TALK ON MARRIAGE

Gisborne Times, Volume XXX, Issue 3464, 2 March 1912, Page 4

TALK ON MARRIAGE

WHEN SHOULD I WED

(By a famous Doctor.) THE WEAKEST TO THE AY ALL

Some of the methods Dame Nature employs to ensure a healthy continuance of the race in the animal kingdom are well worthy of study, even if they cannot be exactly imitated by mankind. For instance ,t\yo stags will fight to the death for the possession of the female, and it is sure to be the strongest and healthiest that kills the other and thus becomes the father of the baby stags who are started in life with a good inheritance of sturdy vigor. In the next generation the same process will go on; the sturdies will defeat the weaker ones and so on. for ages and ages, the weaker animals being weeded out.

QUEEN BEE’S MARRIAGE-FLIGHT. Another wonderful example of the same principle is found in the mar-riage-flight of the queen bee. The queen bee is larger and more powerfully built than th male bee, and when she makes up her mind to enter the happy state of matrimony she starts out from the hive and mounts higher and higher up into the air. She has previously announced that she will marry the gentleman who succeeds in catching her, and for some weeks before the male bees have been getting up before breakfast to do dumb-bell exercise, and have been carefully avoiding any excess in the way of smoking and drinking that might spoil their health. But I am forgetting that I am talking about bees. Well, the queen flies higher and higher, and the males rush after her as fast as ther legs—no, their wings—can carry them. The liees who have kept late nights and have caroused on honey-beer not wisely but too well, soon fall'out of the race, and return to the hive to grumble o\ ei the wiles of unreasonable woman, and to pass resolutions against women haring the vote. The others continue the pursuit, and the process of weeding out the frail brethren continues.

THE RACE TO THE STRONG. At last only a few of the finest and strongest bees are left in, and still her majesty flies just a little ahead of them. Then only two remain, and a fierce struggle between the two rivals is watched by the breathless croud below, and wagers of fabulous amounts of honey are freely given and taken. But the end must come, and the champion claims bis own and leads the blushing queen to the altar. Now this is a true record of natural history, and, if we take the trouble to think, we shall see that Dame Nature has hit upon an extraordinarily efficient plan of deciding which is the strongest bee in the hive. The queen becomes the mother of the new hive; she is truly the mother of her people, and if the hive is to be strong and healthy it is of paramount importance that the mother should wed none but the most fit-

THE LESSON. Now, I do not say that we could really put up two suitors for a lady’s hand to fight it out, the victor to be accepted, because the winner with the heaviest fist might not necessarily be the most desirable husband in other respects. Nor do I think it vould be practicable to set the lady off on a bicycle and let tlie most athletic man catch her and win her. But Ido most emphatically say that we ought to learn from Nature that one of the first considerations for those who wish to see diseases banished and health abound should be to see that it is the healthiest- members of one generation that become the fathers and mothers of the next. Some years ago it was suggested, and the suggestion has often been quoted since, that we should go to the ant. I have no objection to anyone going to the ant, but, in the matter of 'selecting a bride or a husband, I might mention that you should go to the bee. Go to the ant and go to the bee, but do not go to the dogs.

WHICH ? A process of selection is going on all the time. The cripple remains unmarried.. while the girl with health and beauty is snapped up. Hut there is room for a great deal of room in the matter of choosing. You know, deal' Angelina, if only you would pay half the attention to your own health and to the health of your intended that you pay to the preparation of your trousseau there would be a good deal less trouble in the world. In ten years’ time (and they will fly by very quickly) you will have a little family around you. Now, which is it to be? Will you lie sitting by the bedside of a sick child, coughing its soul out by inches, with ruinous doctor’s bills, a harassed and careworn husband, and a home robbed of its sweetness by the dread presence of illness; or are you to be surrounded by a jolly, rollicking, rosjcheeked crowd of kiddies while your husband looks on, proud and happy? When two men come courting, take the healthy one, not always the rich one, whether he is strong or not. You will spend the difference on doctor’s bills. You will get more fun out of life by playing at Jumbo-rides in the nursery in a small house than you will by watching over sick children in a mansion.