Married Without Knowing It

A Mr. Thomas Couper, an Englishman, has publislnI m aooottnt of his tivivels in Thibet, whioh ho visitetl disguised &g a Chinamau. Among hia stories is tho following : He was jupit lialting for breakfast, aftcr leaving the Thibetan town oí' Bathang, vhen a group of young girls, gaily dressed and decked with garlands of flowers, oame out of a grove and surrounded him, gome of tho:n holding bis mulé, while others assistud him to alight. He was tben led into a grove, wheso he found a feast being propared, and after be bad eaten and smoked his pipe, tho girls camo Xa biin again, " pulling along in their midst a pretty girl of sixteen, attii'ed in a silk dras; ■ni ndorned with garlands of flowers. I had already notioed," Mr. Cooper continúes, '; tbis girl sitting apart froiu the others during the meal, and was very much astonished wben sbe wns reluctaatlv dragged up to me, and made to Beat herself by my si'l';; and my aatonfehment was oonsíderably heightened when the rest of'tlie girla begiU) to dance around ü in a cuplé, sipang andthrowing their garlati9s ovor íuyself and my oompjiniou." TIn nteoning af t liis porformance wás, bowcver, soon made li át to Mr. Ooopr. He had been married ■without knowing it. At fint lio tried to esoape tho liabillty entailed npon him; but suob an outcry was made by all the peoile arOund that howas foreed cany off his brido. He ruanaged to eet rid of her beforo long by transferringaer to one of her relations, but even that was not treated as a dissolution of the marriago. Oa his way back he was joined onc day by a Thibetan dame, of about thirty years old, who announced herself as his wife's inother, ajad, said ehe had cooie, with the consent of hor husband, to supply her il:uiLrbter's plico. "Wc c:m v-dl imogin Mr. Cooppr's surprise at meeting with tlii novel proposal ou the part of kin inothcrin-law.