The Marriage Column is a distinctly warm and cheerful work by Langley. The artist had a particular empathy with the women of Newlyn. He famously captured their toil, heartache and grief but also the lighter, sometimes whimsical moments in their lives, as in the present work. Is the young subject reading about a friend or old beau just wed, or lost in a reverie of her own anticipated, or indeed recent wedding? The painting was exhibited at the Messums Gallery on Cork Street, London in their British Impressionism show in Spring 2001. The artist's skill and mastery of his medium in capturing the human form has much matured by this stage in his career.