Rensselaer Republican, Volume 12, Number 24, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 27 February 1880 — A Bachelors’ League. [ARTICLE]

A Bachelors’ League.

Many highly respectable men in London about thirty years ago, as the Punch files tell us, had become thoroughly impressed with the idea that something ought to be done to relieve themselves from certain social duties which had been gradually growing more and more onerous. After some canvassing among the interested persons it was finally decided to form a League of Bachelors, and as the members of that league were endeavoring to escape from responsibilities which are notoriously shirked by the young men of to-day, we shall perhaps interest our feminine readers by transcribing a few of the rules which were laid down for a London society almost a generation ago, and which are likely to be revived before long on this side of the water: 1. Every bachelor joining the League is to cancel all previous engagements. 2. Every bachelor having subscribed for five years to the League, and who, by misfortune, shall have incurred a matrimonial engagement, shall be defended against any action for breach of promise, and thus saved from the shame and misery of going through the Court of Hymen, which is too frequently another name for the Insolvent Court. j‘ 3. Connected with the League it is intended to establish a Bachelors’ Insurance Office, to insure single men against marriage and flirtation, on the same principles as are usually applied to death and fire. Any member having visited willfully a house with more than two marriageable daughters, will, in the event of the calamity of marriage befalling him, be recorded in the same light as felo de se, and his policy will be vitiated on account of the very bad policy that will have guided him. Any bachelor falling—into matrimony—by his own hand, as in the case of a written promise to wed, will be deprived of all the benefits of his insurance, and every applicant proposing to be insured must answer the following questions, among others that will be proposed to him: What is your age next .birthday? At what age had your father the misfortune to marry your mother? Have you been afflicted with the German or other mania? Are you subjected to sentimental fits? Have you been addicted to the writing of sonnets? Or have you ever suffered from the cacoethes scribendi in any shape, or at any time whatever? Have you at any time in your life been a victim to the flute, or any other deadly-lively instrument? Have any of your near relations fallen in love at any time, and if so, have they recovered, or have their cases ended fatally? If these questions are all answered in a satisfactory manner, any member of the Bachelors' League may insure any amount under SS,(XX), to be paid within three months of the melancholy termination of his single career, on proof of wedlock having actually overtaken him The insurance against flirtation or fire can be effected where the applicant is more than ordinarily inflammable, and watering-places in the season, balls and Sicnic parties must be considered as oubly or trebly hazardous, and charged accordingly.— Boston Times. •* Shall I hereafter darn your stockings F’ is said to be toe fashionable language for a young lady to use when making a leap-year proposal.