The Marrying Business.

New Zealand Graphic, Volume XXXI, Issue X, 5 September 1903, Page 713

The Marrying Business.

WORK OF BUREAU FOR PROMOTION OF MATCHMAKING. An institution flourishes in New York which gives the lie to two well known and more or less accepted axioms —“marriages are made in Heaven.” though “marriage is a lottery.” Any one of the 20 clerks employed by this particular institution will tell you that marriage is a business just as much as selling groceries or drygoods. The proprietor of the concern, if he wants to take you into his confidence, can tell you that it is an extremely profitable business. “Life is before you,” he says in his official announcement to the wo-rM. “Your happiness and your prosperity depend largely on whom you marry. While you are waiting for just the right one to cross your path a hundred are ready to be introduced if we have your permission. Broader fields and greater opportunities are opened up for you. Marriage and the selection of the right partner for life’s joys and sorrows are by no means a matter of minor importance. By these methods certainly in a few weeks more opportunities are furnished both the judgment and the heart for a wise selection than by a lifetime of ordinary opportunities.” This alluring prospect is held out to both men and women on the payment of an initiation fee of £1- In addition one promises to pay in case ot successful engagement the amount of half one month’s income or wages. In case an engagement does not result, the preliminary £l, is not returned. This marriage bureau operates on a wholesale scale- It has introduced one hundred thousand men who were hankering to become benedicts to one hundred thousand women who were not averse to changing their names. From fifteen to twenty marriages a week, it is said, result from the bureau’s efforts. Two large buildings are necessary for its offices, the storage of cabinet photographs and descriptions, and for the reception rooms in which patrons meet and look eaeh other over. The bureau can make acquaintances “of any religion or nationality, among labouring or literary people, rich or poor, young or old. and in almost any locality.’" Besides, it claims to be “the surest, most direct, safest, and by all means the most economical.” There are thorns in every path, however. and there are several in the road to rich husbands and wives. The first and most striking is that a “charge for

extra service” is demanded from those who are intent on marrying money. “I want a rich husband.” says the shopgirl, who calls at the bureau after a hard day’s work. “How rich?" questions the man behind the desk. “One with a million will do fine,” she smiles“You cannot get something for nothing.” the man reminds her gently, and he hands out a scale of prices. “Persons requesting that they be introduced only to those possessing means pay an additional advance fee of £ 1 for each £ 1000 required not in excess of £5OOO. and 10 for each £lOOO in excess of £5OOO. and receive extra attention.” is the way it reads. The girl began to figure on the proposition. She found that H would cost her too much! She figured then on half a millionaire, but he was out of reach. She returned to the man at the desk. “Your rich ones are too expensive.” she declared. “Just get me a husband.” She left a cabinet photograph and a detailed description of her life and person. including a certificate of character. She received a number by which she will be known to all correspondents until she cares to give them her real name. If she cannot write correctly the bureau will do it for her. charging a shilling a letter. If she is timid about making appointments at the advertised office, she ean get a card of admission to a brownstone residence on another street, which is divided into reception rooms. The tickets are cheap (6d), and they assure one against the gossip of meddlesome or prejudiced persons. There are no end of instructions looking to the successful issue of the acquaintances made. Some of them may help those who cannot afford to take a hand in this personally conducted marriage game. “Do not state in your first letter that you have 17 children, that you have lost all your property and want a home, that you have failed in business and want some one to help you. Your second letter is abundant time for minor details and the unfavourable sid’ of your description.” Seventeen children! Minor details indeed! “Don’t send a photograph unless other

people besides yourself think it handsome. It is essential that your first letter contain the most attractive description of yourself consistent with truth. It is folly to describe the person you are seeking, for it cannot change the one who will receive vour letter."

There are some crimes which will bring about expulsion from this vast ready-to-be-married family. To break appointments without good excuse is a cardinal sin. Another is “to permit another to correspond with those to whom we have introduced you. or to introduce your friends to our patrons for matrimonial purposes; this is a fraud that will justify us in expelling you from our membership, and requiring from you the fee those should have paid whom you have introduced.” With all these conveniences at their command, can a New York man or woman look the world in the face and say he or she has never had an opportunitv to marrv? n