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Show GRETNA GREEN. j F..r the second time in its history, !l!f.ti.a Cr-'.-u is about to pas from a ' post of prominence in the history ot ; the world to one of obscurity. Mayhap tin time to come, Gretna Green will once au'uiu rise to fame. All contracts having been fulfilh'd, and there being no further need of the .great explosive-manufacturing plants i established by the British at Gretna j Green, which fibed orders involving a ! cost of $00,000,000, the likelihood is that the buildings will be dismantled ami their component parts carried off. Within a few seasons verdure will hide the site which the great shops now occupy oc-cupy and the cecond epoch in the history his-tory of Gretna Green will become a memory even as has the first. The fame attained by the old Scotch village years ago was more distinctive and certainly more enduring than that which attaches to it because of the presence, there of a powder mill. During Dur-ing a period of thirty years or more there w'as a procession across the border bor-der of those wdio sought matrimony, and innkeepers, ferrymen nnd tollhouse toll-house tenders waxed fat. They added to their revenue by forming a company com-pany of ' 'professional witnesses" whose services were always available. When the railroad was put through, the station platform was thronged with these obnoxious "commission men," and no doubt they found their trado a profitable one, for it is reported re-ported that in three decades there were more than 7000 marriages recorded. Nearly 800 of these took place in tho year 1755, just previous to the enactment enact-ment of a law in Scotland requiring residence before marriage. This exodus from England for matrimonial mat-rimonial purposes was due to the rigidity rig-idity of the laws in that country, under which any clergyman who performed the marriage ceremony for those who had not previously announced their intentions in-tentions by banns or by license was subject to fine. Fleet Prison, where debtors were kept, was the first rendezvous ren-dezvous of the eloping couples a clergyman who is held for debt has no fear of fines and later unscrupulous persons fitted up places especially for marriages by the "Fleet parsons." The British government put an eifd to tho abuses by the Hardwicke act of 1754, which made unauthorized marriages mar-riages illegal, and it was then that the Scotch village of Gretna Green assumed as-sumed a position of importance which has made its name significant ever since. |