Page:Christiaan Snouck Hurgronje - The Achehnese - tr. Arthur Warren Swete O'Sullivan (1906).djvu/361

 plantains and other fruits, sirih, pinang, tobacco and gambir. It is however more usual for the husband to give money, and the amount varies from six to eight dollars multiplied by the number of bungkays of gold in his wedding-gift. At the same time he gives her a complete suit of clothing known as seunalén (from salén = "to change" said of garments).

This last gift is reciprocated by the bride on the seventh day (i. e. the day that succeeds the seventh night) by a gift of equal value in money or clothing to the bridegroom; this is also called seunalén. Where it consists of clothes, the adat prescribes that the bridegroom should at once don them and go back thus arrayed to his parents' house.

Not until after the morning meal on this seventh day is the wedding-feast (keureuja) regarded as concluded. It follows, therefore, that at this point the bridal pair require a "cooling". For this purpose they both sit down at the entrance of the jurèë with their legs stretched out straight in front of them. Boughs of the cooling plants already enumerated are dipped in flour and water (teupōng taweuë), and their feet are besprinkled therewith. The bridegroom alone is smeared behind the ears with yellow glutinous rice; this is done by a peunganjō of the bride.

Meantime the mother, aunts and sisters of the bride assemble in the passage (rambat) of the house to take leave of the bridegroom on his departure for home. He anticipates their greeting by a deep obeisance, in return for which they give him money presents of an amount equal to those which he has presented to the bride during the first seven evenings as a recompense for her seumbah.

All these tedious ceremonies of the first seven days are sometimes simplified by being performed one after another on the first or third day.

The wedding is now at an end, and after these seven busy day there succeeds a compulsory day of rest for the bridegroom. On the eighth day it is understood that he must not visit the bride (wòë);