THE MARRIAGE BROKER.

Taranaki Daily News, Volume XLVII, Issue 8071, 29 March 1906, Page 4

THE MARRIAGE BROKER.

Tho atrocious achievements of Witzhoff, tlie American professional bigam- 1 ist, and Lis kind, have brought down ;i i itorm of indignation on the head of' the c narriago-broker. Witzhoff married over | , hundred women, his gains being esti- | nated at £15,000, and it is estimated hat there are over 50,000 women in the ' Jnited States who have been married or the sake of their money by profesional bigamists, robbed, and then de- ; erted. It is said that most of the vicim.s are foreign women, who save up a 'dot" and then apply to a broker for a tusbaud. The broker calls in a regular j lient, arranges a bogus marriage, the roman's money is divided, and tho viciin deserted within a week. A writer J n the " Daily Express," however, points! iut that though marriage-broking may le open to grave evils and absuses, the ery fact of ita existonce and the cnornous number of its clients show that ho marriage-broker fulfils a real social iiant. In London, " the City of Deadly lolitude," there are ten 3 of thousands >f! men and women who are utterly onely. They want to get married, and hey'have no friends. They must either idvertise for a life partner or go to a uatrimonial broker. Not lonp ago a ady journalist desired to test? the exent to which candidates for matrimony eeorted to the Press, and with that obect r advertised herself as eligible. She lascribed hei'self as twenty-one years •Id, moderately good-looking, and posessed of a small income.. She received a howsand replies, tho applicants lagging row a workhouso inmato to a general n the army. The bulk of the applicants lelonged apparently to the educated lassos. Tho number of peoplo who go o tho broker is very large, and is inleaning. One highly suwessful mar-iago-broker admits to having arranged 0,000 marriages. He charges 2J per ent. on the capital yaluo of tho husiand and'also exacts a fee from the

lady. He estimates that over 60 i»r cent .of the marriages urianged by him are successful. The case is quoted of a naval officer's daughter, who at the age of forty-three threw conventionality to tho winds and became a client of one of these brokc-i-s. She married a middle-

■iged stockbroker, with £IOOO a year, with tho happiest results. The writer (who by the way is a woman) pleads for the raising of this business to the dignity of a recognised 'public institution. •' The State recognises marriage as an institution designed for the happiness of mankind. Why, then, should it not go i step further, and provide honourable machinery for the. making - of marriages?"