Page:History of Manchester (1771), Volume 1, by John Whitaker.djvu/401

 $66 TH-B tHtI^jT /O* Y-. » Book I. to the female line was formally faid by the law to defcend to the diftaff. And thus engaged the Britifli virgin was declared by the laws marriageable .'at fourteen '. 'A'htf; lover • rtgultfljr-pd- drefled h'nnfelf ftrft.- tor the father. c& the maid, and requsftod. hi* daughter in marriage. If the father agreed tft the overture,, h^ opened the hall of the maid, the apartment in which' .ma gene- rally fat retired from the.meu -of the- family,- and introduced th© fuitor to his daughter*. - The -period of couvtflaip.- among; tl»« firitifh women '-appears to- hav* Keen generally -a* fhort as k- waff ambftg the Patriarchal^. : A' fev* days wn<3lu"de4-thc /ait -The Abfolute authority -of the father over the child took away' aff power of refiifal from the daughter*. If (he diflikid the ioVw whom her father rccota mended, ftie had no other refofcuee- than fhc tears of entreaty or the dangers of fii^htl The Britiflt wife? f likethe modern, fcrought generally a pdrtion or Argyfrey with . her ". And the Britifli hufband, like the modern, as ^generally made a fettlement or.figweddi upon her previous to the mar- riage . .This did not however, like thie modern, foperfede her f ights.incident on furvivorfhip; ahdflie was'intitled, if there were no children, to the full half of herhufband*s property T, And the ratio of this Egweddi was not. left, as it is left pmong ourfelves^ to be dtfermined by the indtlijbretipn of the lover, the expectations of the lady, ,pr the contefts q? over-reachiflg relations.^ It was ab- solutely afgerjtaujed by the law, and was twenty- four pounds for a king's daughter, three, for* noble's,, and one for a villain's X V This fettlement differed eflentially from the modern and coin- cided exaftly with the Saxon in its import, as it took place im- mediately upon the marriage! and. the wife was immediately inverted with the property ,6. And the rite of marriage was celebrated by the lather ip the fliort fonji of giving up the maid to the (uitor 1 '. But after the marriage was another fettlement, which was denominated' Chotvyll and anfwered to the Morgcn- gife of the Germans, being. made the morning- aft$r the mar-, riage and a^hially before the couple arofe ftoqi ;bp4 I8 » fa-lush- a fituation the man mull have been in peculiar danger of a&ing : indifcreetly with his fortune : and the law which fo i^rangely - c^pofed him to the danger was obliged in equity to protect him from