,
the father loses his head, seeing visions of his loved daughter
hob-nobbing with royalty, and (intoxicating thought!) snubbing the
"swells" at home who had shown reluctance to recognize him and his
family.

It is next to impossible for him to get any reliable information about
his future son-in-law in a country where, as an American, he has few
social relations, belongs to no club, and whose idiom is a sealed book to
him. Every circumstance conspires to keep the flaws on the article for
sale out of sight and place the suitor in an advantageous light. Several
weeks' "courting" follows, paterfamilias agrees to part with a handsome
share of his earnings, and a marriage is "arranged."

In the case where the girl has retained some of her self-respect the
suitor is made to come to her country for the ceremony. And, that the
contrast between European ways and our simple habits may not be too
striking, an establishment is hastily got together, with hired liveries
and new-bought carriages, as in a recent case in this state. The
sensational papers write up this "international union," and publish
"faked" portraits of the bride and her noble spouse. The sovereign of
the groom's country (enchanted that some more American money is to be
imported into his land) sends an economical present and an autograph
letter. The act ends. Limelight and slow music!

In a few years rumors of dissent and trouble float vaguely back to the
girl's family. Finally, either a great scandal occurs, and there is one
dishonored home the more in the world, or an expatriated woman, thousands
of miles from the friends and relatives who might be of some comfort to
her, makes up her mind to accept "anything" for the sake of her children,
and attempts to build up some sort of an existence out of the remains of
her lost illusions, and the father wakes up from his dream to realize
that his wealth has only served to ruin what he loved best in all the
world.

Sometimes the conditions are delightfully comic, as in a well-known case,
where the daughter, who married into an indolent, happy-go-lucky Italian
family, had inherited her father's business push and energy along with
his fortune, and immediately set about "running" her husband's estate as
she had seen her father do his bank. She tried to revive a
half-forgotten industry in the district, scraped and whitewashed their
picturesque old villa, proposed her husband's entering business, and in
short das