ABOUT WEDDING PRESENTS.
Wnv will one's friends show such a plentiful lack of originality in the selection of wedding presents ? Quito recently I entered the married state (says a writer in the Kcho), and my very good friends
embraced tlio occasion to present mv wife and myself with some little token of goodwill. lam deeply grateful to them, but my gratitude is qualified by the reflection that their presents aro, for all practical purposes, of very little use. When we returned from our honeymoon, my wife and I took stock of our acquisitions. I had never thought that different persons could have been afllicted to such an extent with sameness of ideas. I may promise that I have u largo circle of friends and a still larger circle of business acquaintances. I will not dilate upon the reasons why my business acquaintances laid their offerings at my feet— it would be ungenerous. My wife also has a myriad of school friends, who literally deluged her with gifts.
Hero is the inventory, and with it my statement of grievances. I am to-day the unhappy possessor of 15 cruet-stands, ',* liq.ieur-stands,—the rogues knew I was a teetotaler, too —IS pairs of vases, 4 breakfast services, 7 tea services, and last, but decidedly not least, IS photograph albums. Tt is simply maddening. Not being a partner in Speirs and Pond or Bertram and Roberts, I am at my wit's ends to know what to do with these cruet-stands, and the liqueur-stands present the same difficulty. Our house is a small one, and we have been compelled to stow away these things as best we can. Nevertheless, wherever I look I am bound to see a cruet-stand. If I turn aside from the hated object, my gaze lights upon a liquom-stand or a pair of vases. Then again, our tables are encumbered with albums, and whenever it is a question of a meal we have to lift five or six albums from tbe table to the floor. Think of it—ls cruet-stands, !) liquor-stands, 13 pairs of vases, -1 breakfast services, 7 tea services, and eighteen photograph albums '. I excludo from the inventory such unconsidered trifle* as antimacassars, wiilir." - desks, cushions, tea-cosies, of which wo have eight, and a host of other nicknacks. There is a garret, to our house, and ono eveninc-, in a momentary access of despair, I carried up the whole lot, leaving one of each snt, however, downstairs" But my wife made a pother over it when she returned, and I had to unload the garret again, and restore the encumbrances to where I had taken them from. It would affront the givers, said my wife, if they chanced to call, and did not'.-ee their respective gifts in suit. We have been living in misery since. Not even the strongest nerves could endure an environment of glittering cruet stands and tea services, and if a change is not toon made I am persuaded that I shall fall ill.
There is one grain of consolation, howover. My wife often says that we onyht to bo thankful that our friends did not all run upon cruet-stands or albums. The diversity is not very great as it is ; but, nevertheless, it is a diversity. And my wife holds out the cheerful prospect that we will gradually get rid of the surplus articles by giving I hem away as presents in turn. Alas ! then it will be years before I have got, rid of say 10 out of 15 cruet-stands or 17 of those albums. Tln-ve is a practical side, however, to this,question. Why cannot an intending donor consult the recipient beforehand as to the form which his present should take ? Now wo are deficient in pictures, and somewhat to seek in the matter of books. Why could not the donor of the fifteenth cruet liavo asked me beforehand what I would like? My answer, modestly tendered, would have suggested a water-colour painting or an etching, And why could not one of iho album people have put the same question to my wife? She would have bashfully expressed a yearning after a complete set of George Eliot's work, I know. If our friends had only acted in a commou-sonse fashion, our home would possess many things which it at present lacks, instead of being filled with a number of useless duplicates. This mild protest will not have been in vain if it, serves to restrain future donors of wedding presents from rushing headlong at cruetstands and albums. It is the custom to make presents to young people about to be married, and, this being so, there is no reason why the convenience and the needs of the young people should not be consulted.
1 kuow of cases other than my own in which the same reduplication many times over of one article has occurred. Possibly the very neatest, and certainly the most handy, form of wedding presents is n clicquo payable to bearer. This, however, is not always a success. At my marriniro a generous well-wisher presented mo with u cheque for £10. It has just been returned to mo dishonoured. A synio would susrgest that I hud far better huvo had u tea-service or another album. Possibly so.
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Waikato Times, Volume XXXI, Issue 2570, 29 December 1888, Page 1 (Supplement)
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872ABOUT WEDDING PRESENTS. Waikato Times, Volume XXXI, Issue 2570, 29 December 1888, Page 1 (Supplement)
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