Page:The Land of the Veda.djvu/490

480 parents under their bond to see to the consummation of the engagement. This is the usual method, slightly varied in different localities. It is easily expressed in these few words, but what anxiety, what care and inquiry before these determinations can be reached! No part of the Institutes of Menu is more definite and circumstantial than that which gives the law of selection in marriage. With the eye and taste of a whimsical connoisseur in female charms, the old legislator has prescribed the standard of excellence in age, caste, condition, and qualities, by which the Hindoo maiden is to be tested. Nor has he or his commentators forgotten the requisite compromises that will arise in such cases.

With great care and anxiety the questions of consanguinity, name, physical condition, motion, family, etc., have all to be decided upon. But let this singular law speak for itself

As to relationship, “she who is not descended from his paternal or maternal ancestors within the sixth degree, and who is not known by the family name to be of the same primitive stock with his father or mother, is eligible by a twice-born man for nuptials and holy union.” The phrase “twice-born” refers to the investiture of high-caste men with the sacred string into the full immunities of their order, called a “second birth.”

As to families outside the pale of selection Menu ordains: “In connecting himself with a wife let him studiously avoid the ten following families, be they ever so great, or ever so rich in kine, goats, sheep, gold, and grain — the family that has omitted prescribed acts of religion; that which has produced no male children; that in which the Veda has not been read; that which has thick hair on the body; and those which have been subject to hemorrhoids, to phthisis, to dyspepsia, to epilepsy, to leprosy and to elephantiasis.”

The right family and the proper relationship having been carefully sought and found, the child's personal suitability is then examined; and first her age: “A Brahmin should, according to law, marry a maiden about a third of his own age.” The exact