The Decrease in Flopements.

Otago Witness, Issue 2580, 26 August 1903, Page 62

The Decrease in Flopements.

It is very rarely nowadays, although nothing escapes the all-seeing eye of the press, that one hears of an elopement. There are two great facts to explain this. One is that the severity o£ parents is relaxed, and the other is that the marriage laws are much more stringent. There is nothing more likely to make a youth or a girl break loose than to be held by too tight a rein. Parents of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries have learnt this important lesson. On the other hand, legislation has wisely made it extremely difficult to ba married on the sly. Leaving out of count the allimportant Gretna Green, and Scotch marriages, until late in the eighteenth, century it was fatally easy to get married in England. And later on, until the amendment of the Scottish marriage laws, youthful sentiment was greatly in favour of "romantic" marriages. One can easily see this from a study of the fiction of the early half of the last century. It used to irritate me that Jane Austen introduced melodramatic elopements into her natural pictures of English life, until I considered that these would be ordinary occurrences in her time. The tragedy in the second half of George Eliot's "Mill on the Floss" would be impossible in our day — at least, it would have to take quite a different form, since there is no longer an alluring, demoralising Gretna Green to give respectability to runaway passion. Dickens, as might be expected from the sentimental grain of his mind, was all in favour of hole-and-corner marriages frowned upon by worldly parents. A young couple walking quietly into a church early in the morning and getting married, with no witnesses but an, old pew-opener with a rusty bonnet — that ideal pleased the youth and) maiden of Dickens's day. Wedding breakfasts, and 1 carriages, and spectators, all the pomp of a legitimate ceremony, Dickens in his sentimental moods wrote of these with a gloomy and 1 blighting pen. Wedding cake, in particular, had no power over his softer fancy! Those were the iays of hard-hearted, worldly-minded fathers, who looked with a jaundiced eye upon innocent, youthful love. In other words, those were the days when foolish young people could walk out and get married without anybody knowing.

The most fascinating young man -will find it hard in our prosaic generation to persuade a girl to run away with him. She knows perfectly well, however young she may be, that it is disgrace and not romance which she will first reap. It i 9 not romance she longs for, but a description of the dresses and a list of the presents in the local newspaper. There is a vulgar side to this ideal, but it is eminentlysafe and sane. — "Gretchen," in the Scottish Farmei.

To emure publication in the forthcoming jstus letters should retell the Witness office if possible on Satutday nO/ht, but on no account later than Monday night Ctr Descriptions of balls, <£•<;., must be endorsed by either the Witness correspondent for tht.dietrict or ty the sccretai yto the hall committee. £he HIS of any correspondents icho do ?iot comply with thin rule toiU be sent to the secretari/ for endorsement prU>r to ppcariwj.—EMMELlSE WEDDING AT MABEL. Dear Emmelme, — A very pretty wedding took place at the residence of Mr and Mrs Wilson, Mabel, or "Wednesday, sth iust., when, their; eldest son William, was united in wedlock to Misa Annie Young, of Hedgehope. The Eer. Mr Bissett, of Woodlands, performed the marriage ceremony. 11l James Wilson acted as ■ bast man, and Miss Simpson, was tho bridesmaid. After the ceremony, the large company retired to the dining room, where an excellent breakfast va9 partaken of, imd where -the greatest o£ good humour prevailed". In ih% evening Mr and Mra Wilson gave a dance in honour oi the occasion, and fully 40 couple* responded to the invitations. The large bant was beautifully decorated, and the floor was in capital order. The Grand March was led off by the bride and bridegroom. Excellent music was supplied, by Messrs. Dobbie- (piano)J Grant, Kussell, Bridgeman, and M'Leod. Mr G-. Amos carried out the duties of M.C. in s capable manner. Songs were sung, by Messrs Dca and Moylan. Mr Wilson gave a cornets selection, which was greatly appreciated. Jt capital supper waa laid' upstairs in the barn, which, needless to say, was done ample justice* to. Dancing was kept up with vigour till 5 o'clock, young and old thoroughly enjoying themselves. May sunshine and prosperity ba ever with the newly-married couple, who wers the recipients of useful and valuable present* too numerous to particularise. The young 1 couple left next day for Christchurch. on their honeymoon.— A GUEST.

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