COSTLY DAUGHTERS

Manawatu Times, Volume LIV, Issue 6953, 5 July 1929, Page 11

COSTLY DAUGHTERS

ACCOUNTANT’S ESTIMATE.

Clearing out old receipt flies awakens old and- sometimes-- painful memories (writes an accountant in the Daily Mail). Recently, ha says, ho came upon a receipted doctor’s bill for £3O. That wds the baby. Pinned to.i.this was another for £24 15s.>'-3d. in payment to a lady called a ‘'monthly nurse,” although she apparently stayed six weeks. (Messrs. Blank gratefully acknowledge receipt of £lO "to one dark bluo perambulator.” And so it went on. Before she was a few weeks in this world baby had a large'debit to set off against her rebate on tho income tax. And the initial cost is nothing compared with the maintenance charges, which now in her third year are mounting appreciably. The writer goes on, to say:—"Tho disturbing thought comes to me: How much will she have cost by the time she is 21? School bills considered.- I doubt it the outlay will bo less than £3OOO. When on some distant day a nervous young man informs mo that ho wishes to marry my daughter. I shall not ask him whether he can support her in a w or^l 7 state. I shall hand him a neatly-docketed bundle of receipted bills. " ‘My dear fellow,' I shall say, ‘you can have her by all means—at a valuation. Just cast your eye through these accounts and you will see that she has cost me £3OOO 18s. lOd. I shall charge 2j per cent, commission only. Take her or leave her! ’ ”