The Savannah morning news., 1901-12-15
WOMAN'S
WORLD.


that nothing but love should dictate a
marriage. That is true, but the young
couple whose only asset is love are
pretty sure to go into the bankrupt
court of affection before the first year
of married life is over. You cannot be
sentimental when you are being dunn
ed by the butcher and baker and can
dlestick maker. The glamor of ro-
nance fades before shabby clothes,
and dingy lodgings and mean food, and
when a husband and wife get to that
point where life is a perpetual anxiety
and self-denial to make the ends meet,
they are not likely to make pretty
speeches to each other. They are
more apt to indulge in home truths.
Domestic felicity is a fragile vessel at
best, and if it is not kept in a we'll
padded home it is mighty liable to get
shattered.
1t has been my lot, says Dorothy
Dix, in the New Orleans Picayune, to
see the tragedy of the marriage based
on love, and without financial back
ing. so often that have grown skep-
tical of 1t meaning anything but dis
aster. l have seen dozens of young
men, well-born, WELL educated, with re-
fined and cultured tastes, but who were
making only a small salary, fall in love
with many charming, but penniless,
girls. In almost every case the end
ing was the same. The small salary
that enabled the man to live like a gen.
mr. ern IN fakx -
simply starvation for a family. They
had to live in a way that revolted his
every taste. The simple pleasures-the
plays, the books, the charming socie-
ty-had to be ioregone. The man grew
shabby and downcast and discouraged.
Inevitable sickness run up doctors
bills and druggists bills, and debts be-
gun to press upon him. He saw the wo-
man he loved grow slovenly- and queru-
lous and then he asked himself if love
was enough, and the answer came
back, mot on your life"
OF course, there is here and there a
man who loves a woman we'll enough
to do without cigars and clubs for her
sake without repining, and woman
who can wear mother hubbards and
millinery and still feel she has drawn
the matrimonial prize, but such cou-
pies are as rare as white blackbirds,
and nobody knows beforehand they
are going to be that kind of domestic
fool. Most Of us who have been used
to the decencies and luxuries of life
beat our wings against the cage and
wonder what made us such fools as to
get caught in the trap.
1t is to prevent such catastrophies
that I would gladly see the dowery
system introduced into this country.
Marriage for money can bring no hap
piness, but a marriage without mon
ey, except in the rarest cases, brings
only misery. Love cannot thrive on an
empty stomach. You have to be COM
Portable physically before you can be
sentimental. 1t is time we recognize
this palpable fact and entered into the
most important and binding trade of
our lives with little common sense,
instead of stultifying ourselves with
an illusion that we all know to be moth
ing but a poets life dream.
1 do not mean by this that riches are
necessary, but 1 do say, with all the
emphasis that / can command, that no
young couple have any right to get
married unless between them they have
a competency to enable them to live
in the way in which they have been
accustomed. If they have not, they will
surely regret the day when they tied
themselves up in double wretchedness.
1t is all very well to talk about the
pleasure of sacrificing ourselves for
those we love- but have yet to see the
person who did it cheerfully. There
are a good many things that are more
comfortable to talk about than to do.
1t may shatter another illusion, but
every married woman knows that nine
tenths of the domestic spats are the
direct result of a discussion of the mon
ey question 1t comes with a shock of
surprise to every man to learn that
his wife's clothes wear out. and that
she has to have pin money. What!
SIS for that dress! $50 for Il bonnet not
six inches square! Want more car
fare? Great heavens! do you think l
am made of money!" that Is a phono-
graphic reproduction of the breakfast
table conversation in many a home,
and the curtain goes down to the man
slamming the front door, and the wom-
an waiting she is going going home to
mother"
That scene, that always leaves be-
hind it a story of intolerable injustice
and humiliation with woman, could
and would be eliminated if a girl had
something, no matter how small, set
tied on her at her marriage, so that
she would not have to go to her hus-
band as a beggar for the very clothes
on her back.
How deeply women feel this matter
of money only those of us who are
working women know. 1t is the real
secret of the unrest and dissatisfaction
in the home. have had women, wom-
en- who were the wives of rich men,
say to me times out of number that
they envied me because l made my own
living. But look at what you have,
and what l make" I would say. "Ah."
came the invariable reply, but 1t is
your own. You don't have to ask for
it, or account to any one for the way
you spend it."
Men don't know 1t, and they will
probably deny it, every mothers son of
them, but there is nothing they re-
spect so much in woman as financial
independence. The hand that holds the
pocketbook rules the world, and the
wife who is the happy possessor of her
own purse is going to be treated with
the Difference we all feel towards the
almighty dollar. The rich are never
snubbed.
An old story, but one worth repeat
ing, Is to the effect that a young mil
lionairess, once went to that wise old
wording, Sam Ward, and confessed to
him that she was much in love with a
certain young man, but she feared he
was DESTROYS of marrying her for her
fortune. what shall do?" she asked.
Marry him." responded Ward. "A
man always marries for something. II
he married you for your beauty, in
time that would fade. If he married
you for your wit, he would be sure
to grow weary of your jokes, but II he
marries you for your money, as long
as you swing on to that, you have
got your man."