The older brother of my brother-in-law, who came to preside over the arrangement, being required to sign his name, began to tremble, and, with much embarrassment, wrote down his own name on the paper with one mistake! Some cunning fathers, before the coming of the girl’s friends, provide a room magnificently for his son’s study, borrowing a pile of books from the boys in the neighborhood, and, in fact, arrange everything so nicely, that it is hardly possible at first to tell whether the room is the boy’s study or merely a bookstore.
When both parties feel satisfied each with the other, they enter into a written agreement called “log-no pottrica,” which records every arrangement respecting the marriage. In the evening of a fixed day, the parties meet at the house of the bride, where the family priest is required to write the instrument, and an astrologer to appoint a day for the wedding ceremony, and the other friends to be witnesses. Before commencing to write, the priest marks the paper with dots of red and yellow powders, writes the name of “Doorga Ramà,” &c., on the top, and other things below. The following is the form of the agreement or “log-no pottrica”:—
“Sree Sree Doorga.”
“The well-wisher, Ram Chunder Deb.”
“Hereby in this happy writing, I promise to marry my first son, Sree Deno bundoo Deb, with your second daughter, Sree motly Modhoo Bindoo Debee, on the 24th of June, 9½ P. M., 1859. I promise, also, to pay all the expenses that shall occur on the occasion, provided you will give all the gold ornaments to your daughter, &c.”
The father of the girl writes a similar one, answering to and approving the points suggested in the other, and congratulating the proposed Bai-ba-hick[5] with a good will.
My American and English friends know very well what is to be done, i. e. what arrangements and preparations are to be made two or three months before the marriage. The Bengalee do just the same as far as the preparation is concerned. Among the former the young man secures a home, furnishes the parlor with everything to render both the short summer and long winter pleasant and comfortable, drives over to Chickering and Sons for a best, well-tuned piano-forte, and brings home all the newly-composed music that possibly could be procured in the music-stores. The friends of the young lady seem very busy in knitting, seaming, sewing, embroidering, &c. Among the latter, no separate house is required at all, for it is considered greatest of all earthly pleasures to dwell under one and the same paternal roof. If the young man should remove somewhere, even after the death of his parents, in order to live with his wife, the children in the neighborhood would ridicule him as the slave of his wife, and her as the author of discord. Hindoo parents, on their death-bed, charge their sons not to have their food cooked in a different kitchen, but to dwell peaceably in the same house, helping each other. I know a Brahmun family in my village, Bātli, which contained thirty souls at the same time. The house that sheltered them is something like a fortress, enclosing an acre of land. There is no need of separate houses from various reasons. A newly-married wife in Bengal is more fit for a primary school in Boston than for housekeeping. Again, if her husband be absent for half a day even, she would not go to the next house to ask for help if absolutely necessary. Shopping and singing are out of the question. Thus, while very young I was sick, and the physician, not finding my father at home, put a few pills on a plate, and requested my mother, who was then by the side of the door, to get some coorchēē, bark of a tree, and mix its juice with them. Though in the next house there were several persons, yet she could not manage to get any coorchēē. In the afternoon the physician came, and feeling my pulse, said, smiling: “Madam, you have not applied the medicine, nor given your boy the prescribed regimen. I know why you have not: brother Gangooly is not at home.” Going a few rods out of the house, he returned, calling my mother, saying, “Madame, here is the coorchēē, which grew on your lot.”
Now about the necessary preparations for the wedding. Nothing is to be more cared for than a good, faithful goldsmith, who is to make ornaments of various shapes and sizes. Three days before the marriage, both the bride and the bridegroom are anointed and bathed in their respective homes, by a dozen married women. The widows are entirely excluded from this and other ceremonies pertaining to the wedding. I have before observed, that the women cannot associate with men, and the question would naturally suggest itself, Do the married women anoint and bathe both bride and bridegroom? I will here be more distinct in portraying the scenes, for they are all new and different from those of my Christian friends. The women are for the most part elderly persons, and composed of sisters, aunts, and the like. This exception is made on an occasion like this. The bride and bridegroom are requested to keep a jathee, scissors, with them until the marriage ceremony is over. The relatives and other friends send valuable gifts, and entertain them in their houses. This mode of entertainment is called “the bachelor and maiden feasts.” The evening previous to the wedding is celebrated the feast of “joy cakes.” These cakes are made of cocoa-nuts, sugar, and rice-powder, and are cooked with much ceremony. When the raw rice is washed, they sound the sacred shells, trumpets, flutes, cymbals, &c.
As the couple will be joined in a fixed moment in the evening, the friends are very careful to reach the bride’s house before that time. When the bridegroom starts he dresses in red silken cloth, wears a hat made of cord and other glittering, fanciful material; then his mother, or in her absence, aunt, comes near him, and inquires, “Child,—where are you going?” “To bring you a female servant, mother,” he replies. If he be the son of a rich man, hundreds of persons go with him. The bands, both native and English, play before him all the way. Some young boys, a hundred or more, dress in uniform; walk with colored flags in their hands; the hired dancing-girls dance on the platform, carried by men on their shoulders. Various fancy things, such as hills, houses, halls, and churches, made of bamboo sticks, beautifully covered with paint and gilded paper, are displayed,—fireworks of various sorts are burned,—streets leading to the bride’s house are splendidly illuminated. When the bridegroom reaches his place of destination, he is received in an outer hall, accommodating hundreds. A party of twelve young men come and demand some money, which they get from every man who comes to marry in their place. This they dispose of at the public worship. Some little boys come, also, in the name of the “throwing stone party,” for some money, which they spend for a feast or other amusements. The priests of the opposite parties enter into a discussion of various topics, embracing mental philosophy, astronomy, poetry, scriptures, &c., while the schoolboys do the same, questioning each other in geography, history, grammar, &c. Some dull and less active boys sit apart on the cushions with the pretence of headache or something else. Sometimes the boys of the bride’s village disturb the others very much. I know of many instances in which they cut the best cashmere shawls to pieces, threw fire on them with a pretended carelessness, and painted the face of some poor dull boy with ink, who might happen to sleep at that time. Again, the “twelve friends” sometimes practice much violence if they do not get the exact sum of money they demand. I, unfortunately, once went to attend the wedding of our priest’s son, in a town nearly twenty miles north of Calcutta. The party above mentioned proved so troublesome that we were obliged to fly by the back door in the night, through bamboo forests, tired, hungry, and afraid lest they should overtake us, and we be handled roughly.