Lim Ho also advanced to offer his hand to Ngow Ming Nio, and to lead her to a table well furnished with the customary viands. On that board appeared an endless array of dishes, the usual Chinese dishes, such as sharks’ fins, soup made of stags’ tendons and birds’ nests, “kiemlo” and “bahmieh” (two fat soups) and other delicacies of no particular significance. But besides these the table contained other articles of food to which a distinctly emblematical meaning was attached. There was the pomegranate sliced in such a manner as to display to the greatest advantage its innumerable seedgrains, signifying the numerous offspring with which might the marriage be richly blessed! There were large heaps of the orange, fit emblem of the sweetness of life, which might the happy pair long enjoy! There were clusters of the oyster, typifying the distinct personality of each member and the unbroken unity of the entire family; and lastly some cuttings of the sugar cane, signifying the blessedness of the married state which, as that cane from knot to knot, from joint to joint, still increases in sweetness and in love.
The betrothed couple now took their place at the table, Lim Ho at his bride’s left hand, the place of honour in China. Before them were set two mighty goblets of pure gold. Both the beakers were filled with wine to the brim, and were connected with one another by a thread of scarlet silk. Then the bride and bridegroom simultaneously drained half the contents of the cups, after which they exchanged goblets, taking care however, that the scarlet thread remained unbroken. This time the cups were drained.
“Ouff!” cried van Beneden, who was present with his friends, “it is enough to take one’s breath away! Each of those things must hold at least a bottle and a half of wine I bet! For Lim Ho it is nothing; but for that poor little thing!”
“Aye, and I bet, you wouldn’t mind hob-nobbing with pretty Ngow Ming Nio,” replied Grenits.
“Do hold your tongue!” said Grashuis as he glanced at a group of Chinamen who stood near, and who looked anything but pleased at the unseemly burst of merriment which at so solemn a moment, had greeted Grenits’ words.
“Hush! Hush!” was the cry on all sides.
Resident van Gulpendam glared round indignantly, and Laurentia looked black as thunder at the interruption in the midst of the drinking ceremony.
Van Rheijn would have crept underground to avoid those terrible eyes.
When the couple had thus copiously pledged one another, the bridegroom took the left hand of the bride. He raised it to the level of her breast, and in that attitude, the pair gravely saluted one another.
“I say,” whispered Grenits, “I wish that dear little pet would give me such a bow.”