The children were very much interested in watching what happened next. The bride's friends brought out a large red card, on which was written the bride's family name, and the other party produced a similar one, bearing that of the bridegroom. These were exchanged with bows. The two men at the head of the procession then walked, with their lanterns, between the sedan-chair and the lantern-bearers, who carried the bride's family name, and returned to their places in front, when the bride's party turned round and went back to her father's house, carrying home her family name, she being supposed to have now taken that of her husband. Even her brothers went back also, and then the band played a very lively air whilst the rest of the procession took her on.
Fireworks were let off along the road, and a great many outside the bridegroom's door when the bride arrived. Her bridesmaids, who have to keep with her throughout the day, accompanied the procession.
As the sedan-chair was taken into the reception-room, the torch-bearers and musicians stayed near the door, and where it was put down the floor was again covered with red carpet. The bridegroom then came and knocked at the bridal door, but a married woman and a little boy, holding a mirror, asked the bride to get out. Her bridesmaids helped her to alight. The mirror was supposed to ward off evil influences.
BRIDE AND BRIDEGROOM.
Sometimes, much for the same purpose, a bride is carried over a charcoal fire on a servant's back, but this was not done on this occasion. All this time the bride's face was hidden by her veil. She was then taken into a room, where the bridegroom was waiting for her, and here they sat down together for a few minutes, without speaking a word. Sometimes the bridegroom sits on a high stool, while the bride throws herself down before him, to show that she considers man superior to woman.
He then went into the reception-room, where he waited for his bride to come to worship his ancestral tablets with him. A table was put in front of the room, on which were two lighted candles and lighted incense. Two goblets, chop-sticks, white sugar-cocks, and other things were on the table, when the bride and bridegroom both knelt four times, bowing their heads towards the earth. This was called "worshipping heaven and earth." The ancestral tablets were on tables at the back, on which were also lighted candles and incense. Turning round towards the tablets, they worshipped them eight times, and then facing one another, they knelt four times.
Wedding wine was now drunk, and the bride and bridegroom ate a small piece from the same sugar-cock, which was to make them agree.
The thick veil was now taken off the bride, but her face was still partly hidden by strings of pearl hanging from a bridal coronet.
It often happens that the bridegroom now sees his bride for the first time, the two fathers having perhaps planned the marriage, asked a fortune-teller's advice, sent go-betweens to make all the necessary arrangements, chosen a lucky day, without the bride or bridegroom having a voice in the matter. This was the case with the young couple, a great part of whose wedding ceremony Sybil and Leonard had witnessed. Both Chinese boys and girls marry sometimes when they are sixteen years of age; these were very little older.