The Bridgeport evening farmer., 1916-03-09
CUPID IS DOING
BUSINESS ONCE
MORE IN FRANCE
Genuine Courtship and Real
Love Making Now the
Vogue There.

Paris, March 9.-Genuine court
ship-reaI love-making-as an incl
dent to marriage is one of the inno-
vations that war has brought to
France. It may develop into a revo-
luton of the marriage system, and is
almost certain in any case to be the
death of much of the red tape that
has entangled, and more or less
strangled,t cupid.
Marriage was hard hit during the
first months of the war, but by reason
of the authorization of unions by
proxy and the infusion of war ro-
nance, it isl rapidly recovering.
In Paris there were only 76s mar
riages in January 1915 as against o.
341 in january 1914. In December
markab1e recovery under the circum-
stances.
In a great many of these war mar
riages, it is noticed that girls without
fortune are for the time being run
ming their more favored sisters a
close race, since in a great proper
ton of the marriages celebrated since
hostilities began the marriage con-
tract has been dispensed with; no
mention of dover nor talk about
money; romance has taken the place
of finance.
Wounded heroes have in hundreds
of cases fallen in love with and mar
ried their nurses; nearly every day
the story is told of some man in a
fighting regiment corresponding with
an unknowon sympathizer who has
come home on leave to find that his
"godmother' is worth marrying for
herself.
Women and girls acting as god
mothers to unknown correspondents
at the front have developed what Is
lightly called "the f1irt at the front
into formidable proportions, and this
is at this moment perhaps the most
efficient marriage agency in the
world. The sacrifices made by some
girls marrying soldiers who have
been Blinded or manned almost to the
point of total helpIessness have spread
the contagion, and love affairs are
born at every hand by the close com
1nunion of sympathetic minds CEN
tired on great events, and through the
constant movement of soldiers coming
in contact with new faces, every one
of which under present circumstan-
ces is bound to be sympathetic.
Some psychologists have inquired
whether there was not in France
crying need for deeper affection, and
whether the decreasing natality in
the country was not due in great part
to the obstacles of marriage and the
more material considerations that al
ways entered into it. The soul-St1r-
ring incidents of the war have I'M
questionably brought everyone into
been general wiping out of old
scores that kept acquaintances and
even families apart. There have
been many reconci1iarfons through
the exchange of news of the exploits
of mutual friends, and many instan-
ces of divided families reunited over
the tomb of a fallen hero.
Young people are now being
brought together not by contract nor
by the attraction of wealth, but SIM
ply by the greater force now assert
ing itself of young hearts and COM
mon wills. It is asked whether it will
continue after the war, and what eff
feet it will have upon the future of
France; an idealistic people, after be-
ing held in materialistic bondage SO
far as concerns so vital a question to
the race, is coming out so strong in
the present irresistible appeal to ro-
manticism that many believe it will
result in a transformation, if not in
a revolution, of the marriage system.
Some contend that men will marry
younger and marry for love instead of
for money, will marry more in reason
and sincerity, and that with the
stronger tie of affection taking the
place of interest, divorces will be-
come less while the population will
grow correspondingly more numerous.