Download or read book Shapely Ankle Preferr'd written by Fran Beauman and published by Random House. This book was released on 2012 with total page 227 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Every week thousands of people advertise for love either in newspapers, magazines or online. But if you think this is a modern phenomenon, think again u the ads have been running for over three centuries. In 1695, nestling in a weekly pamphlet on Husbandry and Trade, surrounded by ads for a cobbler's apprentice, an Arabian stallion and a second-hand bed, was the brave plea of a young gentleman who 'would willingly Match himself to some Good Young Gentlewoman, that has a Fortune of u3000 or thereabouts'. This was just the beginning. In the 1730s papers carried regular ads in which income or respectability were the most desired qualities, though some asked for a 'shapely ankle' or a 'non-dancer' and by 1900 twenty-five British newspapers were dedicated solely to matrimonial ads.