world with fancy pen-and-ink portraits of the lawyer tribethat of Flint and Sharp; Sharp being myself, and Flint the silver-haired old bachelor we buried a few weeks since in Kensal Green Cemetery.

For this action and others the senators honored him with statues, paid for by private subscription, and by giving bachelors and spinsters the right to behold spectacles with other people and to attend banquets on his birthday.

We house together, old bachelor and maid, in a sort of double singleness; with such tolerable comfort, upon the whole, that I, for one, find in myself no sort of disposition to go out upon the mountains, with the rash king's offspring, to bewail my celibacy.

" "It is John Assheton of Bristol, my mother's brother's son, as inveterate a bachelor as is to be found in the Union" said John Effingham, smiling, in spite of the grave subject and deep emotions that had so lately been uppermost in his thoughts.

But, really, I'm ashamed of getting off all this to you hardened bachelors, as I said before" "If you tell many more such stories in this club," Minver said, severely, "you won't leave a bachelor in it.

For a girl the answer of the oracle was analogous; she would marry a bachelor, a widower, or nobody according to the plate into which she chanced to dip her finger.

One evening, shortly after the events narrated in the last chapter, the three bachelors, having finished dinner, and escaped from the grim presence of Miss Philomela Wilkeson, took their accustomed seats and pipes in the little back parlor.

If he be not all that he pretendeth, give, and under a personate father of a family, think (if thou pleasest) that thou hast relieved an indigent bachelor.

"If caught at large without muzzles, they are taken to the public pound, and, unless redeemed by the owners within twenty-four hours, are drowned in a tub" "Serve 'em right," remarked the hydrophobiac bachelor.

In elucidating the transaction Mr. Jarvis paid Benfield Lodge a visit, and honestly restored the bachelor his property.

Not unfelt 545 Were its admonishments, nor lightly heard The awful truths delivered thence by tongues Endowed with various power to search the soul; Yet ostentation, domineering, oft Poured forth harangues, how sadly out of place!550 There have I seen a comely bachelor, Fresh from a toilette of two hours, ascend His rostrum, with seraphic glance look up,

He was a bachelor, and held women in the half-gallant, half-humorous regard which sets the bachelor apart from the married man, and places him at a disadvantage which he is commonly unaware of.

" "Ah!" sighed the bachelor, "I see there's nobody in this world cares for poor Jack Hardingham, but Martha Honeydew;" and he felt sorry that his housekeeper had departed ere his lips had emitted this grateful praise.

"Did thee ever stay an old bachelor any length of time?