THE WEDDING WAVE.

Taranaki Daily News, 27 September 1919, Page 9

THE WEDDING WAVE.

GIRLS "GOING OFF" EAST. ] Is the bachelor in Auckland a marked man, or is it just his luck.? (asked the Star), Last month the most vital feature of the vital statistics was the fact that the number of marriages in the district had increased tremendously, 118 more than in the previous August. In the last twelve months the consummated matches numbered 37# more than in the previous year. That is to say the tendency to marry and to take in marriage in this community is at the present time over CO per cent, above normal. Many reasons have been add"oed for this wave of weddings. The answers given vary, from the irascible flippancy of the oldfashioned man in side whiskers who declaimed an adaptation of Carlyle's famous generality that the population of England was so many, mostly fools, down to Sentimental Tommy's belief that there are 378 separate and distinct reasons, each represented by the smiling face of a new bride. THE GIRL IN THE JOB. An interviewer tried to get some likely opinion between Carlyle's sweeping generality and Tommy's purely personal feeling, but lie found himself overwhelmed with points of view, and had to give it up. A, prominent member of the Returned Soldiers' Association scouted tiie suggestion that •• returned soldiers had promulgated a scheme to get their jobs back by marrying the girls who had filled the positions, and our lady editor reports a storm of indignant protest to a discreet inquiry in the direction of discovering if the girls in men's jobs are holding the economic pistol to the male heads, with the ultimatum, "We keep your job till you keep your promise of marriage" Nothing doing there. A HARVEST OP HOUSEWIVES. It was put to the pressman by a female war-worker that four years ot sewing shirts and knitting socks for soldiers, of choosing tobacco, baking cakes, and generally studying, fussing over and providing for the wants and comfort of the boys in the ditches had cultivated in the present femnii' generation a rich crop of desirable housekeepers that was ripe for the reaping. Whether the reaping came because tue boys had never before seen such a chance of domestic felicity and just grabbed it or because the girls, to gratify their new taste for domesticity, had used the process of moral suasion known to women from time immemorial for bring- ] ing the bashful male up to scratch, our informant begged leave to let go as an I open question. Probably she was right, for no man ever agrees with his wife on the question of whether he himself achieved matrimony, or had the great ; ness thrust upon him. SO IT WENT ON. "And so it went on with the answer swelling audi growing like an unwieldy snowball, studded with 1 lie twigs, pebbles, coal waste and glass fragments of opinions picked up on its"track. One man held that the matrimonial wave «.vas the natural aftermath of war, with the resuscitation of the mothering inin the female; another that the experience of war had strengthened the male, and given him the moral courage to break away from t\c petty precedents of peace-time; a third ascribed it to the after-effects of influenza, a mere freakish mood born of low spirits. Then there tfas the man who suspected the prohibitionists of having organised the business to overcome the soldier vote. The politician who considered it a stampede induced by the threat, of a graduated tax on bachelors, and finally the poet, who claims it as a victory for his romantic line? that "absence makes the heart grow fonder," and a refutation of the cynic's base addendum "of the other chap." Be the cause what it may, divine discontent or fond compulsion, it seems clear , that the bachelor in/Auckland is becoming a fast-diminishing fji'antity, rare but not reluctant. One time he used to g.'ve a girl a lock of his hair a? a rare memento, something that was getting scarcer Vary year; now lie may give himself on the same pica. AT THE REGISTRY OFFICE. Another feature of the marriage market is the cutting away of inessentials in the weddings, and' the increasing popularity of the ceremony at the reg'strar's office. The local Gordius in Auckland city ropes in and ties the marriage knot on self-selected affinities about twice a day in the year, not counting Sundays. There were 32 couples well and truly tied last month. It is a simple ceremony, but quite as effective from the holding point of view, if not so spectacular as tlie more cus tomary style of getting hitched. A reporter butted in at the registrar's office this morning, and found a wedding in progress. There did not seem to be any excitement in the air. It was jiut like an ordinary, well-conducted business office. Just off Customs Street, seven steps up, oh 1 the first floor, first door t: the left, and there you were. No doubt the groom had been there before to fi?: 'hi' ihite and time, supply particul'ir.i of his family and her fifmily unto the third generation (back), and to ensure that the girl didn't take the wrong turninc when the fateful moment arrived- Well, there they were, accompanied by t.wi male friends; and grouped at the end o '* a long counter. Behind the altar—l mean counter—stood Gordius. Two demure young ladies were also behind the counter tapping away industriously nt typewriters. Never an eye-flash lrom them; they were not interested, though somehow one felt that every detail of the bride's simple millinery and modest gown, and of the groom's turn-out, bad been, in some mysterious wireless fashion, transferred to the unofficial feminine register within the registry office. But officially they were oblivions of the group at the end of the counter. To them it wasn't a wedding, just a couple of people from the street being turned into statistics.

