The First The Marriage Of A
Brahman Heiress, The Second Of A Daughter Of The Fire-Worshipers.
The First Announcement Was Something To The Following Effect:
"The Family Of Bimbay Mavlankar, Etc., Etc., Are Preparing For A
Happy Event.
This respectable member of our community, unlike
the rest of the less fortunate Brahmans of his caste, has found
a husband for his grand-daughter in a rich Gujerat family of the
same caste.
The little Rama-bai is already five, her future
husband is seven. The wedding is to take place in two months
and promises to be brilliant."
The second announcement referred to an accomplished fact. It
appeared in a Parsi paper, which strongly insists on the necessity
of giving up "disgusting superannuated customs," and especially
the early marriage. It justly ridiculed a certain Gujerati newspaper,
which had just described in very pompous expressions a recent
wedding ceremony in Poona. The bridegroom, who had just entered
his sixth year "pressed to his heart a blushing bride of two and
a half!" The usual answers of this couple entering into matrimony
proved so indistinct that the Mobed had to address the questions
to their parents: "Are you willing to have him for your lawful
husband, O daughter of Zaratushta?" and "Are you willing to be
her husband, O son of Zoroaster?" "Everything went as well as it
could be expected," continued the newspaper; "the bridegroom was
led out of the room by the hand, and the bride, who was carried
away in arms, greeted the guests, not with smiles, but with a
tremendous howl, which made her forget the existence of such a
thing as a pocket-handkerchief, and remember only her feeding-bottle;
for the latter article she asked re-peatedly, half choked with sobs,
and throttled with the weight of the family diamonds.
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