The Holbrook News

BACHELOR IS EXPOSED.

TWO SPECIES, THE TROGLODYTE AND BUTTERFLY, KNOWN.

Their Unnatural Civil Condition Regarded by Woman as a Reproach to Her Claims and Reflection on Her Skill.

The bachelor is a man living in a singular and unnatural state; a social buccaneer, fawned on and followed by dowagers, feared and feted by daughters; whose type in all the ages has been considered a danger to society, a threat to civilization, a scandal to his race, a man to be chased, captured and chastened.

There are two species of bachelors—the troglodyte or hard-shell bachelor, and the butterfly or temporary bachelor. The former has his lair in a flat, his habitat in a club, and his atmosphere is smoky, alcoholic and cynical; the latter is a flutterer in drawing rooms, an habitue at four o'clock teas and assemblies, a smiling, elusive, sartorial male creature, who is netted and hobbled in due season.

There is a large and negligible genus of male creatures who are merely quasi-bachelors; men who are reluctantly single, and are captured and led away by any petticoat who happens along.

The bachelor is the pursuit and prey of woman, who regards his civil condition as a reproach to her charms and a reflection on her skill; and her aim is to snare him and lead him into captivity to the end that she may acquire a house, a home, a husband and a helot to harry, hector, humble and humanize. To survive long in freedom a bachelor must be gifted with unusual wisdom and unwonted weariness. The female of the species camps on his trail eternally wise, wily and wistful, attentive, attractive and alluring, smiling in his face, praising his talents, luring him into corners where dangers lurk and traps are sprung, and where the helpless old bachelor is hypnotized, held, hooked, haltered and harnessed, and where he speaks instead of holding his peace.

Then in the meshes of his slim, silken, soft-eyed feline captor, the bachelor is led away to the church, tied up in a knot and reduced to serfdom. Then is his glory departed. The chase done, the quarry seized, he becomes merely a payer of bills, a hooker of waists, a scalp hanging at a slender belt, pitied by those who chased and failed and stigmatized as a silly old fool as he is led around by the Diana who hunted and haltered him.

As a bachelor he was the envy of his sex, the desire of women, the welcomed of spinsters, the sought-after of mothers, the cynosure of neighboring eyes, inspirer of sighs, a lion among the ladies. As a benedict, none is so poor as to do him reverence: he is an ox in the yoke, a broken broncho, a holder of hats, a carrier of cloaks, a buttoner of gloves, a shadow in the procession, a mere married man.

Sic transit gloria bachelorum.—Life.