Laggards In Courtship. MATCHES MADE THROUGH A. STRANGE

Otago Witness, Issue 1894, 9 March 1888, Page 34

Laggards In Courtship. MATCHES MADE THROUGH A. STRANGE

RUSSIAN AND IRISH CUSTOM.

A Eussian custom, now fast declining, was designed to stimulate the laggards in courtship. On Whitsunday there was held in the Summer Garden, one of the city's parks, a fair of all the damsels who wanted husbands. Dressed in their best, with all the ornaments at their command, and holding silver spoons or other ware in their hands, to show that they were not wholly portionless, they stood in rows under the trees, attended by parents or guardians to ensure propriety of behaviour, to facilitate matrimonial bargains. The men in search of wives strolled about scrutinising all the candidates at leisure. When the man saw one that pleased him he usually introduced himself to her custodians, and if his statement of family, business, and prospects were satisfactory, he was made acquainted with the young woman and invited to her residence. After this the nuptial ceremony followed as speedily as the would-be bridegroom desired. A custom precisely like this still exists in a district in the South of Ireland. There it is known as " shrafting," the name being derived from Shrove Tuesday, the day on which it is held, On that day all the marriageable young people of both sexes are marshalled on the village green by their parents — the girls in all the glory of Sunday gowns and gay ribbons, as lovely as fresh-blown roses, evidently enjoying their blushes ; and the joung men, also in their best attire, looking as foolish as only the male human can look on exhibition. The two sexes are stationed in line apart from each other, and the parents pass between to vouchsafe proposals or to receive them and to haggle over marriage portions. The preferences of the young people are fully understood by the elders, and commendable effort is made to gratify them, the main object of the parents being to secure as good a sefc out as possible for the young couple. As this ceremony occurs on Shrove Tuesday, it is often a brief wooing to the willing victims, for Lent begins tlie following day, which perforce postpones all mamages for six weeks. The majority of the couples are united by the priest the same evening. Instances have been known when ladies themselves have assisted a bashful wooer who feared to put his fate to the touch. Such was the case with a young lady who assured her lover that she could make a beautiful cake, all filled with fruit, with a ring on the top ; and when the astonished swain exclaimed "Why, that is a wedding cake I" replied " I meant wedding," and which brought matters to a crisis immediately. More shrewd still was the yoqng lady—and more daring— who told her admirer that she was a mind reader, and could read what was going on in his mind at that moment; that he wanted to propose to her, but did not know how to do it, which of course relieved the young man from his embarrassment permanently. A very bashful man having succeeded in winning a wife, a lady relative teased him to tell her how he ever plucked up courage enough to propose. " Now, tell me the truth N ," she said ; " did not the lady have to do the courting for you ?" " N-no," answered the gentleman; "but I own she smoothed over the hard places for me," And this seems to be the ladies' mission in courtship — to smooth over the hard places. — " Waverley Magazine."