PURSUIT OF A HUSBAND BY THE MODERN WOMAN.
After All, Says the New York "Times,"
It Is Doubtless Better for Man to Be
Chosen Than for Him to Choose.
Taking up a discussion inaugurated by the St. James Gazette, of London, the New York Times says what it has to say on the subject of choosing wives.
The English paper said frankly that the title would better be "The Choice of a Husband," inasmuch as the male, though unaware of the fact, is generally not the pursuer, but the pursued. This condition, however, is by no means to the discredit of woman.
As the Times remarks, "A young woman whose intentions are both serious and honorable has nothing at all to be ashamed of in endeavoring by all womanly means to acquire the man whom she believes she can make happy and knows that she means to try to."
In America and England there is objection to the man who marries for any other reason than being in love. Yet the mariage de convenance is not altogether without legitimate recommendations. To quote the Times:
If one is really bent on making a marriage of reason instead of waiting for a "call," excellent recipes may be given him.
A wise man once advised his son, who had shown some disposition to choose instead of waiting to be chosen, to "look for a good woman's daughter." It would be hard to find any better basis for a happy union.
In general, of course, mixed marriages, whether the mixture be of religion or of country, would be viewed by a wise adviser with apprehension, although Lord Curzon's experience is only one of very many as to the possible happiness of marriages between persons of different nationalities, much more alike as are the nationalities of Lord and Lady Curzon than any other two nationalities.
Dr. Johnson's famous saying that marriages would be happier if they were arranged by the Lord Chancellor, due regard being paid to the ages and conditions of the parties, has never been accepted as a working rule in his own country. In France, again, there is the wholly "reasonable" and extremely circumspect Count Boni Castellane, whose marriage of reason has so lately been shown to be so far from a success.
There are quite enough more failures of the same kind to offset the unhappy marriages of romance. It is of these, of course, that Burton declares that matches are made in heaven, though matches of the sulfurous kind, of which all of us know some instances, suggest a very different place of manufacture.