Page:Far from the Maddening Girls.djvu/22

 was nothing in sight but bills!'' Forthwith, I determined to become a bachelor.

Now a bachelor, like all superior beings, has his responsibilities. Your mere single man may be content with a furnished room and a continual round of the restaurants; but it is incumbent upon the bachelor to make a more conspicuous success of the life to which he thus stands pledged. He must justify himself in the eyes of society. He must meet the boasted superiority of existence a deux on its own ground, and put it to rout with irrefutable demonstration. He must have a house, and equip and order this in such a fashion that the married couples for ten miles around will fall down with one accord and grovel. His peace and prosperity must be so evident and so eloquent as to cause the Green-eyed Monster to harry and lay waste that entire countryside. In short, he must preach with irresistible finality the fact that a man is happier without a wife than with one; and if