PORTRAIT-GALLERY OF OLD BACHELORS. 471 



but after a time contrived to reach a small dwelling placed within 

 the verge of the burial-ground, and awoke, by my cries and 

 knocking, a man who had charge of it. His terror was extreme, and 

 it required no little solicitation to prevail upon him to admit me : 

 this at length he did, but so confused was he, that I could derive 

 no information from him. He complied, trembling, with my request 

 for articles of clothing dressed me in a suit of his own ; and then 

 led the way to the gate, which he unlocked, and permitted me to 

 depart, without speaking a single word. 



" Faint, sick, and bewildered, I wandered on, without knowing 

 where, till I sunk down utterly exhausted ; and death, which had 

 refused to come at my bidding, now seemed hovering over me." 



X. 



PORTRAIT - GALLERY OF OLD BACHELORS. 



BY THE AUTHOR OF < OLD MAIDS/ 



No. II. THE WOMAN-HATING OLD BACHELOR. 



" Out of my sight, thou serpent ! " Milton. 



" YOUR opinion of the sex is wrong, Mr. Context, positively 

 wrong ; and I cannot imagine of what materials that man must be 

 made, who has such an antipathy to the sweetest, the best, and the 

 most attractive of created things woman." 



" I tell you, Sir, that she is no such thing; I had as lief see a 

 toad as a woman. Ah ! name not women 



* They are 



The bane of empire, and the rot of power ! 

 The cause of all our mischiefs, murders, massacres ! 

 What seas of blood they 've spilt in former ages ! 

 Woman, that dooms us all to one sure grave, 

 And faster damns than Providence can save.' 



If you Ve nothing to talk about but woman, I wish you good 

 morning, and more wit." 



" Hah ! hah ! Mr. Context, sour grapes, sour grapes remember 

 the fable ; I have had some experience of the sex, and, in opposition 

 to your misanthropical fustian, tell you, that Nature made woman to 

 temper our coarser qualities, and that we should have been little 

 better than brutes without her." 



" Do you mean to insinuate, you precious ninny, that I am a 

 beast, because I dislike the sex Eh ? " 



" Heaven preserve us from broken bones ! why, you old rheu- 

 matic reviler, there is positively no talking to you : Jay down your 

 crutch, and let us be friends I meant no such injurious comparison ; 

 you cannot deny to woman the praise of beauty, nor can you be 



