Front View.
Side View.
Next day they come home together, and after this they do not hide themselves any more. The parents of the girl are advised to make tesvino, as the young couple should not be separated any more, and word is sent out to a few friends and relatives to come to the wedding.
The guests arrive in the afternoon and most of the people remain outside of the house during the ceremony, but the bridegroom and his parents go inside, where they seat themselves on skins spread out on the floor. The mother of the girl has placed a large skin next to a big jar of tesvino, and on this the father of the boy sits down. As soon as he has taken his place, the host offers him three gourds full of the drink and requests him to accept the office of honour, the distribution of tesvino to all present, and he immediately enters upon his duties. He first gives four gourds full to the mother of the bride, as the mistress of the tesvino, and three gourds full to the host, the master; then four gourds full to his own wife. The bridal couple have been called in and told to sit down side by side, and all the rest of the people come in and stand around the pair. There is no special place assigned to anyone; but the father of the boy stands up and his mother sits down, while the girl’s father sits down and her mother stands up. The boy’s father now makes a speech, telling the bridal couple that they must remain together, and never separate nor fight. He specially tells the young man that he has to kill deer and take care always to bring some animal home to his wife, even if it be only a chipmunk or a mouse. He also has to plough and to sow corn and to raise crops, that he and she may always have enough to eat and not go hungry.
The father of the girl next takes the word, addressing himself mostly to the bride. Now that she is united to the man of her choice, she should always comply with her wifely duties. She must make blankets for her husband, and be industrious, make tesvino and iskiate, pinole, tortillas, gather herbs, etc., that her husband may always have something to eat and not go hungry. He names all the herbs singly. She must also help him, in her way, with the ploughing and sowing, so that he may raise plenty of corn to make tesvino that others may help him. She never must be lazy.
The father of the girl now gives tesvino to his future son-in-law, whose father in turn gives some to the bride. The bridal couple are covered with blankets, and in some cases his and her right hands are tied together. There is no other marriage ceremony. But all the guests partake of the liberally flowing bowl, and the festivities end in general and complete intoxication.
About two weeks later, the parents of the bridegroom make a feast exactly the same in character, but now the father of the girl occupies the seat of honour next to the big tesvino jar and acts as distributer. He also makes the first speech. The bridegroom gives to his brother-in-law a flint for striking fire, and six arrows. No matter how many brothers the bride has, they all get this present. It is considered an exchange for the girl. The shamans avail themselves of jus primæ noctis.
After the marriage the bridal couple separate, each staying in the old home for several weeks, after which the young man comes to live with his father-in-law for half a year or a year, until he has had time to make a house for himself. In the meantime the young couple are fed, but they receive nothing else. The young man has his own animals, which he got when he was small, and now his father gives him a piece of land.
Among the Christian Tarahumares the fiscal is advised of any contemplated marriage. This functionary has charge of the church edifice and the teaching of the children. It is his duty to take the young couples to the padre to be married. But the padre is far away and comes around only once a year, and sometimes even less frequently, and then the fiscal, so to say, rounds up all the matrimonially inclined. On account of their innate ardour to comply with all religious requirements the Tarahumares are willing to go through the ceremony, though to them it has no significance beyond the payment of one dollar. On this account they do not mind waiting for the padre’s blessing for a couple of years, until they get ready to part with the dollar, thereby generally saving an extra trip for baptising.
As the padre’s visits are so few and far between, the fiscal even considers it incumbent upon himself to make up matches on his own account, telling the people that when the padre comes they should be ready to get married. But so independent are the Tarahumare girls that it has happened that when the padre asks the portentous question, they cry, “Kæke, kæke” (“No, no”), and run away.