DOMESTIC TRAGEDIES

NZ Truth, Issue 890, 16 December 1922, Page 13

DOMESTIC TRAGEDIES

Chief Cause* Considered POVERTY, JEALOUSY, AND DISILLUSION. Romance Ruined By Reality. Tho epidemic of domestic tragedies from which Now Zealand m "common with other countries, is suffering, is merely the usual tragedy of modern marriage. The loosened moral fibre of the people — due to the unsettling conditions created by the war — is merely a minor cause. With but enough exceptions to prove the general rule, all the shootings, stabbings, and slayings occur among people .to whom the problem of existence is so insistent as to overshadow all other interests m life. Where two, or more If there are children, are( trying to live on what will not support one decently, domestic dissension, is inevitable. Humanity, as everyone knows, Is capable of Immense sacrifices — the renunciation of love, or for the' sake, of near and dear ones, of life itself. But such sacrifices must not be unduly prolonged. If the act of renunciation Is too long drawn out, the nerves get frayed and 'the warm glow of selfsaorlflce evaporates. There is always suoh a disappointing lack of appreciation. THB NOBILITY OF SOTJL. all the finer qualities which inspired ~ the sacrifice, are only recognised and enthused over, because of their rarity. When renunciation becomes a habit It ceases to appeal. Those who benefit accept it as a matter of course. Then, should the sacriflcer discontinue tha habit and return to the normal selfishness of average humanity, a feeing of resentment is immediately aroused. „ He, or she, has created a demand and refuses to supply it- A most intolerable form of selfishness. As small sacrifices hurt as much as great ones, or more, many of them, the sacriflcer reacts to. the resentment. The selfishness is not on his, or her, side — It is confined exclusively to the beneficiaries. ■' ' i Once started, this sort of resentment grows by what it feeds on, and sooner or later the inevitable tragedy happens along. Here is A STORY FROM REAL. IJFE r which will illustrate this argument. A few months ago, a young couple were I battling to get a home together. For a while all went merry as a marriage | bell. They dwelt high up ln the rosetinted cloudland Of romance. No sacrifice, on either side, was too great. Accustomed comforts were cheerfully foregone. Deprivations due to their altered conditions of living were endured with a smile. A kiss healed a hurt, and a caress Was ample recompense for any of the small disappointments inseparable from matrimony on unstable financial foundations. But, alas! EVEN KISSES GROW COLD and caresses cease to comfort when poverty persistently thrusts a bony hand between married lovers. Life m lodgings— the discomforts,, the deprivations, the delay ln the materialising of their own fondly-visioned nuptial nest — all these helped to fray the nerves of both husband and wife. Gradually they became estranged, and love's youn«j dream was threatened with a rude awakening. The .-grey dawn of reality was close at v hand, but Instead of the sunshine of love ushering m a new day, the red fires of wrath and hatred scorched and shrivelled the hearts and hopes of the young couple, and left them groping amidst the cold ashes of their lost love. Their domestic tragedy was a ghastly and horrible one- Yet, so, strangely interwoven are farce and tragedy, it was precipitated by a mere trifle — a cold, cooked fowl, price 4s fed. Leading up to THE GRIM DENOUEMENT — "she" did riot properly appreciate the sacrifices he was making for her soke. She was careless, and — now the glamor was gone—somewhat selfish aB well. Instead of saving, she was frittering money away. If she didn't care enough; if she wouldn't make sacrifices as well as ' him — what was the use? So the resentful young husband sought his little amusements and small ~ luxuries elsewhere. On tho other hand, the young wife. . living m "rooms" and lodging-house v was keenly realising the loss of th comforts and luxuries she had enjoy ed when she was single. AH the sac rifice was on her side. "He" could g out and enjoy himself while she wn "stuck at home"— -in a squalid hopele • boarding-house. Such a home, too. N comfort, no -conveniences, no nothlnr Not oven decent food, It was intoler able. Why shoud she do all the scrimp Ing and saving while "he" was havln his fling elsewhere? It was all ver well, this sacrifice and Bolf-denlal bu«? lness. But it ought to be mutual. "He" expected her TO BEAR ALL THE BURDEN —and hitherto she had borne it. - Eve to the extent of going hungry. But sh would do so no longer. Then, poo soul, she went out and bought a col fowl, hereinbefore mentioned. Whe "he" came home, and was confronte ' with such damning evidence of ho i extravagance, he reproached her v«* # • hemently. She retorted; and mutua recriminations embittered existent* for both for several days. Eventuall the young husband "ckme his nut." and seising the 'erstwhile "apple o" his eye," hacked and slashed at her faco with a knife until her screams brought assistance. At the subsequent trial lt was admitted that there was no suspicion • of infidelity on cither side. Just the j grinding monotonous misery of poverty \ —ot two trying to live on what was not sufficient for one. That, and tho impotent jealousy of the inefficient - male. "I only wanted," he confessed m court, "to spoil her good looks — not to kill her." She was a good-look-ing girl, and ho feared, ho said, that with him out of tho way she might OET- SOME OTHER MANSome fellow perb*Hps who was more efficient, and could provide her with money enough to buy a cold fowl every day If she felt bo inclined. Recognising, subconsciously maybe, his own incapacity, the distraught young husband had determined that the bliss denied him should be enjoyed neither by Ms wife nor his possible supplanter m her affections, Thus It was that while he went to gaol, she was left, dreadfully disfigured and still more dreadfully disillusioned, to face the problem of existence alone and unaided, and with a woman's greatest asset —her attractiveness— gono for ever. A sordid tragedy, indeed! But then all domestic tragedies among tho working classes are sordid afalrs. Even those arising out of infidelity. They are all provoked by the monotonous squalor of existence, nnd the shootings and stabbings indulged m are a reflex of tho lives lod by tho nctora. Nor can anyone who has experienced it honestly say that life Is not a sordid affair where two — or moro If there are children — aro trying to live on what will barely support one In decent comfort.

A correspondent wants a recipe for elderberry wine. Will some reader please oblige?