French Broad hustler. [volume] (Hendersonville, N.C.) 1916-1919, 1916-12-14
LOVE NOT ENOUGH
MONEY CALLED POWERFUL AID
TO HAPPY MARRIAGE.
Writer of Opinion That the French
System Of Providing Wives With
Dowries Has Much to Rec
ommend Il.

It is said that because of the scar
city of money in France the dot system
is slowly dying out. The American
parent has ever laughed to scOrn the
venerable French custom of supplying
the bride with a dowry to bring to her
husband on her wedding day. A dot
less maiden in French countries re-
mains single. In many parts Of upper
Canada this is still true, and l have
known American girls. who married
into French families in Montreal and
Quebec to secure a substantial dot
from their parents before taking the
matrimonial leap. Otherwise their
standing with the people who are to
be their future friends is decidedly
insecure, a writer in the Philadelphia
Ledger says.
All of which proves that the French
people, with their usual intuitive quick
ness, realize what Americans hesitate
to acknowledgement money is pow
erful aid to a happy marriage. An
American girl is not expected to bring
her husband a dOwry; but let me see
the bridegroom who refuses a fat
check from dad if he thruSts it upon
the blushing pair.
do not mean to say that the mod
ern man and maid make it a practice
to get all out of father that they can;
because, even If there were no father
and the girl happened to be one Of the
working class whose dot depends en-
tirely upon her slender savings, they
would still marry, and perhaps be hap
py forever after.
But if John can't feather his little
nest with Sheraton furniture and vary
his daily bread with plenty Of cake, it
won't do any harm to let him remain
in single blesSedness until he can.
The French put a money value on
marriage. They fall in love after their
respective parents have arranged the
match. The young people begin to call
each other by their first names after
they are husband and wife. remem-
Der staying with a French family sew
eral years ago. The head of the house
was Scandalized by the familiarity
with which the American girls and
men called each other by their first
names.
We are pleased to call our American
marriage system marriage for love.
And probably it is. But the appalling
number of divorces in the United
States is an awful reflection on the
conStancy of American lovers. The
sentimental may sentimentalize and
the sob sisters sob, but to my mind
marriage for love alone, with no visi-
BILE means of support, is as hopeless
as Don Quixote fighting the windmills.
One might as well attempt to swim
Niagara Falls, for the continuous
strain of making ends meet is as re.
lentleSS as the tons of water rushing
over the cataract.
The happiness of French marriages
is well known. The dot system works
out admirably. Girls whose. dots are
large get husbands in their own class,
those who have no dots get to work
and earn them. And Jacques sits back
nOnchalantly and twirls his mustache
until the lady Of his heart makes what
he considers a dOwry suitable to his
place in society. This sounds SNUG
and self-satisf1ed, and so it is; but such
is the custom of the country. The end
justitieS the means; the French bOur-
geoisie are the happiest people on the
face of the earth.
Money makes the mare co." espe-
cially the matrimonial mare. She gal
lOps when the drivers pockets single,
but her tread is slow and dragging
when love alone points the way. I
wonder if the abolition of the dot sys-
tenn will accomplish it's object? Will
France be any more populous because
marriage be easier? l doubt it.