CUPID AND THE CUSTOMS
The authorities at Radkersburg, Styria, have been trying to find out why the number of marriages between Ausbrian , peasant . youths and Yugo-Slav (Slovenian) peasant girls have. been going up recently. The reason is this, The peasants of the Slovenian parts of Yugo-Slavia, along the Austrian ' frontier, are, as a rule, rich, or at least well-to-do people. Ihey are ip a position to. give a considerable dowry to their daugliters This dowry, hcfwever, is nofc paid in .eash but in kind — namely by cattle. There is a pro.hibitive Customs dut} on live cattle coming -into Austria, but the tariff laws make an escmption in
the case of a dowry, which . is let in free of tax. As cattle are much more valuable in Austria than in Yugo^Slavia the Austvian peasant who marries a Slovenian girl makes a very good "bargain." Ib is hardly surprising that the number of "frontier-marriages" has increased lately. They incre'ased eightfold in the period from 1935 to" 1936 ; and up to now tbe figure this year ia twenty-four times tbat of last. The cattle brought over duty free has inoreased forty time«. on the figure of last vear, -and it is calculated that it will go up cighty-fold by the end of tli# ycai'^ ' .
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https://paperspast.natlib.govt.nz/newspapers/HBHETR19371126.2.174
Bibliographic details
Hawke's Bay Herald-Tribune, Volume 81, Issue 54, 26 November 1937, Page 17
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211CUPID AND THE CUSTOMS Hawke's Bay Herald-Tribune, Volume 81, Issue 54, 26 November 1937, Page 17
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