With a honeymoon always shining;
A world where the birds keep house by twos,
And the ring-dove calls, and the stock-dove coos,
And maids are many, and men may choose,
And never shall love go pining!"
If there were no weddings, there would be no art of entertaining. It is the key-note, the initial letter, the "open sesame," of the great business of society. Therefore certain general and very, perhaps, unnecessary hints as to the conduct of weddings in all countries may not be out of place here.
In London a wedding in high life—or, as the French call it, "higlif"—is a very sweeping affair. If we were to read the descriptions in the "Court Journal" of one wedding trousseau alone, furnished to a royal princess, or to Lady Gertrude Somebody, we should say with Fielding that "dress is the principal accomplishment of men and women." As for the wedding-cake which is built at Gunter's, it is a sight to see,—almost as big as Mont Blanc.
The importance of Gunter is assured by the "Epicure's Almanac," published in 1815; and for many years this firm supplied the royal family. When George III. was king, the royal dukes stopped to eat Gunter's pies, in gratitude for the sweet repasts furnished them in childhood; but now the Buzzards, of 197 Oxford Street, also are specialists in wedding-cakes.
Leigh Hunt, in one of his essays, described one Trumbull Walker as "the artist who confined himself to that denomination," meaning wedding-cake. His mantle fell on the Buzzards.
This enormous cake, and the equally enormous bouquet are the chief distinctive marks in which a London wedding differs from ours. To be legal, unless by special license, weddings in England must be celebrated before twelve o'clock. The reason given for this law is that before 1820 gentlemen were supposed to be drunk after that hour, and not responsible for what they promised at the altar.