Washington standard. [volume] (Olympia, Wash. Territory) 1860-1921, 1897-09-24
A MATRIMONIAL RAFFLE.
Wisconsin Farmer Sells His Daugh.
ters to Get Out OF Debt.

IL Xuh AeIkA AAs
wisconsin Farmer Sells His Daugh.
ters to Get Out Of Debt.
Maple (Wis.) Letter to New York
Times: During the past few days the
Finnish settlement, few miles south
of Maple, has been in a state of great
excitement over remarkable success
sion of events. There are about 200
residents in the settlement-all farmers,
thrifty and nearly all in comfortable
circumstances. There is large sur
plus OF unmarried yonng men in the
community and a scarcity of mar
riageable young women, so that every
female old enough to be courted re-
ceives the attention of from one to
dozen rivel lovers. A widower named
Hanes Dorfkie is one of the set
tiers, and has been living, since the
death of his wife, with three pretty
daughters in little log house some
what removed from the main settle
ment. Lately Dorfkie met with o
number of reverses which crippled
him financially. He had accumulated
enough money since his residence
there to pay for a forty.acre tract of
farming land and to equip the farm
with stock and the necessary imple.
ments for tilling the soil and harvest
ing the crops, but this year his crops
were poor, his oxen died, and his poul-
try was carried away by hawks, so that
while his neighbors saw plenty on
hand to carry them through the com.
ing long winter, the old man saw star
vation looking into the faces of HIM
self and three daughters. Something
must be done, and the wary old Fin
lander set to thinking out scheme
for replenishing his departed excheq-
uer. At last an idea came to him, and
he lost no time in shaping it into a
lucrative scheme. He loved his three
daughters and they loved him dearly,
but they had dozens of young men
lovers, and sooner or later they would
leave him to live the remainder of his
days in poverty and loneliness. Why
not realize something on the daugh-
ters? 1t was good scheme and he
proceeded at once to carry it out.
The old man, Dorfkie, held con-
ference with his three daughters, and
unfolded to them his plan for making
money. He proposed at first to have
an auction, and to sell them, one by
one, to the highest bidder, but the
young women shrank from such bar
barous suggestion, though they signi-
fed their willingness to acquiesce in
any legitimate scheme of money-mak-
ing that the father might devise. At
last the old gent thought it might be
a good scheme to have a rattle, and so
informed the three dutiful young
women. They objected at first on the
ground that they might be obliged to
accept men as their husbands who
were unsatisfactory to them, but when
the father promised that the tickets
should be sold to persons only who
were acceptable in all respects, there
was nothing left for the girls to do
but to assent, and this they readily
did.
So it was whispered about the
neighborhood one day last week that
Farmer Dorfkie had decided to rattle
off his daughters, and the day later
the whisperings we're confirmed, for
Hr. Dorfkie himself appeared among
the people with basketful of paste
board cards, upon each of which the
information was contained that the
holder thereof was entitled to one
chance on one or another of the three
maidens fair. The tickets went like
hot cakes at 81 apiece, and within a
few days the loving father had ex-
changed his basketful of pastboards
for a like measure of shining silver
and gold. In his anxiety to dispose Of
all the tickets, Mr.. Dorfkie forgot
his promise to discriminate in favor Of
the best-looking and most prosperous
suitors in the settlement. He took
everybody's dollar in exchange for a
ticket, and the consequence was that
every man in the village, married or
single, rich or poor, homely or hand
some had possessed himself of one or
more chances for the hand of one of
the fair daughters before the time set
for the rattle.
The day came for the great event,
and the schoolhouse was packed to
the outer door with men, women and
children. People in the neighboring
towns had heard of the novel affair,
and came from all directions to wit
ness the final proceedings. Two hun
dred and fifty tickets upon each girl
had been sold, and the arrangement
was that each prize should be disposed
of separately under the auspices of a
committee selected out OF the audience.
Tickets numbered to correspond with
those sold were placed in one box, and
another box contained 249 blanks and
one number marked "Prize." Two
vouny girls were then selected to pre-.