Toward evening her mother and Baltè dressed Theria in her robes. They draped her beauty in the bridal saffron in which it glowed, they crowned her dark head with myrtle, accenting its symmetry. Then they covered all with the bridal veil and took her below into the torch-lighted aula.
Sorry might those well be who missed the wonder of her hidden eyes.
The guests received her with shouts and laughter. For the wedding was a revel and a romp, the subject of raillery and joke. The women sat at table apart; the men at their feast table. How merrily they laughed when Eëtíon kept glancing away from the board toward his bride and forgot to talk. It was not the bride’s beauty but Eëtíon’s which was remarked by the guests.
So they drank the wine and poured it to the gods, and flung it each in turn from his glass into a whirling cup. Whoever flung without spilling won a prize.
The young couple, in spite of their curious history, made a good impression upon the guests, and several that evening asked to become members of the new colony.
Then in the midst of the kottabus game went up the shout:
“The marriage car at the door!”
Only a moment had Theria to gaze about her at the dear familiar place seen all dimly through her veil. Then her mother took her hand and led her out into the coolness of the night.
There the full round of the marriage-moon made a whiter day. Eëtíon lifted his bride, a slim, swathed figure, into the chariot, then sat at her side. Karamanor, as paranymphos, sat with them.