The Saint Paul globe. (St. Paul, Minn.) 1896-1905, 1899-08-18
THREE KISSES FOR S..
The Price of Oscillation by Theft
Declines Sharply.

Declines Sharply.
New York Times.
In his Polite Conversation" Dean
| Swift has the explanatory remark:
Lord! L wonder what fool it was that
hrst invented kissing" The fallack in
this saying is the attributing of the in
| Ventlon to a fool for if he was a fool he
! was very wise one indeed to invent a
thlng Tor which so many men have paid
so much. Only the other day an estt-
mabIe young man at Paterson, N. J., a
| town noted for its peaceful and CONNER
! cal ways, fell upon the neck of passing
| maiden, and, much to her surprise and
dlsmay, kissed her three times on the
mouth The young woman, who placed
secret value on the privacy of her lips,
| mad the yiung man seized by a minion
OF the law and hailed before a justice on
a charge of assault and battery.
And at this point the young man made
! 1t appear that he had sinned, if sinned
he had, with elaboration and, well, it
| can hardly be called malice, but some
| thing or other aforethought. He said
| that he had carefully calculated that,
If ne kissed that girl without telling her
that he was going to do so, he would
| be arrested. He Furthermore said that
he had calculated that he would need
| So, and he had also calculated that it
| would be worth the money. But he ar
Sued that it was not assault and battery.
| He held that at the worst he was guilty
| only of disOrderly conduct. The young
| lady, however, adhered to her contention
that it was assault and battery, and
| the learned Justice agreed with her, and
fined the young man for that But the
! fine was only S., and in so far the
young man may be said to have tri-
| umphed.
The case establishes a dangerous prec-
edent. In the first place, there is not a
girl In the land who will agree with that
eminent New Jersey justice that S. is a
fair price for three of her kisses, even
when taken by assault. Cynics may ar
que that a girl ought to be willing to let
them go at that price so long as she had
the opportunity to pose as giving I'M
willingly that which she was glad to
have taken. But the truth is that the
average girl prefers to give a kiss freely
The judge ought to have decided that
the kisses were worth not less than $40
each, and that the act Of preventing the
girl from giving them was worth at
least double that Such a decision would
have discouraged the practice of kissing
the passing maiden unawarea. 1t would
also have encouraged the gratutous be-
stowal of kisses.
1t might also have .suggcstei to the
young man the utter uselessness of his
1
which there are no girls willing to be
kissed? Out upon the thought! Pater-
son is in New Jersey. And even if it
were in Massachusetts, there would still
be hope. But no well-ordered girl is GO
Ing to stand by and see her kisses taken
at three for S. and disorderly conduct.
The conduct is the addition of insult to
injury. If that young man had gone
about it in the right way it is probable
that the kisses would not have cost him
red cent. Let us suppose, however,
merely for the sake Of argument that he
could not in any circumstances have
kissed that particular girl with her con-
sent. What goose he was to admit
that he had calculated that three of her
kisses were worth any fixed sum of
money! Now his chances are gone with
all the other girls in Paterson, and
about the only thing left for him to do
is to change his name and go to live in
Hackensack.