The true northerner. [volume] (Paw Paw, Mich.) 1855-1920, 1871-05-19
A Little Story Of Married Life.

In an English court there was lately
tried an action for protested dress
makers bill, which revealed curious
picture of womanly independence In
that country where society is supposed
to be strictest in its conventional exac-
tons, and the domestic subsection OF
women most complete
The plaintiff was London draper,
and the defendant Yorkshire clergy
man, or as he describes himself, Z" u
country parson with ten daughters"
Now, daughters are blessing, of course,
but they are also great anxiety, and
when it comes to having ten of them a
man may be excused for feeling some
anxiety to get brace or so Oft his
hands. Two he had already disposed
of, and when so desirable a man as
captain in the royal artillery proposed
for the hand of the sixth, we may sup
pose that the good rector of Ronald
kirk gave his consent and his paternal
blessing with something approaching to
Joy full alacrity. The marriage took place
on the Doth Of September, and the hap
Ply couple went off to India, where the
bridegroom was ordered, and equally
happy father was left to congratulate
himself on one care the less. His con-
tentment, however, was destined to be
rudely ended. The thunderbolt fell from
his cloudless sky in the shape of bill
addressed to the absent bride under her
maiden name, amounting to fl55 5s.,
for the wedding rousseau. "The list
of the things supplied extended" we
are told, lover many pages, and en-
braced a variety of silk and other dress
es, pettcoats, jackets, mantles, walls,
head dresses, embroideries, trimmings,
laces, and immense variety OF other
things" There was also a wedding
vail particularly long" as the fair bride
was so very tall, being five feet ten
inches high" and certain mysterious
devices called dress protectors" to be
used on going to India. All these things
the enterprising young lady had ordered
through an extensive personal cores
pondence with the London mantau-
maker, and without the tritling lormali-
ty of a consultation with her father, who
repudiated the debt, and the haber-
dasher resorted to the law. On trial it
was shown by another daughter of the
defendant that neither of her parents
had been consulted about the order, and
that other wedding bills had come in,
since the brides departure to the am
cunt Of nearly three hundred pounds.
The plaintiff testified with the engaging
and unusual candor that his bill was q
very reasonable one, very little indeed
for lady about to be married to an Off
Ger. 1t would not have been extrava-
CANT if it had been three times as
much" To this authoritave exposition
from an expert, there was no available
answer. The defendant, to be sure,
feebly protested that he had never
heard Of the plaintiff 5 existence till his
bill was sent to the rectory that he had
never seen the things his daughter had
ordered, except the dress in which she
was married" and that he had told her
THAT was a most ridiculous one, more
fitted for a dukes daughter than for a
country parsons" All this, and the
assertion that his dutiful child's orders
had nearly ruined him, went for moth
with the jury against the decisive opin-
ion Of the plaintiff as to the proper out
lay for lady so lucky as to be married
to an officer, and verdict was given for
the plaintiff for the full amount.
If the immediate effect of this case is
not to discourage country parsons from
having ten daughters, it will render
them less anxious to marry them, at
least to officers.