[17] From these duties the indemnity for the war was being extracted.
[18] The errand was to obtain the notorious Anglo-Chinese flotilla.
CHAPTER XIX.
A Double Wedding.—Its Celebration.—The Honeymoon.—Its Interruption.—Warlike Preparations.—Soong-kong Invested.—General Ching's Despatch.—Tsing-poo Recaptured.—Ti-ping Seventy Excused.—England's Responsibility.—Curious Chinese Custom.—The Chung-wang's Policy.—His Explanation.—The Ti-ping Court of Justice.—How Conducted.—Opium Smoking.—Its Effects.—Evidence thereof.—Forbidden by Ti-ping Law.—Opium Trade.
Soon after our return to Nankin, the Chung-wang, having left the Shi, Mo, Ting, and other Wangs, in charge of the lately captured Shanghae and Hang-chow districts, despatched considerable reinforcements to the Ying-wang, on the northern side of the Yang-tze river, and to the Ti-ping positions along the southern bank. These troops quickly dispersed the Imperialist force supposed to be investing Nankin from the hills on the opposite side of the river, and recaptured many towns on the southern side.
Meanwhile, at the Ti-ping capital, Marie became my wife, while my friend L. received the Chung-wang's youngest daughter in marriage. When Cum-ho's father ascertained the state of that young lady's affections, he sanctioned her union with L., although his better half made no little opposition at first, her ambitious mind being directed to the Mo-wang as a suitable son-in-law. This, however, she eventually accomplished by giving the chief her next eldest daughter as a wife. We were married according to the ritual of the Ti-ping church, but with the addition of using a ring, in conformity with the usage of our own. The Kan-wang's own chaplain, who was an ordained teacher of the London Missionary Society at Hong-kong, performed the ceremony.
Since the arrival of the Kan-wang at Nankin, he had altered the Ti-ping marriage service so as to closely resemble that of the English church, to which he had been used when principal native instructor and catechist of the London Mission. Although by the laws of the state polygamy was allowed, the improvements introduced by the Prime Minister, in fact we may term them regulations, had almost abolished the custom, so that few among the people married more than one wife.
Although L. and myself were married on the same day, and nearly at the same time, there was a vast difference between the style of the two ceremonies. Marie agreed with me in preferring a quiet solemnization, with only a few friends present; but L., taking to wife a chief's daughter, was obliged to undergo the usual pomp and festivity.