Wood County reporter. [volume] (Grand Rapids [i.e. Wisconsin Rapids], Wis.) 1857-1923, 1885-09-03
Why They Do Not Marry.

The Pail Mall Gazette, a week or two
ago, suggested a subject of inquiry to
It's readers which is of interest in every
part of the world. 1t asked "Why
are young Englishmen of the gentler
class so unwilling to marry, and why
are young Englishwomen of the same
class so willing?" The query brought
shower of letters of both parties.
which revealed a good deal of the in
ner workings of English social and do
mestlc life. The principal reason al
legged for the dislike of men to give up
club Tor family life was that they knew
nothing of the women submitted to
them orapproval beyond few glimps-
es OF them infull dress. A British ma
tron, wrote one bachelor, who wishes
to secure a bon parti for her daughter
manages that he shall dance with her
at ball, invites him to ball at her
own house, then to two or three din
ners. Then it is time for him to make
up his mind as to a proposal. He will
see her no more closely. He then goes
on to state how unpleasant it is for a
man to go into such 3 yoke blindly;
how he wishes to see the candidate at
home waiting on her old father, or
wants to know how she talks to her
maid. or looks when her brother sets
his foot on her gown, ETC., etc.
All of which is very reasonable and
just. But why should not the girl also
demand to see the prospective yokefel-
low when he is not en- grande tenue?
Why must she be satisfied to take the
man who waltzes with her or fingers
her dinner-card as her companion for
life, and never get glimpse of him as
he appears at the club among men, or
when he has drank his nightly allow
ance, or In his home the morning after
that nightly allowance? Why, in
short, is the man to choose and the
woman to be passively chosen? Every
letter published in the Gazette from
both sexes takes the fact for granted
that the average Englishwoman stands
ready to marry the man who can give
her handsome maintenance without
regard to his temper, habits, or morals,
while the man waits until he has
weighed the woman carefully in the
balance and found her not wanting in
any of these particulars.
One of Thackeray's marvellous initial
ASbISAo NhASh PAOSCNiC LIS CtIdplCIS On
fashionable married life shows us be-
flounced and bejeweled mother leading
up her innocent young daughter to sell
her to a gross Englishman robed as d
Turk. The practice, if we may Judge
from the Gazette, is more common in
England now than in Thackery's day.
1t is not common here. The American
women have their faults. She is often
bold, slangy, vehement; she likes, when
she is young, to be free to 90 where
she will and fiirt as much as she pleas
es; when she is old she likes and gen.
orally takes her own way. But she is
seldom for sale. With all the excep-
tional power which money gives in
this country, with all the struggle
which is made for it in every class, it
is only among the most fashionable set
that marriages de CONVEYANCE are rec
ognized as justifiable and decorous.
Ii these statements in the Gazette
fairly represent English social life we
are a much less mercenary people than
they; the dollar will buy more that is
sacred and pure and dear there than
here, where it is supposed to be al
miOhty