Series 1 > Journals of Sir John Lauder, Lord Fountainhall, with his observations on public affairs and other memoranda, 1665-1676

FRENCH MARRIAGE LAWS
65
makes betuixt Tutors and Curators, for they call all curators,
of which tho they have a distinction, which agries weill wt the
Civil Law, for these that are given to on wtin the age of 14
they call curateurs au persones et biens, which are really the
Justinianean tutors who are given principaliter ad tuendam
personam pupilli and consequenter tantum res; thes that [are]
given to them that are past their 14, but wtin their 25, they
call curateurs du causes, consequentialy to that, quod curatores
certcc rei vel causae dari possunt, and wtout the auctority
of thir the minors can do nothing, which tends any wayes to
the deteriorating their estat, as selling, woodsetting or any
wayes alienating.
What concernes the consent of parents in the marriage of
their children, the French law ordaines that a man wtin
the age of 28, a woman wtin 25 sail not have the power of
disposing themselfes in marriage wtout the consent of their
parents. If they be past this age, and their parents wil not
yet dispose of them, then and in that case at the instance of
the Judge, and his auctority interveening they may marry tho
their parents oppose.
When the friends of a pupil or minor meits to choose him
a curator, by the law of France they are responsible to the
pupill if ether the party nominat be unfitting, or behave him¬
self fraudulently and do damnage, and be found to be not
solvendo.
At Bourges in Berry theirs no church of the religion, since,
notwtstanding its a considerable toune, their are none of the
religion their, but one family, consisting of a old woman and
hir 2 daughters, both whores; the one of them on hir deathbed
turned Catholick when Mr. Grahame was their.
Its a very pleasant place they say, situate on a river just
like the Clin heir ; they call it the Endre.
Heir taught the renouned Cuiacius,1 whom they call their
yet2 but a drunken fellow. His daughter was the arrantest
whore in Bourges. Its not above 4 or 5 years since she died,
whence I coniecture she might be corned to good years or she
died.
1 Jacques Cujas, eminent jurist, 1522-1590. 4 i.e. ‘ still speak of there as.’
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