Unwilling Brides

1896

If there is a person on earth entitled to sincere commiseration, it is an unwilling bride — a girl who has given her hand, without her heart, in marriage; and more especially is she to be pitied if her heart, unhappily, has been prepossessed by another. Can any prospect be more dreary than that which lies before such a bride? What has she to look forward to, what to expect, what to hope? Linked not for a day, but for life, to one with whom she has no sympathy — who is no more than a stranger, save that in law and in fact but not in soul, he is her husband!

Is it not dreadful to contemplate? How much more so to experience! It is natural and it is proper that parents should desire that their daughters should marry well, and it is reasonable that they should prefer for them husbands in comfortable circumstances.

But when it comes to the exercise of compulsion in the selection of a husband — to commanding a daughter to relinquish an engagement or an attachment on which her whole soul is fixed, and to marry a man towards whom she feels indifference or dislike — that is a very different matter.


Why Men Become Bald

Men become bald more frequently than women because of the closeness of the hats they wear, which keeps the head too hot, induces perspiration and weakens the hair. The boys of the famous Blue Coat school in London, who never wear hats, never become bald late in life.

New York Man Never Kissed

1910

Handsome Easterner Makes Blushing Admission — Likes Girls

New York. — Can a man live 40 years in New York, with all its pretty girls, without kissing or being kissed? Here is one man who says he can. He points to his own case as an instance, and the other day he told why. Olin W. Hill, secretary of the Carnegie Safe Deposit company, is the man. He is over forty, handsome, well groomed, and bears all the outward marks of a man-about-town.

But Mr. Hill has at last fallen a victim to Cupid's darts, and he blushingly admitted his engagement to Miss Martha Brown, daughter of Mrs. Slater Brown of Seattle.

"The young woman is now in New York purchasing her trousseau," Mr. Hill said, "and she expects her mother here shortly.

"Until now I have never been in love with any woman, have never kissed a woman, or even thought of proposing. I had intended to keep my engagement secret until Miss Brown's mother arrived, and then let her make the announcement, but the false reports that I was to marry a stenographer named Miss Brown in the employ of the Carnegie Trust company had to be corrected."

Mr. Hill admitted that he liked the girls well enough, but said that he believed that no man had a right to kiss one until after marriage.

Life in Dreary Iceland; Romance in America

1878

Life in Dreary Iceland

Men and women, masters and servants, all inhabit the same room, while the cleanliness is not much attended to; but poor as they are, and accustomed to great privations, they set an example of cheerful contentment. The beauty of the young girls is remarkable; their fair hair falls in long plaits, partially covered by a black cloth coil, daintily worn on one side of the head, and finished at the top with a tassel of colored silk run through a silver or steel buckle, which floats on the shoulder. It reminds the traveler of the Greek head-dress, but the blue eyes, with their sweet, benevolent expression, soon recall to his mind their Danish origin. The dress is made of the cloth woven in the country, and on festive days the bodice is gaily adorned with silver braid and velvet, while the belt and sleeves are ornamented with silver devices, beautifully chased and often of great value. On wet and cold days the shawl becomes a useful mantilla, completely enveloping the head, and defending the wearer from the effects of the frequent storms. — Chambers' Journal.


Condensed Romance

1878

Who says that there is no romance in practical America? Who says that the days of chivalry and love-making are gone, and that this is a world of ledgers and blue stockings?

Why, the exchange table shows:

(a) that romance begins early: for a Chicago lad of fourteen eloped, last week, with a sweet little miss of thirteen;

(b) that it gets on fast: for a dashing naval officer proposed to a Washington belle last Tuesday, was accepted on Wednesday and married on Saturday;

(c) that it is numerous: for a woman in Coventry, Conn., swears that, like the good wife in Chaucer's tale, she has had seven husbands, and that they have annoyed her all her life by turning up after she had every reason to suppose that they had been hanged as pirates, or carried off by small-pox;

(d) that it is exceedingly uncertain: for "Clara," of Westfield, Mass., broke the engagement the moment she heard that her betrothed had been bitten by a mad dog, on the ground that it would be unsafe to marry a man who might have the hydrophobia;

(e) that it is never too late for it: for a farmer in Massachusetts, who confessed his seventy-third year, hired his neighbor's son to find a wife for him, insisting that she must be young and pretty, and the agent brought to the venerable widower an engaging lass of seventeen, who, rather than work out for a living, professed her willingness to marry him, and to inherit his money in the sweet by-and-by; but the marriage has cost the old man dear, for, besides the commissions charged by the neighbor's son, he has had to give his daughter, who was the bride's senior by eight years, $10,000 outright before she would consent to leave his roof and allow him to enjoy his honeymoon. — New York Tribune.

Engagement is Announced at Tea Party

Ohio, 1918

Miss Marguerite Moyer of Bellefontaine avenue entertained a coterie of her intimate friends at her home Tuesday evening at 6 o'clock tea. The table was attractively decorated in a color scheme of pink and white, and during the last course the announcement of the engagement of Miss Zada Moyer, sister of the hostess and Mr. Mitchell B. Hissong, of Detroit, Mich., was made. The announcement came as a complete surprise and the bride elect was showered with congratulations.

The wedding will be an event of October. The girls enjoying the evening were: Misses Berda Smith, Clara McPherron, Ruth Remagen, Kathleen Neff, Esther Roberts, Mary Tyhurst, Mrs. Howard Courtney, Mrs. Clifford Slater, Miss Lura Bateson, Mrs. Albert Stump, Miss Zada Moyer and the hostess Marguerite Moyer.

—The Lima Daily News, Lima, Ohio, Sept. 18, 1918, p. 2.