A Pagan View of Marriage.

Te Aroha News, Volume VI, Issue 340, 6 February 1889, Page 3

A Pagan View of Marriage.

There has been much controversy of late among Christian gentlemen and ladies of the Nineteenth Century on the marriage question, and much more seems inevitable. It may, perhaps, interest them, or, at any rate, the readers of their contributions to that controversy, to learn the pagan view of the matter, as recounted in the columns of the ' Old Saloon ' — a series of papers now in course of publication in a leading London periodical for December. It is taken from the letters of Lady Duff Gordon, and it is the opinion of one of her attendants in the East, when, with suffering and waning strength, she was out upon one of her long, solitary voyages in search of health ; an opinion touching his mistress, and, as represented by her, ohe English 'harem' — i.e., womankind in general: — ' I heard Saleem Effendi and Omar discussing English ladies one day, while I was insido the curtain with Saleem's slave girl, and they did not know I heard them. Omar described Janet, and waa of opinion that a man who was married to her could want nothing more. By my soul, she rides like a Bedawee, she shoots with the gun and pistol, rows the boat ; she knows many languages, and what, is in their books ; works with her needle like an Efreet ; and to see her hands run over the teeth of her music book— keys of the pianoamazes the mind, while herslnging gladdens the soul. How, then, should her husband ever desire the coffee shop ? Wailatree ! she can always amuse him at home. When I feel my stomach tightened, I go to the divan, andsay to her, Do you want anything—a pipe, or sherbert, or so and so ? And I talk till she lays down her book and talks to me, and I question her and amuse my mind ; and, b , if I were a rich man and could marry only one English harem like these, I would stand before her and serve her like her memlook. You see, lam only this lady's servant, and I have not once sat in the coffee-shop because of the sweetness of her tongue. Is it nob true, therefore, that the man who can many such harom is rich more than with money ? I nearly laughed out hearing Omar relate his manoeuvres to make me ' amuse his mind.' It seems 1 am in no danger of being discharged for being dull.'