The enterprise-recorder. (Madison, Fla.) 1908-1933, 1910-04-21


err advance still more calamitous to the
hearth and home. The price of hus-
bands has gone up Any Jewish schat'
chen will vouch for It. The increase is
along the line from the plain, unyarIl'
shed business husband, uneducated,
earning not more than SIS week." 20
the lawyer, doctor, or professional man
with wellestablished patronage, who
now comes as high as S25,C00 for the
families which can afford such a lux
ury
The accepted belief is that the schat-
/ chen. or Jewish marriage broker, op.
crates only for the poor and ignorant.
That side Of the business covers only
one part Of very wide field, There
are according to conservative estimate
about 5000 professional schatchens in
New York city, whose only means OF
support is the regulation 5 percent CT
the marriage dowry of every trans.
action, Besides these, so a jew well.
yersed in the affairs of his country.
men maintains, there are almost as
many again who while Ostensibly en-
gagged in other pursuits do not despise
arranging an occasional match or ac-
cepting the perquisltvs,
The Sehatehen in Real Life.
The traditional picture is the man
Of the tenements with a three-pound
watch chain and a polka-dotted vest,
whose work in life is to see his neigh.
bors happily married. Even in the
humber ranks the schatchcn is gen.
orally a man for the contracting par
ties have more confidence in the bus
mess acumen CT mankinu and the high.
er one goes in the marriage game the
more important does the management.
Of its financial end become.
Accordingly, the trail of 'the trans
actor which is the literal transla-
tion Of the Yiddish term, reaches evea
to the ,brown-stone. front Of the very
wcll-to-do, although in that case the
father Of either the prospective bride
or bridegroom is generally foreign
born and was brought up in the estab.
lished custom of the Old World
ghettos 1t doesn't work as well VITA
the present generation of American.
born youths and maidens, Polish jew
confded to the reporter and told a
recent little tragedy Of real life re.
sulting from the clash Of two different
generations.
This father had by industry and
thrift arrived at a very considerable
fortune and lived in a prosperous
looking "brOwn-stone front" but he
had let his daughter stay unmarried
20 the ripe old age of twenty-five. be,
cause be was loath to part with his
only child Last Spring, the Russian
father was aroused to his derelction
Of paternal duty and arranged a mar
riage for his daughter. An unexpected
obstacle arose, for the girl brought
up TO American ways wouldn't hear OF
the proceeding. She wouldn't be dow.
cred she said, only she called It
sold to the horror Of her father She
even refused 10 meet the young man
whom her father now invited TO the
house, suspecting some subrosa e.
nancial understanding She would
be married for love alone, she de-
clared.
Not lacking in astuteness, the father
sent the girl for the summer TO a pop
ular resort, well equipped to out
shine the other girls there. So she
met her Prince" fell in love, and
the wedding was set for December.
Everything was ready but the wedding
gown itself, when one day the fiancc
called on father and demanded a $40,
600 settlement. The father had been
planning TO present the young couple
with $4,000 as a gift, but he waXed
indignant at the man who pretended
love when he wanted money" and de-
layed his demand till so near the wed
ding day that a broken engagement
would be almost as much a scandal IN
his world, as a divorce.
In his indignation the older man
/ broke the engagement, but told his
daughter that he had discovered that
! her intended had tuberculosis and
| could live only a few months. The
girl PERSISTED that She would marry
| him all the same, so she was told the
truth, and now the girl is weeping
her eyes out over her lost Illusions. '
Sometimes the parents become AM
! ericanized, too. An Austrian, rated in
Bradstreet's at $4,000, announced to
all his business friends at the time of
her debut that Maud won't receive
one cent till'my death, and I'm pretty
| healthy and expect to live a good long