Popular in 1850, I found a first edition of this at a garage sale and thought to expand my tastes.
Now, this has been a simple read (thank goodness), just - despite the title, entirely irrelevant. The quaint philosophical reflections of a Bachelor in front of his fire; Chapters about the joy a wife and child might bring him, chapters then arguing against the lack of freedom, or speculating upon the heartbreak he'd experience when his wife/child die, etc. Reveries mean "daydreams", yet in this instance it would have been preferable he keep the dreams in the airy clouds rather than set them to paper.
Funny how tastes change, he actually had a good reputation. Unfortunately he's not aged well.
Perhaps charming and picaresque, but I've grown a little annoyed with the shilly-shallying dilly-dallying bachelor who can't commit and prefers to speculate on all the pleasures he will never possess for fear of losing them.
Link: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Donald_Grant_Mitchell
Works online: https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/authors/search/?query=Mitchell,+Donald+Grant
Time now to read something a little bit different.