The Cass County Republican. [volume] (Dowagiac, Mich.) 18??-1880, 1859-09-15

nounoed Mormonism and left for Gala
fornis, where he experienced no difficult
ty; "for''said my informant Ia woman)
che introduced his two younger wives
(girls of 10 and l4 as his daughters,
and married them both off in the course
Of six weeks"
l am assured by Gentiles that there
is large business done here in amman
rying as well as marrying; some of
them assure me that the Church exacts
fee of $40 on the marriage of each
wife after the first, but charges still
heavier fee for divorcing. / do not
know that this is true, and l suspect
my informants were no wiser in the
premises than / am. But it certainly
looks to me as though a.rioh dignitary
in the Church has q freer and fuller
range for the selection of his sixth or
eighth wife than poor young man of
ordinary standing has for choosing
his first And / infer that the more
sharp-sighted young men will not al
ways be content with this.
THE MoRMoN WOMEN.
Since the foregoing was written, /
have enjoyed opportunities for visiting
Mormons, and studying Mormonism,
in the homes of its votaries, and of dis
GUESSING with them what the outside
world regards as its Distinguishing fea-
ture, In the freedom of friendly social
intercourse. In one instance, vete-
ron apostle of the faith, having first
introduced to me a worthy matron, of
ffty-five or sixty-the wife of his youth
and the mother of his grown-up sons
LAS Mrs. T., soon after introduced a
young and winning lady of perhaps
twenty-five summers, in these words,
ssHere is another Mrs. T." This lady
is q recent emigrant from our State, of
more than average powers of mind
and graoes of person, who came here
with her brother, as convert, a little
over a year ago, and has been the sixth
wife of Mr.. T. since few weeks after
her arrival. (The intermediate four
wives of Elder T. live on farm or
farms some miles distant. The man.
mer of the husband was perfectly un-
constrained and off hand throughout /;
but could not well be mistaken in my
Z conviction that both ladies failed to
conceal dissatisfaction with their posi-
ton in the eyes of their visitor, and OF
the world. They seemed to feel that
it needed vindication. Their manner
towards each other was cordial and
sisterly-sicerely so, / doubt not-but
this is by no means the rule. A Gen.
tile friend, whose duties require him to
travel widely over the Territory in
forms me thathe Unexpectedly stopped
with q Bishop some hundred miles
south of this, whose two wives he has
never known to address each other or
eyince the slightest cordiality during
the hours he has spent in their society.
The Bishops house consists of two
rooms; and when my informant staid
there with a Gentle friend, the Bishop
being absent, one wife slept in the
same apartment with them rather than
in that occupied by her double. Ipre-
sumo that an extreme case, but the
spirit which impels it is not unusual
Il met this evening large party Of
{ young people, consisting in nearly equal
numbers of husbands and wives; but
no husband was attended by more than
one wife, and no gentleman admitted
or implied, in our repeated and ANNA
tied discussions of Polygamy, that he
!. had moro than one wife. And / was
: again struck by circumstance that
here, IS heretofore, no woman indica.
ted, by word or look, her approval Of
any argument in favor of Polygamy.
That many women acquiesce in it an
ordinanceof God and have been drilled
into a mechanical assent to the logic
by which it is upheld, believe; but
there is not woman in Utah who does
: not in her heart wish that God had not
ordained it, / am confident. And quite
q number Of the young men treat it in
conversation as temporary or exper
simental arrangement, which is to be
sustained or put aside as experience
shall demonstrate its utility or mis-
chief. One old Mormon farmer, with
whom l discussed the matter privately
= admitted that it was impossible for {
poor working man to have well-or
dered well-governed household, where
his children had two or more mothers
occupying the same ordinary dwelling
On the whole, l conclude that Polyga
nv. as it was graft on the origina
5 stock of Mormonism, will be outlivec
by the root-that there will be a new
revelation, ere many years, WHEREBY
the Saints will be admonished to love
and cherish the wives they already
have, but not to marry any more be
L. - ON.