Year: 1864

Such is the comprehensive announcement
that meets the eye at the end Of those news
paper items which ladies find so interesting
under the head of " Married" The phrase
No Cards" may be interpreted as follows
Owing to the hard times and the high price
of stationery, the happy couple herein named
have concluded to dispense with the custom
of sending cards to their innumerable friends.
They trust that the virtue of economy will be
duly appreciated, when coal is 50 ton, and
the other expenses of housekeeping are in
proportion, and all going up. The happy
couple hope that this explanation will prove
satisfactory; but should it cost the loss of
anybody friendship, they will try to survive
the afliction" Something to this effect
we say, was the original idea of this inven.
tive and intrepid young couple who dared
to break over a venerable conventionalism
and put No cards" at the end of their ad-
vertised felicity 1t is intimated by others


NOT for all these grave reasons, perhaps,
but because it has become recognized and
approved (if not universally adopted) fashion.
Not often is it that economy dictates the
fashions. That has done SO in this case is
proof of that beautiful magnanimity with
which the unmarried portion Of the fair sex
adapt themselves to these trying crcumstan-
ces in our national history, and take from
the dilatory lover his last weak excuse Of
" too poor now; guess I'll wait till the war
is over" When the war is over, the ladies
may conclude to recede from this liberal
proposition, and insist on their time honored
privilege of scattering showers Of pasteboard
over the country.


Now is the time to make up matrimonial
arrangements cheap for the same self sacri-
fcing spirit that consents to "nD caIds' may
possibly agree to other economical arrange
ments ofthe grand budget Of wedding ex-
penses. But that is point upon, which
we are not authorized to make statement
and we must refer anxious inquirers to the
only scources where they can be correctly in
formed, viz, in whose opinion of the case
they are most directly interested.


This partially discarded custom Of sending
cards was a very pretty custom. 1t was
pleasant to receive occasionally those double
envelopes, and that excess of pasteboard
tied with the emblematical silken cord, which
marked an eventful epoch in the lives and
experience of ones friends, and showed that
one was not forgotten in the rush of agreea-
BILE anitcipations Just at this time, too
photography was beining to find a capital
use for some of that superfuous pasteboard
by copying the heads of the expectant pair
upon it and conveying to the distant friends
of either party what the other party looked
like. With the end of the war and the re-
turn of some measure Of our national pros
perity, and fall in the price Of stationery,
the announcement of " No Card" may pass
out of fashion, and photography give new
charm to the hymeneal pasteboard Of the flu
ture.-N T. Journal Of Commerce.


CATS AND WoMEN.-It is not surprising
that the cat should be thought the analogue
of woman. Her very soubriquet of Grimal-
kin-the grey intimates that she
suggested to our ancestors the idea of fair
spirit emergent from the gloom, like the
White Lady of Avenel. Her vagueness of
color, and the luminousness of her eyes in the
dark, led the ignorant to conceive that there
was something supernatural about the cat,
and gave birth to superstitions not yet quite
eradicated from the popular mind; and
very disagreeable impression is undoubtedly
made by the weird and uncauny crcumstan-
ces Adopting the more kindly view, Gray,
in charming poem, familiar to all, terms
puss "nymph )" and indeed what better
representation of the grace, sensibility, witch
cry, artifce and malice of the sex can be
found among brutes. The frisky volatility
of the kitten, yet innocent of the blood of
mice, of girl yet ignorant of Che power of
her charms and the noisless movement and
sedate demeanor of the mature Tabby, recall
the experienced matron. From involuntary
associations of ideas, the volatile girl is spo-
ken of as mischievous kitten" the French
man fondly addresses his spouse as "nla
chatte, and some persons, by strange men
tai obliquity, vituperate any obnoxious old
woman as " that old cat"


SHASTA STAGE.-Mr. Rice of Shasta,
Cal, arrived in this city on Wednesday af-
ternoon with nassen0ers direct from Shasta