For instance, a Frenchman, no matter what his age, cannot legally marry without the consent of his parents, a fact which it is just as well for English girls to remember.
Now I know that you will not be offended with me when I tell you that your fiancé, although a man of business, is not a business man.
This may sound contradictory, but is not really so. There are many men who follow regular occupations and attend to their own particular business and yet are not, strictly speaking, men of business habits and instincts. Literary men, musicians, artists, and inventors may be generally regarded as instances in point. And Gerald, who is an engineer and inventor, is not one of the exceptions to the rule, which is my reason for offering you the following suggestions.
In the first place I would strongly advise you to persuade Gerald to insure his life in some respectable English office; the American ones are risky.
It is true that he is making a good income, but he has very little money put by for a rainy day, for both of which reasons I would suggest that he takes out a policy for £1,000 with profits. The premium for insuring without profits would be a little less, but I am certain that it is better on the whole to insure with profits.
The policy he can assign to you or leave you in his will, or, if he waits till you are married, he can, if he likes, effect what is called a trust policy for your benefit, and, so long as any object of the trust remains unperformed, the policy will not form part of his estate or become subject to his debts. The last few words of the foregoing sentence you will be able to understand. You need not trouble your head about the meaning of "trust" and "performance"; it is sufficient for you to know that the arrangement is intended to benefit married ladies, and can be carried out under the provisions of the Married Women's Property Act.
All the above I am aware sounds dreadfully technical; but it is extremely difficult when writing on legal matters to avoid legal phraseology, the danger being that the omission of a single word in a sentence may have the effect of giving a totally wrong interpretation of the law.
The Act which I have mentioned above also gives you the right to retain sole control of the money left you by your god-mother. It was not a very large amount—£50, if I remember rightly. I should advise you to deposit it in the Post Office Savings Bank if you have not already done so. You will receive two and a half per cent. annual interest for it, which is rather more than double what any ordinary bank would offer you.
There is only one thing more that I wanted to mention, and I have left it to the last because it is perhaps the most important thing of all—it is on the subject of wills. It is not generally known that every will is revoked by marriage.
You cannot make a will, my dear Dorothy, because you are not yet twenty-one years of age; but Gerald can, and I consider that it is his duty, and the duty of every man who gets married, to make his will, no matter however small the amount of the property he has to dispose of may be.