MARRIAGE GAMES.
In India and Japan marriage ceremonies bear a feature of youthful play. Amongst the Moslems in the former country—where the doll is forbidden—the day previous to a real wedding the young friends of the bridegroom are summoned to join in a wedding game. On the eve of the day they all meet and surround the bridegroom-elect, then they make for the house of the bride's parents. On arrival at the gates the bride's relatives shut the doors and mount guard.
"Who are you," exclaims the bridegroom, "to dare obstruct the king's cavalcade? Behold the bridegroom cometh! Go ye not out to meet him?" The answer comes from within the abode. "It is a ruse—so many thieves roam about, more than probable you and your band are of them."
In England in 1557 the boys of London town sang a rhyme at their mock wedding feasts of—
"If ever I marry I'll marry a maid,
To marry a widow I'm sore afraid,
For maids are simple and never will grudge,
But widows full oft as they say know too much."