HINTS TO UNMARRIED LADIES.

Ashburton Guardian, Volume 1, Issue 77, 23 March 1880, Page 3

HINTS TO UNMARRIED LADIES.

A certair has made out a table showa very fraction, what a •woman’s chafices of marrying are for every year of her life. This most precious document should be posted, I think, on the doors of all our churches, and if, after such pointed admonition, young girls trifle away their time, the blame is entirely their own. The calculations were made, I understand, upon 876 cases, but for the sake of greater perspicuity let us enlarge the denominator to 1000. Of 1000 married women, taken with our selection, it is found that the number married at each age is as below. Or if (by an arithmetical licence) we call a woman’ chances of marriage in the whole course of her life 1000, her chances in each two years will be shown in the table : AGE. CHANCES. AGE. CHANCES. 14-15 16-17 18-19 20-21 22-23 24-25 26-27 3000 Now this table, it will be seen, tells us that one half of a woman’s chances of marriage are gone when she has completed her twentieth year ; and mind you what the consequence of this is. She must, as seamen say, “ carry less sail,” and shoot at a lower mark. At 23 she ought to be “ very reasonable,” for three-fourths of the golden opportunities are gone, never to return. At 26 you will see at a glance that sauciness is out of the question, for your hopes, if the case should be yours, fair reader, will be shrunk to the- small fraction of an eighth. Possibly you may think the poor fellows you once despised fine “ catches.” At 31, despair should begin to wrinkle your brow, for when that age comes, and finds you single, pray remember that if you have in the circle of you acquaintance forty marrying men (a rare contingency) you have just one solitary chance among them all. When you stand on the dread verge of 36, it is “quite too awfully terrible” to reflect that of the thousand chances with which you started, three only remain—a miserable remnant of three. It is now high time to bespeak lodgings for a single lady, and to procure a couple of cats. Therefore, t( carpe diem,” or in plain English, improve your time. There are plenty of Parkises about. —Ccehebs. Thames, 17th Feb., 1880.