POLYGAMY IN UTAH.

South Canterbury Times, Issue 3489, 11 June 1884, Page 3

POLYGAMY IN UTAH.

In the opinion of an intelligent American visitor to Utah, who communicates tho results of his observations to the “Nation,” Mormonism is rapidly dying out. Polygamy is now the exception—daily becoming rarer—not tho rule in the Mormon territory. Twenty-five years ago it was “ the staple of exhortation and command.” Now it is held to bo only for the few, the elite, the chiefs; it is the reward of special virtue, and constitutes the badge of aristocracy.” At a meeting recently held in one of the settlements there was great lamentation, the writer tells us, on the part of the elders over the fact that the rising generation of girls was so depraved as to be determined to have a whole husband or none,” and one heartbroken septuagenarian possessed of only seven or eight inartiall partners declared with heavy heart that, if he should need a young wife in addition, he knew not where to look for the same. The exj travagance of fashion, which moralists are so ready to denounce, has had much to do with the moralisation of Utah. Marriage, according to Sydney Smith, may be defined as an insane desire on the part of one man to pay for the board and lodging of another man’s daughter. But it also involves paying for clothing, and thanks to the expensive tastes of the day in the matter of female dress, tho wealthiest of Mormons can hardly afford to clothe more than a very moderate number of wives.