WIDOWERS.

Thames Star, Volume VII, Issue 2138, 10 November 1875, Page 4

WIDOWERS.

BY M. OB N

Perhaps, with, the exception of bachelors, the most interesting class of human beings in the world to unmarried ladies are widowers. A widower, indeed, appeals more strongly to the female heart in many respects than a bachelor. He has had the courage once at least to ask the question which is the preliminary to the matrimonial relation, and everything may be hoped for from tlae manwho is used to that kind of conversation. Then his having been married is presumptive evidence that he is in a position to marry again, which at once establishes his superiority over half the bachelors going. For it is a melancholy fact, well known and deeply deplored by all unmarried ladies, that the number of bachelors useful for marriageable purposes is very limited. Bachelors may be nice enough to look at, to talk to, to dance and flirt with; they may bo as men everything that would satisfy the fondest aspirations of maidens in search of husbands, bu,fc if they are unable to venture on the responsibilities of housekeeping, it is worse than useless for girls to waste their affections on them. _ • | Another great advantage that widowers possess over bachelors in the estimation j ' of the fair sex is, that they are broken in.! They know what marriage is. They have been accustomed to ran in harness, and j , there will be little or no trouble in getting j them into training. The value of a widower for matrimonial purposes* should . be very much enhanced if his deceased wife'had the repulation'of being a regular Tartar:. Such a widower, if still young, rather good-looking, well off, and without; incumbrances in the way of children, is a prize that any girl might think herself fortunate to -secure. If anything would justify a girl in laying herself out deliberately to ensnare a man, it would be the fact that there was such a man to be ensnared. He is lonely, she will cheer his solitude ; he has suffered at the hands of her sex, she will endeavour to make him amends ; he is no" doubt plundered by Bis servants and trit'despeople, she will come to. the rescue, and, if sue succeeds in winning his hand, do her best to save.his pocket. , . '■„.[ . . But it must be confessed that this kind of widower is not a type of the class.! The,general run of widower is middleaged; and averaged two or three children. He hasbeen so long married that he: has . fallen fimperceptibly into, the heavy father-bf-a-family, ratepaying, thoroughly respectable, and long-suffering look, by which a keen observer is always able to distinguish a married man in a crowd from^a, bachelor. ,As a widower he is still pervaded by the marriage air. He talks to other married people about his children and theirs ; he has stories to tell about the misdoings' of his servants, and listens patiently,-and even with interest, to the narrative of the misdoings of theirs. He knows jthe prices of bread and meat, and is painfully aware of the difference thetariff has made in the cost of children's" boots.rand shoes. He is regular in his habits ; has a fixed hour for gel'ting up "in the morning; a fixed time for breakfast, dinner and tea ; and is put out if anything causes a change in the routine of the household. He has arrived at a time of life, that makes it necessary he should avoid draughts, and if he goes on a pic-nic will not sit on the grass for the sake of being by the side of the prettiest girl in the country. Widowers who have lived with their late wives for a number of years must notice a strange difference in the way they go about their second wooing. Their thoughts have long been weaned from .all ideas of love-making. They have frequently learned to regard girls rather as nuisances than as objects upon whom to bestpw" attentions. Even where their original liking for pretty faces has never quite died away, the manner in which they express it is very different to the manner of a bachelor. Married menfathers especially—are privileged to say things^to girls that would commit a bachelor fojp?life. But the-married man adopts a;. fatherly patronising way in saying nice, things, which is only excusable in one who has a wife of his own, and who" can therefore express the warmest admiratioiirwith -limited liability. But; there is a great, an alarming difference between the flirtations of a married man and those of a widower. If the widower attempts the same sort of ihing that was considered rather a joke while his wife was alive, he will find himself married before he has had six months' respite from the cares of matrimony. -Widowers have therefore to be cautious. They must remember that they are now subject to the laws that govern all unmarried men; and if they desire to have a voice in the selection of their second " choice," the fatherly flirtation of the , past must be given up for the present. . r As a general rule, the older a widower is the younger is the wife he looks for. A widower who^e children have all turned 20, will turn up hismose at a girl who is over 18 And as a "Corollary to this proposition, ifc may be safely assumed that very few girls of 18 will turn up their nose at widowers who have turned 50—if they are well off. Given, then, a widower of 50 or 60, and a girl in her 'teens, each of whom desires and is prepared to marry , the other, the love-making, it is plan, must be of a different kind to the loveaiaking of youths and maidens. Gout, lumbago, rexxhmatism. or sciatica, may restrain him from falling upon his knees.; but this, of course, she is prepared for, and waives the ceremony.- [Most men develope some form of disease as they advance in years. Excessive corpulency may prove a physical bar to her em- :: bracing him as they would both, desire. s . She may be unable to run her fingers "through his curly locks having gone the way of all hair. He can whisper what he feels ; but she lriusfc shout ifc into his . ear, as his hearing is not as good as it was. She can see every change in his face with the naked eye j but if he wants to have a good look q|t' his beloved one he must bring art to his assistance, and put on a-pair of spectacles. It is quite possible that her hand may nestle in his and; play with it, and lie be unconscious of the pleasure she is conferring—a slight touch, of paralysis dulls our sense of enjoynient. Some widowers go in exclusively for widows, and the mixed families that result are very confusing to those who profess to understand the table .of' affinities. Widows encourage this feeling in every way they aro capable of. A widow, doubtless, feels that it is a nicer thing to amalgamate two families than to take possession of a single man,.and make him at one fell swoop, a husband to herself and a father to her orphaned children. Rather than not marry again, widows will have bachelors-; ■as long as widowers arc free to marry raaldeus, ifc would be Lyranuy Lo

Prevent them ; but if widows had their will, they would be satisfied if the widowers, were made their exclusive prey. A legislative enactment.that would restrict the field of widows' activity to the confines of widowerhood would be of, in-, estimable value to the interests of mankind at large. A few men who - might like to marry a few nice widows might suffer, but humanity, as a Whole, would gain. Youths and maideni >werb formed by nature to mate ; widowers and widows should bo made to mate by Act of Parliament. —Australasian.