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Show MARRIAGEABLE WOMEN. One of the great social problems of the day is to explain why there are so many marriageable women who never get married. Some say that it is owing to an excess in numbers of women over men, in consequence of which there are not husbands enough to go around. This, however, is disproved by statistics. Take the world through, and the figures show that there are as many men in it as there are women. Others attribute it to the expensiveness of modern life. Men do not marry because, it is said, they cannot afford to. But the fact is that no man who truly loved a woman ever hesitated to become engaged to her and eventually marry her because of poverty. There are cold-blooded men, with no idea of any feeling for a woman stronger than a languid admiration, who may be deterred from assuming what they regard as a burden in the shape of a wife, unless assured of a liberal income, but most are not so calculating. Others, again, attribute the evil to women's fastidiousness. They expect too much in a husband, and, while waiting for an impossible shadow, let the possible substance slip through their fingers. This is a libel on the sex. As a rule they are more fastidious than men are, and are just as susceptible as men to that enchantment of love which invests its object with every perfection and covers up every fault. So far as men and women themselves are concerned, they are as prone to marriage now as in any period of the world's history. Nevertheless, there are women who are waiting for husbands and not getting them. They are pretty, they are accomplished, they are sensible, and under proper training, they would make excellent wives and mothers; but they never get a chance. What seems to be needed is a more thorough method of bringing men and women into social contact with each other. |