The New Zealand Graphic AND LADIES' JOURNAL. SATURDAY, JULY 25, 1891.

New Zealand Graphic, Volume VIII, Issue 30, 25 July 1891, Page 200

The New Zealand Graphic AND LADIES' JOURNAL. SATURDAY, JULY 25, 1891.

There is a curious practice in our midst which, as it periodically occurs, must draw tears from the eyes of the angelic host. It happens unto all men to die once, and now and then, though not with especial readiness, a certain gentleman of sable hue gathers to himself a poor wandering sheep from the parental fold, and the bench and bar assemble to mourn over the absence of a dear brother rudely torn from them in the midst of his usefulness and strength. Death has the effect of purifying the reputation of us all. None appear to such advantage as when they are lying in state at the last. Indians, according to the American trapper, are then, for once at least, ‘ good,’ and, so one learns from the funeral orations pronounced upon them by their sorrowing fellows, are lawyers.

Merchants, bankers, clerks, commission agents, tradesmen, actors artists, musicians, and the rest of the toilers fora living are, curiously enough, content to note, unrecorded, the gaps made in their midst by the touch of Azrael’s darkly waving wing. As for doctors, their feelings upon the death of a colleague are such that no amount of hypocrisy has ever yet been found sufficient to disguise them. The clergy, too, are accustomed to take such visitations calmly as being part of the divine dispensation to which they can bow with cheerful, though chastened hearts, tempered by the thought of the benelice that has been vacated. It is, however, when the waters of life have closed up over the head of one of Satan’s corps de elite, that the tiood-gates of regret are burst open, and the public view the edifying spectacle of a real heartfelt corporate sorrow. Who shall say after this that contact with the hard arcana of life has the effect of freezing up the fountains of compassion and esteem ?

Does not His Honor weep as the senior member of the bar recounts in language of the most recherche brand, bottled up for these occasions, the occult store of virtues which life so long overlaid in the deceased ? Wonderingly the other brothers sit, their wigs shaking in reverent awe at that laying bare of a heart of which they humbly confess they were unable, while there was yet time, to compass the full extent. Now he is gone with his incomparable brain power, his fund of legal lore, his straightforwardness, his temperateness, his moderation in all things—even in fees. What shall we do without him 1 His was a glorious voice, too, for he could shout at the other bar as well as at this one. Now, alas 1 we shall have to do the shouting for ourselves. Hence there is a sincere sorrow over one lawyer' that departeth, and if there be any unseemly rejoicing it is, let us hope, among the unfledged clerks. They have never enjoyed the peculiar virtues of the departed, but have known him merely in his capacity as a devourer of six and eightpences innumerable, and the sight of his vacant shoes breeds renewed hope in their ambitious souls.

Among the other progressive ideas which are taking hold of the modern mind is that of the facilitation of divorce. In this matter, as in most others, the United States leads the van. There, for almost a generation, the laws on the subject have been of the newest character. The I nion is now composed of forty-four States. Each of these, front Delaware, which is smaller than Taranaki, to Texas, which is three ami a half times as large as the whole of New Zealand, has been free to pass whatever laws it chooses on every subject not of federal import. That is to say, they are as independent of each other as are Victoria and New Zealand in matters relating to the domestic relations, and much else. Hence the extraordinary stories of couples taking the train to get married or divorced in the journey

as they pass from a State having one law of marriage to another possessing a different law. The result of this has been to create a wide and wonderful field for matrimonal experiment among a young people speaking a common tongue, and having enormous facilities of locomotion. It is there, consequently, that the European marriage institution is being put to the strongest test, and it is there that the relationship between man and woman is likely to settle down npon its fresh basis. There are certain persons in the United States who are already beginning to cry out for the introduction of a common system of marriage law for the whole Union, which would represent the average sense of the existing American people on the subject. Marriage would then become part of the Federal Constitution. Seeing, however, the intense jealousy which each State shows to the slightest whittling away of its supremacy in domestic matters —a jealousy which gave rise to the War of Secession thirty years since—the probability of the Union ever having a common law of marriage seems to be very faint indeed. In the present fluctuating condition of the American population this would in reality be undesirable, as for three or four generations at least the view of the subject, must, from time to time, undergo considerable modification. Such a tendency to modification is in fact being exhibited by the European peoples, despite the ridicule in which they love to indulge regarding the habits of their American cousins. Half-a-dozen years since France enacted her first law of divorce, of which more women have so far availed themselves than men. England, after a terrible hubbub, introduced her first general law on the subject thirty-four years ago, and now, accepting the laws of Scotland and New South Wales as excuses or precedents, is deprecatingly considering the wisdom of a fresh movement onwards.

The inclination to legislate on the question is an outcome of the manifestion of public feeling as it appears expressed in the newspapers and periodicals of the day. The mooting of the question, ‘ls Marriage a Failure?’ by the London Daily Telegraph three years ago seems to have hit the nail upon the head, for ever since that discussion closed at the 27,000 th letter, it has been kept up in some form or other in current literature. The recent futile attempt of Mr Jackson to abduct his own wife, known as the Clitheroe case, has added fresh fuel to the fire. Men are naturally anxious to ascertain what rights they are to enjoy in the married state. In English communities their position now is that they are liable to maintain their wife and children, but have no interest in the property of their wife, or right to keep their wife at home. In many of the American States a man is not much better oil'. If he marries a penniiess woman, she gets a joint-interest in his property with almost the same facilities as the English wife of leaving him. His is only at an advantage, therefore, when he has not money and she has. Then he is more fortunate than the English husband. Despite all asseverations to the contrary, the practical tendency at the present time seems to be to secure the paternity and maintenance of the children without very much regard for the mother, and still less for the father. These two are apparently to be left to arrange matters as best they can. What society is coming to is the idea of marriage as a union by simple contract, and as women go more out into the world and become selfsupporting, that view of marriage will probably become more prevalent.

It is sad to think that among the other institutions which are sharing in thegeneral depression is the temple of Bellamy. Assuming that its management has not been linked in any way with the genius which has presided in the Department of the Official Trustee, it is difficult to understand why such a popular establishment does not thrive. The public must be clearly under a misapprehension in supposing that a seat in Bellamy’s is the ambition of our aspiring legislators, or, what is more probable, they do not realize the significant aptitude of the majority of our members in getting tick from waitresses and barmaids. There is no more arduously thirsty work than the pursuit of political fame, and to some members the dinners and sundries with which they are treated, or treat themselves at the public expense at Bellamy's, are in reality the brightest spots in their career, andon which they will love to dwell when the arch-enemy steps in and says finally that for them the comestibles are all ‘off’and the liquors locked up.

It is a great institution is Bellamy’s, and to the ambition and enthusiasm it has been in the habit of exciting amongst the members we owe some of the brightest speeches and most thrilling episodes of New Zealand history. To it we probably owe also several millions more of debt than we should otherwise have enjoyed, when fired with its communicated virtues members poured in to acclaim the financial necromancy of the Hebrew seer, now, alas ! cruelly estranged from us. In these blessings all New Zealand participates, but it is to Bellamy that the inhabitants of Wellington should be especially grateful, for, from it radiates that jocund influence which results in their enjoying any number of free shows in no wise inferior to the efforts of the sweet negro minstrels, whose visits are more intermittent than those of the white confreres kindly deputed by the constituencies. Let us hope that so noble an institution will not founder under the present deficit, and the voters of New Zealand be robbed of one of their great inducements for tempting the unemployed into the council of the nation.