Life — December 4, 1919 — page 36: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

Love Keeps On! HE cost of marriage has lately risen to such a marked degree as to excite the acute alarm of all the experts. They point out that this is already having an effect upon the birth rate, and that in the course of a reasonable length of time the race will decline and eventually die out. This prediction has been made before, it is true, but the experts declare that the conditions were never so grave as at present It is not only highly expensive to get married, but worse to stay so. In the eyes of sober-minded gentle- men, the prospect of having a baby is a financial disaster. The act of living together is, for two people, a tragic adventure in a barbed wire network of economics. Single people may perish nobly, and if their dispositions be doubtful, and they have few friends, their loss will be reduced to a minimum. But it is declared to be more expensive for two to live together than for two to live apart. Marriage must there- fore go out. There seems to be no other way. For a few of us, however, who are ignorant enough to lelieve in blind Providence, there is still hope. Love, in spite of many setbacks, has now been going on for some time. In the Garden of Eden the lovers had their own way. There were no idle people to pry upon them. There were no relatives to interrupt them, and to make the lovers ever critical of each other. They could be alone very nicely in those days, and interruptions were negligible Love got a good start in the Garden of Eden, and made the most of the opportunity until the flood came, Then things looked dark for all lovers. The garden produce was swept away, and there were no desirable lots for sale. Lovers were painfully reduced in numbers, but, after all, there were enough for the future. Love began all over again, and established itself more firmly than ever. Science came along and statisticians began to multiply in the land. Germs came and still love persisted. War raised its horrid head. Even lovers began to quarrel among them- selves, and the divorce courts began to thrive. But love set his little teeth together, replenished the arrows in his quiver and kept on, And in spite of everything, he is still doing business in his little eternal shop Necessity T was in one of the social settlements conducted by per- ons of a philanthropic turn of mind. The young kinder- yarten teacher, having finished the morning's talk on hygiene and sanitation, wished to make a practical appli- cation of the lesson. Turning to one little youngster whose face, hands and whole appearance bespoke the cry- id a little Chink gink to a little Jap chap: I think, if you could help it, we would not be on the map.” - Said the little Jap chap to the little Chink gink Izzy, when the house gets all mussed up and dirty, “Why, old boy, if we could help it, we'd not even let you — what does mother do?” think!” “We move.” ing need of soap and water, she asked : comicbooks.comiy