QUEER WEDDINGS AMONG THE CARRIBEES.

Otago Witness, Issue 1920, 4 December 1890, Page 35

QUEER WEDDINGS AMONG THE CARRIBEES.

It is said that the Garribees make their daughters fast four days preceding their marriage. The ceremonies of their marriages are singular.

The men and women are crowned with flowers, and they assemble in a wood at the sound of a great number of various instruments, with their chief marching in front ; and when they quit the wood a plate of meat is brought, which the chief throws on the ground, saying these words :

"There 1 take that, thou wicked demon, and leave us in tranquility this day."

The company then goes on dancing all the way to the door of the newly-married couple; they find them walking in a circle of old women, half of them crying and tho other half laughing heartily. The first party sings these words :

" Oh, my child, if you knew the trouble and embarrassments in taking care of a family you would not have taken a husband."

The second party sings :

"Ah, my child, if you knew the pleasures of taking care of a family, you would have taken a husband long since."

Thus the young men and woaaen dance, the old women cry and laugh, the musicians make a great noise, the children cry loudly, and the new 'married couple remain silent spectators, till at length they arrange themselves around a table covered with turtles and intoxicating drinks.

They all get drunk and remain drinking till the next day.

The Turkoman women do a vast amount of work ; they fabricate carpets, screens for doorg, work-bags, horse clothing, blankets, &c, and when a young woman is engaged, it is thought to be the right thing for her to work all the tent domestic carpets and other household requisites before she is married.

When, however, she does marry without having completed this task it is expected from her that, as soon as (practicable, by her own labour, she will refund, in cash or kind, to her husband the dowry paid to her parents on marriage.

Such dowry generally consists of 100 sheep and a certain sum of money, which the bridegroom either pays down in a lump sum to the parents of the bride or by stipulated instalments.

Before the wedding it is customary for the bridegroom, after having arranged for the dowry to be paid to the parents of the bride, to collect his friends for a succession of horse race? and other sports, and also to secure and decorate a camel with the handBomest trappings, which is sent to the bride's tent, and on which she mounts and goes forth to receive the congratulations of her own relatives.

On the appointed day of the wedding the bride seats herself on a carpet outside of her tent, surrounded by her people, and the female relatives of the bridegroom come there to receive and take her away.

This is immediately opposed by the young lady's party, who offer resistance by tho discharge of raw eggs, &c, at the new comers, on which a general egg fight is entered into by the young women present, whilst the older dames carry on the engagement with almonds and raisins. . In the meantime the bridegroom rushes into the melee, walks off with his beloved, and puts her upon the camel saddle, when the matter is concluded.

Another sort of marriage is where the girl cf her own accord runs off with the young man, without reference to her parents, is accepted as correct, provided he is of a like social position, and duly pays the prescribed dowry.

When a girl is betrothed among the Australians her mother and aunts may not look or speak to the m<m for the rest of his lifo, but if they meet him they equat down by the wayside and cover up their heads, and when he and they are obliged to speak ir. one another's presence they use a peculiar lingo which they call " turn-tongue."

This queer dialect is not used for concealment, for everybody understands it, an«) some examples of it show that it has mud in common with the ordinary language.

To give an idea of the state of formaliu into which life ha 3 come among these suj posed free aud easy savages, mention may be made of the duties of the bridesmaid and groomsman. When the married pair have been taken to the new hut built for them, for the next two moons the groomsman and the husband sleep on one side of the fire, and the bridesmaid and wife on the other; the newlymarried couple not being allowed to speak or look at each other.

The bride is called a " not look around," and the pair in this embarrassing position are a standing joke to the young people living near, who amuse themselves by peepin°- in and laughing at them. * °

In fashionable circles in Russia it is the custom to solemnise marriages in a drawing room, and by candle light. There is no departure on a honeymoon tour.

There is a banquet, followed by a ball, then by a supper ; and at this last repast, when held in houses where old customs are observed, a new satin slippor, supposed to

be the bride's, is produced, and used as a drinking vessel by the bridegroom's friends, who pass it around |and drink the bride's health in it till is is soaked through, and will hold liquor no longer.

In houses where speeches are made, it is not the bridegroom, but the bride's father, who returns thanks when her health is drank, this usage being owing to the fact that a father still retains authority over his child after she is married.

He may summon her home to attend him when he is eick. If he lose his wife he may claim his married daughter's services during the first three months of his widowhood, and he very often does so.

If the daughter's husband dies her father may compel her to return to his roof, and he becomes the guardian of her children. None of these privileges are retained by a married woman's mother.

On the wedding day in Borneo the bride and bridegroom are brought from opposite ends of the village to the spot where the wedding is to be performed.

They are made to sit on two bars of iron that blessings as lasting and health as vigorous may attend the pair.

A cigar and a betel leaf, prepared with the arecanufc, are next put into the hands of the bride and bridegroom.

One of the priests then waves two fowls over the heads of the couple, and in a loner address to the Supreme Being calls down blessings upon the pair, and implores that peace and happiness may attend the union.

After the heads of the affianced have been knocked together two or three times the bridegroom puts the prepared sirih leaf and cigar into the mouth of the bride, and she does the same to him, whom she thus acknowledges as her husband.