But to return to the wedding ceremony. The young couple having been now made man and wife in the sight of Church as well as the State, they start on their voyage together into the unknown, to discover one another and, if possible, after what answers to a time of courting, to fall in love with each other. Should this time of exploration into each other's characters and temperaments, likes and dislikes, prove entirely unsatisfactory, it becomes a matter of acute interest to enquire how the knot may be loosened or untied. Until 1883 divorce was not legal, but since that year of emancipation the Civil Code permits it for several reasons. These are divided under three headings: first, unfaithfulness or desertion on either side; second, acts of violence and _injures graves_, which covers the great area of incompatibility of temperament; and third, penal sentences passed on the man or woman. It is fairly obvious that this wide doorway will permit the entrance of a great majority of those who wish for freedom from an ill-chosen partner, and the result has been a steady increase in the number of divorces in recent years. The figures were 10,573 in 1906 and 13,049 in 1910. Even the Church of Rome will allow the marriage tie to be severed under certain conditions not perhaps open to a poor couple. There can be little doubt that divorce in France is facilitated by the fact that the wife has in most cases an independent source of income, and is therefore economically on her feet in the event of a termination of her wedded state. She is, generally speaking, looked upon with less favour as a divorced woman than is a man. No doubt this is due to slow-dying prejudice in favour of the man in these circumstances. Changes are, however, coming with such accelerating speed in these matters that anything written to-day is more or less out of date by the time it is printed. To come back to the normal condition of married persons in France, there is no doubt that, surprising as it may seem, the _jeune fille_ does in a very large majority of cases settle down contentedly with the husband chosen by her parents. She blossoms with the speed of an Indian juggler's magic plant into a woman of affairs, and in a very short time is taken into the fullest confidence in monetary matters by her husband. Many develop such a capacity for business that they rapidly out-distance their men folk in such matters, and if, as is very often the case in middle-class life, they are obliged to contribute towards the family budget, their earnings will frequently exceed those of the easy-going husband. Any one at all intimate with France knows the keenness and capacity of the woman in business, whether as a shopkeeper, a manageress, or a hotel proprietor. They can drive a hard bargain and are less easy to deal with than men, although the writer is inclined to think that he has met quite as many men as women who are difficult or unpleasant in a financial matter.