LATE AND EARLY MARRIAGES .

Dominion, Volume 4, Issue 1097, 8 April 1911, Page 11

LATE AND EARLY MARRIAGES .

WHICH ABE HAPPIER? Some remarkable facts in connection with married lite are brought out by Sir John Macclomiell in an analysis of the divorce statistics for the past ton years. It seems that in 85 per cent of tlio cases divorce takes place after five years of" married life. Hero are the figures showing the duration of marriages :— Per cent. Less than 1 year 38 or -11 From Ito 2 years ... 106 or 2.11 From 2 to 5 years 1137 or 12.2-3 From 5 to ](1 years 28G5 to 30.8(5 From 10 to 20 years 3868 to 41.6fi 20 years and upwards 1179 to 12.70 Another question which Sir John Jlacdonnell put to the statistics was whether the marriages which ended disastrously were early or late. • Ho found that only 5.75 per cent of tho marriages ended in divorce when the husbands were under twenty-one at the time of the wedding; 27 per cent of the divorces were in cases where the wife was married before she was twenty-one. There may he some connection between this fact and the fact that the- more children there are the fewer the divorces. Here is tho answer to the question —how far do large or small families affect the number of divorce cases? Per cent. No children 3673 or 39.56 One child 2316 or 21.95 Two children 1528 or 16.47 Thrco to six children 1599 or 17.22 Above six children ... 160 or 1.72

Turning from the certain failures to the possible success, the statistics bring out clearly the modern tendency to postpone marriage. The marriage rate for bachelors shows a general increase at ages above twenty-five below which age there is a general decrease. In the case of women, whether single or widowed, the rate has declined in all ago groups except twenty-five to thirtyfive. The tendency in London to postpone marriage is even more marked than in tho country and provincial districts. The mean age of all tho bachelors who married was 27.93 years in London, compared with 27.18 in the rest of England and AVales, while the mean age of their wives was 26.02 and 25.53 years respectively. London, at any rate, seems to be taking some part of the advice of Thales to heart. The philosopher, being: asked when a man should marry, said: "Young men, not yet,'old men, not at all."