The Savannah morning news. (Savannah, Ga.) 1900-current, 1903-04-26
MARRIAGE ENGAGEMENTS.

The longest engagement on record,
says the New York World, is seventy
five years and it took place in Bo-
hernia, where engagements of fifteen
and even twenty years are so common
as to cause no remark.
The names of the wooer and wooed
were respectively Franz Rosner and
Anna Renner, and they had been
counting continuously for seventy-f1ve
years, but had repeatedly deferred the
bridal day. At last Franz became IA
tally ill and was married on his death
bed on the eve of his one hundredth
birthday, the age of the bride and
widow being ninety-nine.
In Russia long engagements are not
relished by bethrothed young men, all
though the ladies usually are not at
all averse to them. Indeed, these lat
ter not infrequently use all sorts of
articles in order to stave off the we'd
ding day to as distant a date as pos
sible
Perhaps the custom which DEGREES
that the Russian bridegroom ELECT must
send his sweetheart a present every
day, no matter whether the engage
ment last for ten weeks or ten years,
may have something to do with this
anomalous state of affairs.
The regularly recognized length of a
Siamese engagement is exactly one
month. For the bride to ask for an
extension beyond that limit is neld
to SAVIOR of reprehensible prudery
Moreover, in Siam, old maids are UNI
known, as all girls marry.
The reason for this is probably to
be found in the low estimation in
which unmarried women are held. They
are not merely looked down upon. They
are absolutely of no account what
ever.
AS soon as the marriage ceremony
is performed, however, the hitherto
neglected and despised little female
atom becomes distinctly a Some
body" People who would not have
deigned to even recognize her existence
while in a state of single blessed
ness" now admit her willingly to their
houses, and even go out of their way
to seek her friendship.
Still, it is not until she has become
a mother that she is held to have
reached her highest estate. Then she
has attained the pinnacle of honor,
can claim as a right presentation at
court and is addressed by the coveted
title of 1.-THE Matronly One"
In the Argentine Republic an en-
gagged man who dallies beyond rea-
sonable time ere leading his fiance
to the altar is heavily fined; that is,
if he is over twenty. Moreover, he is
not permitted by the state, after at
tanning that age, to enjoy free the
pleasures of bachelorhood, even al
though he may not have committed
himself so far as to have promised
marriage to any maiden.
In other words, every Argentine Jack
must choose his Jill as soon as he ar
rives at years of discretion. If he fails
to do so the penalty is a payment by
the defaulter of S. a month to the
National Treasury; and this is in
creased as the years go by up to no
fewer than $50 per month.
Only when he has celebrated his
eightieth birthday. if he ever does
so, is he held exempt; the Legislature
probably regarding him then as a
"hopeless case" so far as the matri-
monial market is concerned.
There is, however, even as a young
man. one loophole of escape provided
for him. If he can prove that he has
proposed and been refused three times
in one year he is held to have, as it
were, done his best, and to have earned
immunity.