courting on the bed, etc.  It is well known in Wales; it is found in various English counties as in Cheshire; it existed in eighteenth century Ireland (according to Richard Twiss’s Travels); in New England it was known as tarrying; in Holland it is called questing.  In Norway, where it is called night-running, on account of the long distance between the homesteads, I am told that it is generally practiced, though the clergy preach against it; the young girl puts on several extra skirts and goes to bed, and the young man enters by door or window and goes to bed with her; they talk all night, and are not bound to marry unless it should happen that the girl becomes pregnant.

Rhys and Brynmor-Jones (Welsh People, pp. 582-4) have an interesting passage on this night-courtship with numerous references.  As regards Germany see, e.g., Rudeck, Geschichte der oeffentlichen Sittlichkeit, pp. 146-154.  With reference to trial-marriage generally many facts and references are given by M.A.  Potter (Sohrab and Rustem, pp. 129-137).

The custom of free marriage unions, usually rendered legal before or after the birth of children, seems to be fairly common in many, or perhaps all, rural parts of England.  The union is made legal, if found satisfactory, even when there is no prospect of children.  In some counties it is said to be almost a universal practice for the women to have sexual relationships before legal marriage; sometimes she marries the first man whom she tries; sometimes she tries several before finding the man who suits her.  Such marriages necessarily, on the whole, turn out better than marriages in which the woman, knowing nothing of what awaits her and having no other experiences for comparison, is liable to be disillusioned or to feel that she “might have done better.”  Even when legal recognition is not sought until after the birth of children, it by no means follows that any moral deterioration is involved.  Thus in some parts of Staffordshire where it is the custom of the women to have a child before marriage, notwithstanding this “corruption,” we are told (Burton, City of the Saints, Appendix IV), the women are “very good neighbors, excellent, hard-working, and affectionate wives and mothers.”

“The lower social classes, especially peasants,” remarks Dr. Ehrhard ("Auch Ein Wort zur Ehereform,” Geschlecht und Gesellschaft, Jahrgang I, Heft 10), “know better than we that the marriage bed is the foundation of marriage.  On that account they have retained the primitive custom of trial-marriage which, in the Middle Ages, was still practiced even in the best circles.  It has the further advantage that the marriage is not concluded until it has shown itself to be fruitful.  Trial-marriage assumes, of course, that virginity is not valued beyond its true worth.”  With regard to this point it may be mentioned that