The Portland daily press. [volume] (Portland, Me.) 1862-1921, 1871-08-04

When giant meets giantess then comes the
tug OF love. A marriage between two persons
whose combined height, to use the arithmeti-
cal method generally adopted by newspapers
where the bride and bridegroom are of ad-
vanced age or of particularly tender years,
would approximate to that of two lamp-pos
placed one upon the top of the other, is an
event which cannot be properly appreciated
save by such an enterprisng soul as Barnum.
Something similar may be common enough
in Patagonia; bat in this country it is an in
cident almost as rare and interesting as the
birth, at the Geological gardens, of an infant
hippOpOtamus. For the celebration of the
ceremony it was only right that the royal par
;sh church of st. Martins-in. the Fields
should be chosen; and those happy beings
who this morning saw sixteen feet of human
ity made one flesh will be able with reason to
boast to their posterity that they were wit
nesses OF submer sight, Or as Americans
woald say, taller spectacle, than any royal
family in the inhabited world could offer. Gil
ants are known to be weak, especially in the
knees; and from the days Of POyphemns they
have always been very susceptible of the ten
der passion. But poor Polyphemus could
cast but single Sleeps eye, and couldn't find
anybody taller than Galatea upon whom to
cast it. Our giant who was this morning
married in our royal parish was more fortu-
nate. He and his giantess met-at a public
exhibitiOn-and loved. The giant proposed
and was accepted; and this morning Miss
Anna Swan, "the tallest person known to ex-
ISL" was Joined together in wedlock with
Captain Martin Van Buren Bates, whose
Christian name may have suggested the idea
of comforting such distinction as has been
conferred upon the church of st. Martin's-in-
the Fields. 1t is certainly case of matrimo
ny IN ercelsis; and the curious occupy their
thoughts in guessing upon what grounds the
union was contracted. 1t may have been
case of true love, of which the course un-
doubtedly ran high, if it did not run smooth.
1t may have been due to a sense of symmetry
and fitness; for it is easy to conceive that
each, at the fist glance, must have felt made
for the other, and that the gallant captain
must have muttered, in the words of Geraint,
"Here by Gods grace is the one maid for
me-" Or it may have been, as the cynical
will perhaps suggest, marriage of cold calcu-
lation; for a marriage is of itself an advertise
ment, and bride is always, for some inexpli.
cable reason, a more interesting spectacle
than spinster or matrOn. 1t would be an
unwarrantable liberty to pronounce an opn-
ion about the cause which has produced SO re-
markable union, and, besides, it would be
too late, for by this time they have taken one
another for better or worse, for shorter or
taller.
The hour fixed for the solemnity was eev-
en- A. NJ, and tie affair having got wind,
there was, long before the mcmentous ques-
ton was put by the priest, a goodly company
OF those spectators to whom any kind of we'd
Ding is Away gratifying, and monster we'd
ding joy forever. Perhaps crowned heads
or dwarfs would have commanded a larger
concourse; but multitudinous, nevertheless.
were the eyes which gazed anxiously to ward
the door for the bridegroom's coming. At
quarter ito eleven exactly he arrived, and
walked composedly up to the altar. He did
not wear the uniform OF that corps of Ana
kim in which he is understood to hold a cap
tain's commission, but an ordinary dress, if
we exclude an exceedingly blue tie. At ten
minutes to eleven loud whispers, succeeded
by dead silence, announced the approach Of
the bride, who-pale of face and clad in fe W
acres OF white samite, mystic, wonderful"
and with her veil thrown back-moved, as
majestcally as her peculiar circumstances or
circumference admitted of, up the nave, stood
in front of her atfianced husband, and looked
down upon him from her superior eminence
with the ghastly smile proper to the occasion.
She had been preceded by the "two-headed
nightingale combination" whose misfortune
naturally caused buzz of comment and
much hllarity. The service was read amid a
reverential scene of whispering, giggling, and
climbing over pews; ard when it was over the
usual signing of names appeared to occupy
| much more than the legitimate time. As the
reasen could not be The length Of names,
which by no means corresponds with that OF
the owners, one is driven to the conclusion
that children of Anakim, like some other
| great folks, find writing laborious and diff
cult operation. At last, however, The pair of
Titans emerged from the vestry and strobe
| arm-in-arm, followed by the sympathizing
| "combination," and accompanied by the
| strains of the wedding march, to meet the
| plaudis of the outside crowd. At II :15 all
was over. 1t were rash to DIP into the future
but one cannot help seeing that If, when 81
ants marry gianiesses, the result is giant and
giantesses, there has this day been taken a
| step which will shortly "ruin the business