“No Presents, by Request.”

New Zealand Graphic, Volume XLIII, Issue 23, 8 December 1909, Page 7

“No Presents, by Request.”

Is it really philanthropic to set a “No presents, by request” example in announcing a wedding? In the particular case which has caught the Argus eyes of the “Daily Mail” the bridegroom is a Soudan judge, and there is ample evidence to show’ that couples who are going to live abroad are often more worried than gratified by being cumbered with a mass of showy lumber. But it is more doubtful whether wedding presents as a whole should be discouraged. They have become, no doubt, in certain grades of society an almost intolerable tax upon mere acquaintances, and the farce of endowing a couple with twenty-five ten sets and forty-three cheese-scoops is notorious. But if those classes in which the wedding presents are not really essential to the start of a married life give them up, imitative fashion, which rapidly percolates down through all degrees, might very well rob many sting-

gling middle-class brides and bridegrooms of those genuine assistances to housekeeping which they really need and now get. Possibly the true solution ia to substitute the cheque or the cash for the article. But that too has its difficulties. A postal order for half a sovereign would not look so well as a ten-shilling gimcrack article.