MARRIAGE CEREMONIES. 
281 
^‘9. A Dozen of Points. ■ • 
‘‘You are in every point a Lover true, 
And therefore Fortune gives the Points io you.” 
** 16. A Skarfe. 
r- 
“ Take you this Scarfe, bind Cupid hande and foote, ^ „ 
So Love must aske you leave before he shoote.” 
Herric, in his Hesperides, in the Epitbalamie on Sir Clipseby Grew 
and his- Lady, thus cautions the bridegroom’s men against offending the 
delicacy of the new-married lady : 
“ We charge ye that no strife 
(Farther than gentleness tends) get place 
Among ye, striving for her Lace.” 
At the marriage ceremony of John Newchombe, the wealthy clothier 
of Newbury, cited by Strutt, his bride was led to church between two 
sweet boys, with bride laces and rosemary tied about their silken 
leaves. 
Bride Knives . — Strange as it may appear, it is however certain 
that knives were formerly part of the accoutrements of a bride. This 
perhaps will not be difficult to account for, if we consider that it, 
anciently formed part of the dress for women to wear a knife or 
knives sheathed and suspended from their girdles : a finer or more 
ornamented pair of which would very naturally be either purchased 
or presented on the occasion of a marriage. In that most rare play% 
the Witch of Edmonton, Somerton says, “ But see the bridegroom 
and bride comes : the new pair of Sheffield knives fitted to one 
sheath.” — In ‘Well-met, Gossip or, ‘ ’Tis Merry when Gossips meet/ 
the Widow says, — 
“ For this you know, that all the wmoing season, 
Suitors with gifts continual seek to gain 
Their mistress’ love, &c.” 
The wife answers : — 
- * 
“ That’s very true 
In conscience I had twenty pair of gloves, 
When 1 was maid, given to that effect ; 
Garters, knives, purses, girdles, store of rings, 
And many a thousand dainty, pretty things.” 
Thus to another part of the dress, in the old play of the Witch of 
Edmonton, old Carter tells his daughter and her sweetheart, “Your 
marriage money shall be received before your wedding shoes can be 
pulled on. Blessing on you both.” 
We find the following passage in “ a Treatise wherein Dicing, 
Dauncing, Vaine Plays, or Enterluds, with other idle Pastimes, &c. 
commonly used on the Sabbath-day, are proved by the authoritie of 
the Word of God, and antient writers, by John Northbrook, minister 
and preacher, of the word of God.— ^In olde time (we reade) that 
there was usually carried before the Mayde, when she shoulde be 
married, and came to dwell in hir husbande’s house, a distaffep 
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