Billet Are Getting More Doux, Say Square Stores

Valentine's day is making Square businessmen hate love.

Last year, they reported that the trend was towards lugubrious greetings like, "I could boil you in brine, Won't you be my Valentine?" So this year, they ordered several gross of similar soupy sentiments. But they claim the demand is now for the lace-and-honey type of card.

The survey showed that more men are becoming amourous this year, too. Last year, the majority of Valentine buyers were women.

"I wish this whole mess never began," commented one clerk. "It's more trouble than it's worth."

St. Valentine, legendary perpetrator of the universal love-your-lover-day, might have found it was more trouble than it was worth as far as he was concerned, too. Under Emperor Claudius in the third century A.D., young men in the army were forbidden to marry since it sapped their strength. St. Val began marrying couples in secret, for which Claudius had him whipped and imprisoned. That's when the Saint began sending cards to his friends on every anniversary of his imprisonment.