A MARRIAGE. 25 



the weather was too bad for out-of-door work, 

 and we were forced to content ourselves with 

 observing the proceedings of the wedding-party in 

 the village. Among their amusements were 

 music and dancing. The band consisted of a 

 grotesque-looking little burly Turk, with a bushy 

 black beard, and twinkling cunning eye, as if he 

 had a cross of the Gipsy in him, beating a mono- 

 tonous air with admirable precision on a large 

 but short drum. He had a second drum in 

 reserve in case of accident. His drumstick was 

 of carved wood. He was accompanied by two 

 boys, each playing on a sort of wooden trumpet, 

 resembling a penny trumpet in form, but infi- 

 nitely larger, the tones produced, and the air 

 played being for all the world like a Scotch 

 strathspey on a bagpipe. The villagers, one at a 

 time, would dance, moving their feet and hands 

 as the women do theirs in a Highland reel; 

 the arms, however, being put into more active 

 and graceful motion. Occasionally the old drum- 

 mer raised his drum in the air, tambourine 

 fashion, and danced for a moment or two himself, 

 and now and then the extempore dancers put in 

 a touch of the burlesque. They seemed never to 

 tire, and kept up their noise and capers day and 