HOLDING HANDS. "Please close the door, there's a draught," said the Registrar. This was not part of the wedding ceremony, but a pontic, courteous request to a iiervni.sloking man wlio lmd pushed tlio door open, and stood trying to make up his mind whether or not ho should take off his hat, at the same time unsuccessfully endeavoring to conceal the printed w.irds "birth registration" that cried out from some papers he held in one hand. T!.o nervous man hurriedly closed tlio door, and, hat in hand, was attended to by a young man at the other end of tlic counter while the wedding went oil. He signed, and she signed, at the behest of the registrar papers which were put before tliem with explanatory remarks. A man came in, and threw down on the counter, to the young man at the far end, some electoral enrolment forifis, and a policeman entered the room and supplied some information relating to sta-

tisties, but still the wedding went on I like the mdy s right hand," enjoined Gordius, alld the groom did so. Then, holding hands, iW he and (hen siie made to the Registrar, in an audible voice, and to his dictation, the statement that neither knew of any lawful impediment to the joining of each to the other as man and wife. Still holdin" hands, and still under the guidance oi Gord'us, each called in a carefully modulated tone, on all the witnesses here present to take notice that "I, Jack Brown, take you, Jill Smith, to be my lawfully wedded wife," the .vice versa. At a hint from the official presiding, Genius, the groom, produces a ring from' his vest, pocket, and presses it on the third finger of the bride's left hand.

"THEY'RE OFF!"

. Tle ■ t' ,la a book and a paper, she does? likewise, and the two official witnesses' follow suit. Then for the first time in the proceedings the lady, transformed from a maid to a matron, comes iirM, astlie Registrar makes her a present oT'the paper, the treasured "marriage lines," sacred to the heart of women't'rom the days when the cave woman of the past hoarded tip some old club whose rude noln lilted a scries of indentations on the top of her inch-thick cranium, just to show thai her man had got. her in t'.e orthodox l iribai fashion, "Uuod luck," says the Registrar as he offers his mind in congratulation to.the bride and bridegroom, and, after having had a wait of only ten minutes at the post, they're oil' for the matrimonial stakes. And, precious omen, they are on a right-hand course, for tliev keep on turning to the right till they reach the street, in-double harness, and probably to find, should they chance to get out' of step, that their friend the Registrar has made t'.em ,i nmc ) more ppcmvly iiUuclkhl couple lh;Ul they had (boujjil, ilipy were. Thus ai-e marriages made in the Regstry Oilice, without the old-time big and large promises on the one side co"love, honor, and obey, and (.11 the other to cherish and succour through health and sickness, thick and thin.'lor hotter or worst! "till death do us part". 1 ' Jt is a simple, modest contract solemnly made to fullil the states til' husband aiid wife between two panics who are detinitc'v identified beforehand, and who are not asked to make rash \ows which are so frequently forgotten in the storm and stress i>i lite. In one rc-|Kv ; the ceremony described differs slightly from ■some others of the kind, in that should the parties, especially desire.it. they .arc married iu a private room adjaeeiit to I the Registrar's workaday office.