Page:Folk-lore - A Quarterly Review. Volume 23, 1912.djvu/484

 460 Collectanea.

church, the door of which is decorated with myrtle and laurel (porta triunfanta). After the church ceremony, all go for dinner to the bridegroom's house, at the door of which the bride is given by the bridegroom's mother the traditional kiss and everyday head-kerchief which reminds her of her future lot of household labour. At various points on the way from the church will be placed tables, each with two glasses of liquor and two nosegays. The newly-married pair must drink the liquor and take the nosegays, and fill a plate with confetti. On the way, the traditional sweets, confetti {benis), boiled chestnuts, nuts, and walnuts are distributed to the spectators. After dinner the Te Deum is sung, the bridegroom's father starting it if the cure is not present. After the feast, wine-drinking, and supper, the guests disperse, and the bride returns to her own home. At dusk on the following day the bride bids goodbye to her relatives, and goes to her husband's home, followed by a number of girls proportionate to her station and carrying in gerii (baskets for the back) her scherpia (dowry of linen).

In some places in Piedmont, if the bride or bridegroom has jilted a former lover, a line of sawdust will be laid from the inconstant lover's house to that of the unfortunate sweetheart.

On the last day of Carnival some maskers will draw a pig roughly on large sheets of paper, or on the leaf of a book, and pretend to read aloud from this manuscript to the laughing bystanders the lives or stories of any unmarried girls who have refused or jilted lovers, i.e. to whom they have dato il porco (given the pig).

At Carnival time girls and boys dance around a fire, singing : —

" Carnival Ta rott ul co'. Vegn da mi, ch'al cusiro. Pam la quqia e'l didal. Viva, Viva, Carnival ! "

{i.e. "Carnival has broken his head. Come to me, I will mend it. Give me needle and thread. Long live, long live. Carnival ! ").

At Antrona, at Easter time, a quantity of holy water is taken to the church to be blessed. Every peasant takes some home in a bottle, which is kept in the house ready for the use of the cure in cases of emergency. Estella Canziani.