Bellows Falls times. [volume] (Bellows Falls, Vt.) 1856-1965, 1874-08-14
5Rliscellanp.
COurtship I'm Germany.

The Berlin correspondent of the Lon
don Daily News discourses about court
ship in Germany to the following effect
cit is not Of much consequence hov
the parties become acquainted. Ever
if the young man has no thought o.
marriage, the society of the young ladies
is likely to be not quite without interest
Now there is no other quality that Ger
man men of the middle class prize in
their wives as domesticity. The young
girls are very carefully trained in this
respect by their mothers, and at the age
at which they marry they are nearly al
ways equal to the domestic duties Of
their position. They know how to knit
mems hose, and to deal out rations to
the servants. In the little parties the
young lady is expected to make the nee
essary display. of her Domestic accom-
plishments, aided, of course, by judicious
hints from the mother
An observant young man can gen.
orally tell by the second evening at the
beer garden if he is persona grata with
the mother. If on his appearance the
second evening at the rendezvous she in
nocently offers him place beside the
daughter, or accidentally makes place
for him, as it were in the confusion of
the moment, he knows at once that one
formidable outpost is carried. Perhaps
the most interesting scene is mother
who, at public place like that, has
three or four daughters to adjust among
as many ardent or reluctant suitors
From the pair who are most advanced
in their wooing and may be left pretty
much to themselves, to the pair who
least harmonic and consequently need
the most discreet attention and encour-
Augmentation the one of these extremes
to the other, along the intermediate
grades of connubial readiness the care
of this watchfnl mother ranges and op-
crates.
:" In default Of public announcement
of betrothal, people in the habit of watch
ing the actors from evening to evening
may tell by one infallible sign when the
happy climax is reached. AS soon as
the swain begins to pay the young lady's
reckoning in addition to his own, de-
pend on it they are engaged. Up to
that time the maiden's Gansebraten has
been reckoned at the close of every eve
ming with the account of the family, and
paid for by the fond parent, but now
the burden has been lightened. The fu-
ture son-in-law meets his sweetheart's ex-
penses, but them alone. Even if there
be nobody else with them but the mother,
she pays her own bill. Night after
night one may see at the same restau-
rants young man pay for himself and
his sweetheart, while the worthy matron
just as regularly is left to the resources
of her own purse. If the three visit
the theatre he purchases stalls for two
while the mother takes her place in the
queue, and looks out for herself, and the
rule Is scarcely ever broken. If it be
said on the one hand that the mother,
having shuffied off the responsibility of
her daughters entertainment, ought to
be satisfied with that. it may be urged on
the other hand, that, in view of the f.
deity and regularity expected of Ger
man lover, the support of the young
lady is in itself enough, and he ought
not to be asked to have the mother SUI
peradded, at least until after the mar
riage. Young people engaged are ex-
pected to pass three hundred and sixty
five evenings year in each others soci-
ETY.. If they belong to the middle or
poorer classes this phenomenon is gener-
ally witnessed at cheap beer-houses and
gardens, varied in summer by an occa-
sional rural excursion. If they have a
more exalted position IN the social scale,
there will generally be facilities for en-
tertaining the victim at the home of the
intended /; and for beer-gardens they will
now and then substitute a concert or a
play. But the full quota of evenings is
always vigorously exacted. Perhaps the
most delicate situation for an anxious
sutton is when the mother is Indifferent,
or with little judicious matronly CO.
quetry, knowing that he is anxious, pre-
tends to be Indifferent This situation
exacts from the candidate the most care.
full behavior, especially late in the eve
ming after beer, when the mother is like
ly to be sleepy and tired, and.even irri-
table. One false step may ruin all.
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