ST. VALENTINE’S DAY.

Taranaki Central Press, Volume IV, Issue 360, 15 February 1937, Page 2

ST. VALENTINE’S DAY.

An Occasion For Lovers. How many people realise that yesterday was St. Valentine’s Day? How many even remember the time when St. Valentine’s name v.'as kept alive by an exchange of elaborately decorated cards, inscribed with sentimental messages? The old custom seems to have passed with sidewhiskers 1 and hansom cabs. At three, large stationery offices at which he sought “valentines,” an inquirer was greeted with a. puzzled stare, but finally in an old-established store he was successful. “We have a few," stated the fair assistant, wiping dust from the top of a long unopened box, “but they are old stock and people only send them as a joke.” Poor St. Valentine—once the idol of bashful lovers, he has lived through the years only to become a 20th century joke! St. Valentine’s Day has been observed through the centuries since the days of ancient Greeks, when anxious youths drew the names of young maidens from the sacred urn, and pledged themselves to the service of the selected lady. The identity of St. Valentine is obscure, though many theories have been put forward. In the sixth century, a father of the Church, objecting to the pagan lovers’ festival that had been handed down from the Greeks to the Romans, and had then spread over the whole civilised world, decided to rename the day in honour of a Roman bishop, St. Valen-, tine, who had been put to death on February 14. The youth of Rome, however, quickly reverted to the old festival as being of a more entertaining nature. Another theory, and one that appears to be equally satisfying, is that “valentine” is a corruption of the French word “galantin,” or sweetheart. St. Valentine is dead, and. it appears likely that before long oven the memory of his name will have vanished from the earth.