THE CHINESE: THEIR MANNERS AND CUSTOMS. 683 



unity and affection. The ladies, too, in China as well as elsewhere, 

 indulge in a little fashionable crying on the occasion, and so the rela- 

 tives of the bride spend the morning with her, weeping over her im- 

 pending departure, or, more probably, their own spinsterhood. They 

 do not, however, forget to bring some contributions for her trousseau. 

 In the evening comes the bridegroom with a whole army of his friends, 

 a procession of lanterns, a long red cloth or silk tapestry embroidered 

 with a figure of the dragon, borne on a pole between two men, and a 

 large red sedan covered with carving and gilding, and perfectly close. 

 In this the bride is packed up securely out of sight, and the whole 

 procession, preceded by a band of music and the dragon and closing 

 with the bride's bandboxes, starts for home. On arrival she is lifted 

 over the threshold, on which a pan of charcoal is burning, probably in 

 order to prevent her bringing any evil influence in with her. She then 

 performs the kotou to her husband's father and mother, worships the 

 ancestral tablets of her new family, and offers prepared betel-nut to 

 the assembled guests. Up to this time she has been veiled, but she 

 now retires to her chamber, where she is unveiled by her husband ; 

 she then returns, again performs obeisance to the assembled guests, 

 and partakes of food in company with her husband ; at this meal two 

 cups of wine, one sweetened, the other with bitter herbs infused in it, 

 are drunk together by the newly married pair, to symbolize that hence- 

 forth they must share together life's sweets and bitters. The bride 

 then retires, escorted by the matrons present, some one of whom re- 

 cites a charm over her, and arranges the marriage-couch. The next 

 morning the gods of the household and the hearth are worshiped, and 

 the six following days are devoted to formal receptions at home of 

 different members of the two families or equally formal visits paid to 

 the family of the bride. During the whole of this period she still 

 travels in her red-and-gold sedan, and is still escorted by her band of 

 music and dragon. 



Such are the ceremonies with which the chief or number one wife 

 is espoused, and of this rank there can be but one. Taste and depth 

 of pocket give the only limit to the number of subsidiary wives that 

 may be taken. These are married with far less ceremony than the 

 first, are often from a different class of society, being literally pur- 

 chased, and act to a certain extent as servants or attendants to the 

 chief wife. They are, however, legal wives, with recognized rights 

 and position ; their children are legitimate, and inherit in equal shares 

 with those of the first wife. Indeed, this last is considered as the 

 mother of the whole family, and the children are bound to. display 

 toward her more reverence than even toward their natural parent. 



But even in the Flowery Land, people sometimes find that the bit- 

 ter predominates over the sweet in the cups of alliance, and that the 

 geese borne in the marriage procession are emblematical of something 

 else besides domestic affection. In a word, they occasionally want to 



