University of Virginia Library

A BACHELOR'S CONFESSIONS.

The Collier of Croydon.

I was sitting in my room, a morning or two
since, reading, when some one tapped at the
door, and Master Simon entered. He had an
unusually fresh appearance; he had put on a
bright green riding coat, with a bunch of violets
in the button hole, and had the air of an old
bachelor trying to rejuvenate himself. He had
not, however, his usual briskness and vivacity,
but loitered about the room with somewhat of
absence of manner, humming the old song, “go
lovely rose, tell her that wastes her time and
me;” and then, leaning against the window, and
looking upon the landscape, he uttered a very audible

sigh. As I had not been accustomed to
see Master Simon in a pensive mood, I thought
there might be some vexation preying on his
mind, and I endeavoured to introduce a cheerful
strain of conversation; but he was not in the
vein to follow it up, and proposed that we should
take a walk. It was a beautiful morning, of
that soft vernal temperature that seems to thaw
all the frost out of one's blood, and to set all nature
in a ferment. The very fishes felt its influence:
the cautious trout ventured out of his dark
hole to seek his mate; the roach and the dace
rose up to the surface of the brook to bask in the
sunshine, and the amorous frog piped from among
the rushes. If ever an oyster can really fall in
love, as has been said or sung, it must be on such
a morning.

The weather certainly had its effect even upon
Master Simon; for he seemed obstinately bent
upon the pensive mood. Instead of skipping
briskly along, smacking his dog whip, whistling
quaint ditties, or telling sporting anecdotes, he
leaned on my arm, and talked about the approaching

nuptials; from whence he made several
digressions upon the character of women;
touched a little upon the tender passion; and
made sundry very excellent, though rather trite,
observations upon disappointments in love. It
was evident that he had something on his mind
which he wished to impart, but felt awkward in
approaching it. I was curious to see to what
this strain would lead, but I was determined not
to assist him. Indeed, I mischievously pretended
to turn the conversation, and talked of his
usual topics, dogs, horses, and hunting; but he
was very brief in his replies, and invariably got
back, by hook or by crook, into the sentimental
vein. At length we came to a clump of trees
that overhung a whispering brook, with a rustic
bench at their feet. The trees were grievously
scored with letters and devices, which had grown
out of all shape and size by the growth of the
bark; and it appeared that this grove had served
as a kind of register of the family loves from
time immemorial. Here Master Simon made
a pause; pulled up a tuft of flowers; threw
them one by one into the water, and at length
turning somewhat abruptly upon me, asked me
if I had ever been in love. I confess the question
startled me a little, as I am not over fond of
making confessions of my amorous follies; and,
above all, should never dream of choosing my
friend Master Simon for a confidant. He did
not wait, however, for a reply; the inquiry was
merely a prelude to a confession on his own
part, and after several circumlocutions and whimsical
preambles, he fairly disburthened himself
of a very tolerable story of his having been crossed
in love.

The reader will very probably suppose that it
related to the gay widow, who jilted him, not
long since, at Doncaster races. No such thing.
It was about a sentimental passion that he
once had for a most beautiful young lady, who
wrote poetry and played on the harp. He used
to serenade her, and indeed he described several
tender and gallant scenes, in which he evidently
was picturing himself, in his mind's eye, as some
elegant hero of romance; though unfortunately

for the tale, I only saw him as he stood before
me, a dapper little old bachelor, with a face like
an apple that has dried with the bloom on it.

What were the particulars of this tender tale,
I have already forgotten; indeed, I listened to it
with a heart like a very pebble stone; having
hard work to repress a smile, while Master Simon
was putting on the amorous swain, uttering
every now and then a sigh, and endeavouring to
look sentimental and melancholy.

All that I recollect is, that the lady, according
to his account, was certainly a little touched,
for she used to accept all the music that he
copied for her harp, and the patterns that he
drew for her dresses; and he began to flatter
himself, after a long course of delicate attentions,
that he was gradually fanning a gentle flame in
her heart, when she suddenly accepted the hand
of a rich boisterous fox-hunting Baronet, without
either music or sentiment, who carried her
by storm after a fortnight's courtship. Master
Simon could not help concluding by some observation,

about “modest merit,” and the power
of gold over the sex. As a remembrance of
his passion, he pointed out a heart carved on
the bark of one of the trees, but which in the
process of time had grown out into a large
excrescence; and he showed me a lock of her
hair, which he wore in a true lover's knot, in a
large gold brooch.

I have seldom met with an old bachelor that
had not, some time or other, his nonsensical moment,
when he would become tender and sentimental,
talk about the concerns of the heart,
and have some confession of a delicate nature
to make. Almost every man has some little
tract of romance in his life to which he looks
back with fondness, and about which he is apt
to grow garrulous occasionally. He recollects
himself, as he was at the time, young and gamesome;
and forgets that his hearers have no other
idea of the hero of the tale, but such as he may
appear at the time of telling it, peradventure a
withered, whimsical, spindle-shanked old gentlemen.

With married men, it is true, this is not
so frequently the case; their amorous romance
is apt to decline after marriage; why, I cannot
for the life of me imagine; but with a bachelor,
though it may slumber, it never dies. It is always
liable to break out again in transient flashes,
and never so much as on a spring morning in the
country; or on a winter evening, when seated in
his solitary chamber, stirring up the fire, and
talking of matrimony.

The moment that Master Simon had gone
through his confession, and, to use the common
phrase, “had made a clean breast of it,” he became
quite himself again. He had settled the
point which had been worrying his mind, and,
doubtless, considered himself established as a
man of sentiment in my opinion. Before we
had finished our morning's stroll, he was singing
as blythe as a grasshopper; whistling to his
dogs, and telling droll stories; and I recollect
that he was particularly facetious that day, at
dinner, on the subject of matrimony; and uttered

several excellent jokes, not to be found in Joe
Miller, that made the future bride blush, and
look down, but set all the old gentlemen at the
table in a roar, and absolutely brought tears into
the general's eyes.