THE MARRIAGE AGE.

Taranaki Daily News, 4 February 1922, Page 10

THE MARRIAGE AGE.

THE GOLDEN PERIOD. It must be some consolation to women in the late twenties who cherish hopes of a wedding ring that they did not live a century ago, when, on the evidence of Jane Austen, “A woman of seven-and-twenty can never hope to feel or to inspire affection again.”

In Jane Austen’s time—only three generations ago—a maiden who had not blossomed into a wife by the very early twenties became an object of anxiety to her family and of pity to her more fortunate friends. To-day she can celebrate her twenty-fifth birthday unwed with a light heart and a knowledge that she is only just entering the ‘‘premised land,” and that she has before her the five richest years of matrimonial premise. Her chances of a husband are, in fact, nine times £s good as when she was in her ’teens.

Statistics are, as a rule, “odious things” to women; but when they shed a new and bright light on their matrimonial chances they assume an aspect almost of fascination.

Women will learn with interest and probably with surprise that out of 72 maidens of 15 to ]9 only one may hope to stand at the altar. The remaining 71 must be contest to “bide a wee,” and they need not worry, for in 10 years’ time their chances will be much rosier than ever at “sweet seventeen.” Between the ages of 20 and 21 a girl’s prospects become distinctly brighter, for of every 13 in this period one secures a husband. If she is one of the 12 who still remain unappropriated, she has good cause to look forward hopefully to the next five years. This is, in fact, in our day, the golden matrimonial period, for there is a wedding ring waiting for every eighth woman between the twenty-fifth and thirtieth birthday. These years are her true' time of conquest, of which she will be wise to make the most, for every later year’will see her expectations of a husband dwindle.

Of 24 spinsters between the ages of 30 and 34, one will be taken and 23 will be left. During the next five years —35 to 39—she may count the “shelf” perilously near, for- there is only one husband for every 28 aspirants. At 40 to 44 the odds are sfo5 f o to one against her securing even a middle-aged widower, and in the next five years the odds against an appearance at the altar have swelled to 108 to 1.

Thus we see that the woman who has the brightest prospects in the race for the Matrimonial Stakes will never see her twenty-fifth birthday again, and that she has five golden years in which to “make the running.”—Daily Express.