COST OF A DAUGHTER

Taranaki Daily News, 19 July 1929, Page 10

COST OF A DAUGHTER

FROM BIRTH TO MARRIAGE. Clearing out old receipt files awakens old and sometimes painful memories. Recently I came upon a receipted doctor’s bill for £3O. That was baby! Pinned to 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 acknowledged receipt of £lO “to one dark blue 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 the income tax (writes a chartered accountant in the London Daily Mail). And the initial cost is nothing compared with the maintenance charges, which now, in her third year, are mounting appreciably. The disturbing thought comes to me, how much will she have cost by the time she is 21? School bills considered, I doubt if the outlay will bo less than £3900. When on some distant day a nervous young man inform- me that he wishes to marry my daughter, I shall not ask him wnether he can support her in a worthy state. I shall hand him a neatly docketed bundle of receipted bills. “Aly dear fellow,” I shall say, you can have her bv all means—at a valuation. Just cast your eye' through these accounts and you will see that she has cost me £3OOO 18s 10d.. I shall charge 2| per cent, commission only. Take her or leave her!”