Wedding Veil Traditions.

Tuapeka Times, Volume XLIX, Issue 6690, 20 August 1919, Page 3

Wedding Veil Traditions.

Satin, orange blossom and a wedding veil. A wedding without these three important cleiients is to the ftrualc mind most incomplete. Everything connected with the "bride's own day" is ba,thcd in sentiment and superstition, from the blue headed pin fixed in some half-hidden fold to the old shoe tiod to the carriage door, and the wedding veil has its share. It may be an heirloom, banded down from generations long gone or lent by a friend to bring to the bride the good fortune of "something borrowed" On no account, says one superstition, should the bride-to-be buy her own veil. One ok! inaid was heard to remark that she had never worn her wedding voil herself, that is the wedding veil bequeathed to her by her mother, but that seven nieces,, four cousins, and one grand-niece had each in turn taken it to the altar, and she didn't believe one of them regretted having done so.

We arc told that the ill-fated Mary, Queen of Scots, was the first to wear a white wedding gown, and the story of tl.c first wedding veil is equally interesting. It was merely a bunch of coralline weed, ofttimes called mermaid's lace, threaded in and out of the meshes of a new white fishing net by a lark-eyed daughtor of sunny Italy, whoso sailor lover, with an Italian's eye for true beauty, had brought as a token of his love. Thus originated the point Venetian lace we admire so muchat the present time.

Another story is told of an old lace maker who spent the greater part of two years making a veil for her'lord's daughter Her work, however, was wasted, for the girl's mother thought tho large oblong-shaped dots embroidered between the lilies of tho valley and roses suggested tears too vividly, and so tho labour of love was cast aside. Even to-day there are girls who object to dew-drops forming part of their veil's design, just as, though passionately found of pearls, thoj would noi countenance the idea of a pearl engagement ring. It is the custom now for the veil to be worn so as to havo the face exposed, this in former time was habitual with royalty alone, the explanation being that by this means no deception in' tho way of impersonation could be practised