The copper country evening news. [volume] (Calumet, Mich.) 18??-1907, 1897-01-04
WIVES OF GERMANS.
AN AMERICAN GIRLS POSITION WHEN
SHE MARRlES A BARON.

Her Own Money-An Authority on the
Subject Writes For the Benefit of Young
Women In This Country.
Few questions have been put to me as
test TO my foreign experience oftener
than the familiar: Ought American
girls TO marry German men? Are such
unions happy? Do they turn out we'll?
What class Of men is it that step out
side the beaten track of home matri-
mony to seek American wives and
transplant them into the life of the ia
therlandY writes Baroness Won Wedel
in Cosmopolitan.
In respect to the marriages of Ameri-
can girls with German men, they may
be approved Of safely in the cases Of
practical, worldly minded women and
of very young or of very gentle temper
ed girls. Wives who possess little senti-
ment or only soft sentiments yield read
lily to their environment, the latter Civ
ing way unconsciously, and hence with
out pain, the former with foresight and
with purpose selfish enough, as we
their renunciations.
As for the class Of willful, silly, pre-
tentious women, they are happy no.
where. German society should not be
called too harshly to account, therefore,
il they are wretched in marrying into
it. We must concede, if we are fair
minded, that they would have been just
as discontinued in any other geograph-
ical position as in the fatherland.
The inquiry begins with our average
girls. They represent American wives
whose happiness is influenced by the
specifically foreign traits in their hus-
bands and their husbands society and
surroundings. However they may vary
in character, they are alike in their
Americanism, and it is republican prin-
ciples which are opposed in them to the
aristocratic education of the men Of
their choice.
1t is false prejudice to suppose that
these or the titled gentlemen who take
American wives are mere fortune hunt
ers and degenerated specimens of nohil-
ity. They are often men, it is true, who
could not marry women without dow
ries, for gentlemen on the continent. as
it must be kept continually in mind,
are excluded from the chances Of max
ing money.
Where cases Of dissipation of the
great fortunes of American wives occur
and are duly reported, two or three
| things are sometimes overlooked. The
| first is that, il the cases were not rare
they would hardly be considered worth
Offering to the public as shocking facts
| The second is that the fortune evidently
was limited. The next may surprise us
for it is a truth that has not not beef
realized by our home staying country
men-I mean the fact that foreigner
Law the blame on the American wife
Why, the relatives ask, did she not brlni
more money into the connection?
What they mean, and what they fee
justified by the usages of their class i
meaning, is that young noblemen q
nothing unusual in being extravagant
If the consort of such man bring
wealth enough for her to be luxurious
4 100, uO w tlibN 10 'ot''' ~~S
the head of the house is the membe
who is the representative Of his rank, tC
getber with the munificence that is sui
able to it, and where the mutual FORUM
is circumscribed it becomes the duty
the wife to retrench her outlays III ordt
to allow him to continue representa-
their station without too much dang(
Of bankrupting the family means. Ge
man wives economic the more in pr
portion as their husbands spend.
American born wives, on the contrar.
have drawn the reputation upon then
selves of being incapable Of this sort
sacrifice.
/ have learned to look for the re
tragedies among foreign marriages
the silent cases. These women OF cha
acter and ambition, united in q ferv
temperament, keeping their post III
!, soldiers, are admirable wives often
admirable men, yet they endure the co
, slant realization of the chosen places
: their thoughts being foreign to the wa
and thoughts Of their husband and G
world about them. There are mode
women of strong and distinct liv
whose inner principles are supreme pr
tests against the system of living viii
their marriages unknowingly drew the
into-exiles from the soil, and, abo
all, the soil of republicanism.
Both law and custom grant men q
. thority over women. The bride pass
. from the parental control into the co
troll Of her husband, and, II she live
:. be a widow, into that of her son.
. Our girls know theoretically befc
marriage that they must be subscribe
to their husbands as German wives a
;, that the obstacles to happiness lie
the path of wifely independence. L
= gentle footpath of submission is II
. from hindrance.