A "MARRIAGE BLACK LIST."

Taranaki Daily News, Volume LIII, Issue 265, 18 March 1911, Page 10

A "MARRIAGE BLACK LIST."

The habit of making enquiries at private detective offices as to the means and mode of life of any young man who is under consideration as a suitable husband by the relatives of a girl whom he wishes to marry leads to some curious complications in Austria and in Hungary V oung men deep in debt are inscribed on the so-called "black-list" at the enquiry office. Good "partis" are, on the other hand, put down on the "white list." The London Mail's Vienna correspondent states that five young Hungarian aristocrats who were involved in debt to such an extent that the only possibility of retrieving their fortunes lay in making rich marriages, formed a kind of com° pany for the purpose of finding wives fiaeh was to be provided with a rich bride, preferably an American heiress as his turn came. '

Ihcy gathered about a hundred pounds together for the preliminarv purpose of having their names taken off the "blacklist. One of their number then approached an employee of the private detective oltico, and by means of bribes succeeded m getting the names of all five removed As all five men bear high-sounding titles they expected to encounter little difficulty with their matrimonial venture once the agencies spoke well of them Ihe nobleman who was at the head of the company was to try his luck first \ whole page in the "white list" described his fortune, ancestry, and other virtues He went to Berlin to with the intention of discounting bills to raise further funds He was arrested there and extradited to IJudapest at the instance of bis creditors. The alterations that had been made in the agency offices were then discovered *he three officials concerned were ar rested, but afterwards liberated, as'it could not be proved that thev damaged anyone by the alterations thai had made in the books.