SEEKING WIVES AND HUSBANDS.

New Zealand Graphic, Volume VIII, Issue 36, 12 September 1891, Page 366

SEEKING WIVES AND HUSBANDS.

gS-azMtegg’VT FRENCH writer has just published in the [3 \ouvellesde Munich a curious account of 8 marriages by means of advertisements from •W I 3 their origin up to the present day. The 3 oldest advertisement dates back to July Bth, 1738, and was inserted in the Feuille d'Avis of I*rankfort. It was couched in these terms : An honest young girl, single, well made and very pretty, with m ? f obtaining an inheritance of 100.000 francs, which justly Sh’l? *“ •* 11 K country, seeks a lawyer, a single man. who ntr? 118 ,* t K- Baln lawsmt for her. In exchange the voung girl offers to become the lawyer s wife. 3 s It would be interesting to know if candidates presented themselves and if the lawsuit was won, tut the German journalist has not pushed his searches that far. Notwithstanding all the progress made in the science of advertising, the matrimonial advertisements of the past possess a savour which those put forth by our modern matrimonial agencies totally lack. One can judge of this from the following advertisement which appeared Mav 2 1812, in the Intelligenzblatt of Leipsic : ’ Four honest and very pretty girls, from eighteen to twenty-four $ ears of age, belonging to a good country family, and each of whom possesses a marriage portion of 3,000 florins, desire to get married in order to live in town. They flatter themselves that they are good housekeepers, for they have been accustomed to all sorts Of work, and they set greater store by honesty and good family than by fortune. For more extended information, gentlemen not older than forty, and having no personal defect, inlv can address the office of publication. - The above advertisement is perhaps a trifle long, but at least it is explicit. In this regard, however, the palm belongs to a card in the Journal de Munich of 1840 Assuredly advertisements must have cost much less than at present to judge by the dimensions of that one which read as follows : According to the record I am already seventy, but according to my strength lam but t wenty-five. She who I desire to wed must be between sixteen and twenty, must have beautiful hair, handsome teeth and small feet. She must be born of good and honest parents, and her reputation must be without stain. She must dress plainly in velvet and silk and under no pretext wear any other stuff. Neither do I want her to wear ear-rings, chains hnger-rmgs, nor other like trinkets, nor false hair. She must, never make her dresses in accordance with the prevailing fashion for there is nothing more detestable than aping the follies of others. I wish her to have her dresses made in conformity with ber.particular taste and do not want her to pay any attention to the remarks of fashionable people. L I want her to know how to ride a horse, or to learn eouestrianism if she is ignorant of it. She must never amuse by embroidering, for that kind of exercise of the lingers is good onlv mask emptiness of mind. I want her to be able to plav on sonie musical instrument, but to understand music thoroughly for nothing is more insupportable than the din, miscalled music with which young woman ordinarily afflict those who five in the’same house with them. She shall be absolute mistress of the hou<e as I shall consider it a pleasure to submit to her reasonable caprices it being odious in my opinion for the wife to be a slave of the hu"’ band. She will accompany me in all my travels and everywhere! may go, for it is a shame for men to pass their da vs and nights in the while they leave their wives to worry themselves to death all alone at home. In using the word ‘ must ’as I have above, I have not wished to imply an idea of submission, but merely to indicate an understanding, an agreement wholly to the wife’s advantage On the dayof her marriage she will receive 30.000 gulden in Russian or Prussian obligations, but she will engage to spend each vear the revenue of that sum, for nothing is more repugnant than the vice of avarice. She mnst never dance, for I should not like to see my wife bob around like a fool. If she is rich, she will be the mistress of her fortune, but she must spend all her income for I more stupid than saving up for the benefit of others. Enjoy life—that is my principle and my philosophy. We may still find some treasure-troves in the sheets of certain countries, wheie publicity is less costly. For example, quite recently at Loda, in Russian Poland, the journal ot the town inserted the following advertisement : lam an honest working-girl and I work in the factory. My father owns fifty hogs, each worth thirty rubles. I work at the factory. as I have said, and whoever wants me can have me in lawful marriage America has the speciality of advertisements which are not commonplace, as, for instance, that which a certain Miss Georgina MacClarman recently published: Fellow citizens! Can you remain indifferent in the presence of a well-bred compatnot.acquainted with music, possessing all that one can desire, even though she be reduced to seeking a husband through the medium of the newspapers 1 Make hifste. citizens. Forward, march! Marriage or death! Advance wirhout fear. Since the world has existM. never has a cowardiv heart been able to win a woman! * u An advertisement still more bizarre, and which proves that the redskins are decidedly in it is this one, culled from the Prairie Journal: An Indian chief offers a thousand horses to the white man who " ill marry his daughter, aged 18 years. In exchange the white man will inhabit the Indian 'lerntory and teach the Indians how to plough lhe horses represent a capital of $BO,OOO. The voung Indian girl is of medium height. She has black eves, abundant hair and charming. Alas ! even among the redskins the idyls have to-day bloomed in the form of advertisements ! How far removed are we from Longfellow’s poetic reveries ! In Paris singularly worded matrimonial advertisements are constantly published. Some of these are undoubtedly genuine, emanating from country girls who wish to make their way to the giddy capital, or from girls tired of poverty and toil who wish for lelief from their misery in the agreeable shape of a husband; but experience will teach that the majority of these advertisements are so many traps laid by designing adventuresses to ensnare and capture unwary men with a view of despoiling them of what money they may possess. 3 Only recently thirty men, mostly Parisians who should have known better, were caught by the specious advertisements of a woman who kept them all on the hooks until she had beguiled them into making her all the gifts they would, wheu she abandoned them if she could, but if not married them and vanished immediately after the performance of the nuptial ceremony no one knew whither. She was finally exposed, and received her just deserts at the hands of the law she had outraged, but that afforded small satisfaction to her fleeced dupes, who of course, never again as much as caught sight of their precious cash. If the real truth about nine-tenths of the matrimonial advertisements and matrimonial agencies could be reached and w-ritten up, it would afford some highly interesting reading or the sensational type worthy of comparison with the best detective romances ever conceived and published by Emile Gaboriau or that equally fertile genius, Xavier de Montepin.