The news & observer. [volume] (Raleigh, N.C.) 1894-current, 1900-10-14
GETTING MARRIED.-AND WHEN.
Dorothy Dix Discusses the Question in a Most
Sensible Sort of Way.
New York ,Journall

0cusADA0 QUIZ VI way
(New York Journal)
Do girls get married for lack of other
employment? Professor Franklin Gid
dngs says that the effect of factory work
on women is to put off marrying day. Miss
Smith, of Leland Stanford University,
| finds that the higher education has sim
liar effect On the sex. and that the col
lege bred woman enjoys a longer span of
single blessedness than her non college
bred sister. This plainly indicates that
Cupid like Satan, finds work for idle
hands to do, and that if girl is fully en-
| ployed she is as little apt to fall in love
as she is to get into other kinds of mis-
chief
| Whatever the reason. it is apparent
| that the marrying age is growing later.
| Every year we see fewer examples OF
that always pitiful spectacle of girl TAX
ing flying leap from the cradle to the
altar, making VOWS she is too much child
to understand, taking responsibilities she
is too young TO fulfill, too often in her
| ignorance fastening the milestone about
her neck that is to crush out all the
sweetness and 10y of living. 1t has not
| been so long since early marriages were
| the rule. but now when we hear of girl
| of sixteen getting married we extend to
the hapless little victim the same compass
| sion we bestow on the child brides of In
| dia. Moreover. we wonder at the unso-
! phisticated taste of a man who still rel
| ishes bread and butter and ask ourselves
| if he isnt-just a little-liable to get tired
| of it and crave something trife more
| piquant.
Viewed from the practical standpoint
| of getting as much happiness out
of existence as possible, girl has every
thing to gain by postponing marriage to
date we'll beyond her teens. To marry
| the moment she gets out of the school
room is to deliberately rob herself of the
| playtime of life. AS affairs are ordered
in this country, the young daughter is the
despot Of the home If she belongs to
rich people you meet her dragging equity
papa, grumbling and protesting, to Eu-
rope, or you find apoplectic mamma pant
| ing around the golf links after her. II
she is poor, mother may have to hustle
! out of bed at dawn to get the breakfast,
| but everybody goes by Mauds door on
| tiptoe to keep from waking her up. What
| ever economies must be practiced, she
is exempt Whatever hardships must be
endured, she is spared. Her mission in
life is to enjoy herself, and with the self
abnegation possessed alone by the early
Christian martyrs and American parents,
nothing is expected of her but to have
good time"
| Married life, even under the happiest
auspices, can offer no such holiday to a
woman. Matrimony brings responsible
| ties that none escape. For one thing,
the average bride finds herself up at once
against the awful servant problem. 1t is
| her first intimation that life is real. and
she sheds bitter tears over the discovery.
Then, if she is a fool she gives up the
struggle with incompetent cooks and
| saucy maids, and takes refuge in board
| ing house. If she is sensible she ties on
! her apron and goes down into the kitch-
| en- and fights the battle out. She knows
| she is starting out to learn the hardest
and most exacting profession in the world
| and that never again will life be n pie
| MIC where somebody else pays for he
band and furnishes the refreshments.
She finds, too, that she has somehow
| gotten off her pedestal and is expected
to burn incense before another goo. At
| home everybody considered her tastes
| and pleasures, but as married woman
she ascertains that she is the one who
must do the pleasing. 1t is the man
! whose temper and little peculiarties
must be rubbed the right way of the fur.
More serious still is the question of moth
| erhood, and, in truth, there are few sights
in the world more pathetic than that of
the girl other-herself a child-igno-
| rantly and incompetently struggling with
| a teething baby.
On pretty much the same principle that
the reformed roue makes the best hus-
band, the woman who does not marry I'M
til she has seen good deal of life makes
the most contented wife. Men seldom
marry until they are weary of society and
long for fireside peace. If they wed a
young girl she is still anxious for the
pleasures she has not enjoyed. She wants
to go because she has not seen the show
| Of life. He wants to stay at home be-
/ cause he has seen too much of it, and
there is no subject of discord more fire.
/ quent than the antagonistic attitude Of
husband and wife on the anus mt ques-
ton. The mature woman hi had hel
fling, too She is tired of the gay whir
and is glad to settle down.
The clirching argument against early
marriages for women, however. is tina
the woman who has had time to come
to herself knows what she wants. Shit
may not always get it, but at least she
makes her bargain in the market will
open eyes. A young girl is like one wht
risks her all in a lottery where the odds
are desperately against her, for she takes
chances not only on what the man is, bu
what she is going to be herself. Thu
curled mustache lay figure that thrilled
her at seventeen fills her with DISCUS
and loathng at thirty. Happy, then, i
she has not tied knot with her tongue
she cannot unite with her teen N
tragedies are more bitter than thos
caused by the young wife outgrowing he
youthful romance and the husband t
whom she IS bound.
DOROTHY DIX.