Twenty-one days' residence since 1896 is required, but otherwise acknowledgment before witnesses is a legal marriage. In the year 1878 an Act entitled An Act to encourage Regular Marriage in Scotland was passed, and under it ministers may celebrate marriages on a certificate from a registrar, which is equivalent to the publication of banns. This certificate is issued by registrars on receiving notice of the intended marriage. The registrar posts the notice in the prescribed mode, and, if no objection is received, grants his certificate. The notice must be given to the registrar of the district or districts in which the parties have resided for fifteen days at least.
Marriage of Minors and Wards in Chancery.
If a minor who is a ward in Chancery marries without the consent of the Lord Chancellor (who takes care that proper settlements are made of the ward's property), he or she commits a contempt of court, and is liable to punishment accordingly. A minor who will inherit property can be made a ward by settling £100 upon him or her and making a proper application to the court. There is no law against two minors marrying, but the consent of parents is required.
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CHAPTER XIX
Foreign Etiquette of Marriage--Quaint Customs and Strange Superstitions.
Continental Weddings.
Many of the national, picturesque customs have disappeared from the weddings of the townspeople and the more educated classes on the Continent; but many distinctive points of etiquette still remain, and we shall find that in matters of detail there is much that differs from our English ways.
In Germany it is impossible for young people to marry without the consent of their parents or legal guardians, and unless certain prescribed forms are gone through, the marriage will be null and void. So many certificates of birth, parentage, etc., have to be produced that, it is said, the working classes can neither afford the time nor the money necessary for a legal marriage; so many of them do without it. The husband is the lord and master; his wife's property passes into his keeping and is at his absolute disposal. He may compel her to work, and even if the pair be divorced he still retains her money. As German girls are brought up to expect this, it does not strike them as any hardship, and most of them are quite happy to be under the sway of their liege lords.
The chief festivity of a German wedding is the Polterabend, a somewhat hilarious party given the night before. The young friends of the bride enact charades, or give living pictures illustrative of the chief events in her childhood and youth. There is much merriment, and, I believe, the breaking of crockery has a part in the proceedings. The bridesmaids are accompanied by an equal number of young men, called Brautführer. The bridal wreath is always of myrtle, not orange blossom, and the bride and bridegroom exchange rings. Customs vary according to social station and locality.