Page:Wanderings of a Pilgrim Vol 1.djvu/538

 gold, which hung down over the veil so that she could not see, and could scarcely breathe.

When the guns fired at the signing of the contract, the Prince ate the lumps of sugar that had been sent him by the bride; he then arose, and, quitting the male assembly, went into the zenāna, where he was received by the Begam and her guests, and seated on a gaddī. Soon after Mr. James Gardner appeared with the bride in his arms; he carried her from her own room, according to custom, and placed her on the gaddī, by the side of the Prince.

There she sat, looking like a lump of gold; no one could have imagined a human being was under such a covering; with difficulty she was kept from fainting, the heat was so excessive. Her lips and teeth had been blackened for the first time with misī, and gold and silver dust had been thrown over her face!

Surma (collyrium) also had been applied to her eyelids, at the roots of the lashes, by means of a piece of silver or lead, made in the shape of a probe without the knob at the end. The ladies in attendance on the young Begam then performed innumerable ceremonies; they fed the Prince with sugar-candy, and sifted sugar through his hands; they put a lump of sugar on the head of the bride, off which he took it up in his mouth, and ate it; sugar was placed on her shoulders, on her hands, on her feet, and it was his duty to eat all this misrī off all those parts of her body. The bride's slipper was concealed under rich coverings, and the grand art appeared to be to make the Prince eat the sugar-candy off the shoe!

The Kur'ān was produced, and some parts of it were read aloud; a large Indian shawl was then spread over the heads of the bride and bridegroom, as they sat on the floor, and the shawl was supported like a canopy by the ladies in attendance. A looking-glass was put into the hands of the Prince, he drew the veil of the bride partly aside, and they beheld each other's faces for the first time in the looking-glass! At this moment, had any false description of the bride been given to the bridegroom, he had the power of saying, "I have been deceived, the face I see is not the face that was pourtrayed to me; I will not