Wood County reporter. [volume] (Grand Rapids [i.e. Wisconsin Rapids], Wis.) 1857-1923, 1884-12-18
MARRIAGE WITH FOREIGNERS.


I hear from Washington, says writ
er in The NeaO York World, that state
" young lady there, the daughter of an
old and respected officer in the army, is
so greatly infatuated with an attache
of the CHILEAN embassy That she is en-
tirely willing to marry him and 90 to
live in his own country. The young
foreigner has long been her devoted
sutton, and the attachment between the
two is Of the most marked and decisive
character. They would have married
long ago but for the strenuous opposi-
ton of the parents of both the young
lady and the young man. The CHILEAN
minister himself disapproves of the I'M
ion, and there is some anxiety as to
what will be the outcome.
The ground of objection on the part
of the minister is that, while he has the
greatest regard for both the young
people concerned, he believes the hab-
its of life practiced by the people of
Chill are so radically different from
those of the United States that he fears
the happiness of the marriage would
soon be broken, and the bride come to
an unhappy realization of great mis-
take. True, true, too true, she might.
The Latin idea of marriage is quite
another thing from that which obtains
among the Saxon races. A CHILEAN
husband is very much such a husband
as a Spaniard or a Frenchman, even a
little more liberal, perhaps.
French women sometimes marry
Americans, and live very happily with
them, because American men generally
make better husbands than Frenchmen,
but American women who accept
French husbands generally get very
much the worst Of the bargain. The
Latin men ere passionate and poetic
lovers, but poor husbands. The Ger
mans are the most constant people in
the world, and no people on earth have
SO much happiness at home as they do.
That means the husband and wife are
satisfied with each other. But while a
German makes a true and devoted hus-
band, he is not so chiValrOus husband
as the American, who mingles with his
love and exaltation of home appetite re-
gard for his wife that is beautiful and
inspiring. Marriage with him is not
the end of courtship, but the continu-
ance of it on a higher plane. / speak
There is no country where woman is
SO esteemed and accorded her proper
position with such graceful gallantry
as this, and therefore our women are
more independent, more self-confdent,
more self-reliant, and more brilliant in
society than those of any other nation.
History does not tell of such q race of
splendid women as have grown up I'M
der the expansive and enrolling ideas
of domestic life that prevail in the Uni
ted States, and that are due not only to
the primal disposition to deal Justly
with women that had its origin in our
Saxon ancestry, but to the hberality of
our political institutions. In America,
Germany, and England there are homes,
in France and the other Latin countries
there are establishments. This is the
difference. Where there is a home the
woman has chance, for that is her
kingdom, and she is granted some
right of identity and personal conse-
quence there, but where an establish
ment is the domestic center she is es-
sentially a submissive convenience.
Two typical countries for the illustra-
ton of this contrast are America and
France. In the one there is a hearth
stone, in the other there is not; in the
one a woman is coordinate element
in society; in the other she is not, IN
less she asserts herself on grounds not
related to her sex. The French woman
may achieve position and fame on the
stage or in literature, as, for instance,
Sarah Bernhardt or George Sand, but
as wife, as mother, as sister-as a
woman simply-in the capacity where
she is greatest and best and forever de-
serving of the warmest regard of the
other sex, she is a sort of interesting
necessity, or the plaything of a tran
sient fancy. 1t is in our free America
where woman has an undisputed en-
pire and where her distinctive and low
able attributes blossom out in their
most charming fullness and perfection.
As | may have said before in these col
umns, do not the wife-seekers of other
lands look to our shores with cOvetous
eyes, and do they not come this way on
matrimonial adventures a hundred
times oftener than we 90 their way on
similar errands? Yes, verify.