tives of the latter must invite the bride’s relations to their houses and entertain them. The company then separates, and awaits the day of the wedding.
§ 4a. The following account of the carouse differs so considerably from the above, that it must be given separately. It is related by Melnikoff, of the Erza of Teryshevsk (Simbirsk), who are greatly Russianised, and have borrowed many customs from their Slav neighbours. On the day of the carouse the bridegroom proceeds, with his father, to the house of the bride-elect, taking all the articles agreed upon, including spirits and a barrel of beer. They enter the house without a word or the least salutation, lay bread and salt on the table, and place money on the loaf.[1] If the bride belongs to another village, the bridegroom does not accompany his father, nor under any circumstances does he see the bride before the wedding. At the carouse the bridegroom, if present, sits in a corner, and does not utter a word the whole time. His father, after a prayer to God, proffers spirits and beer to all the bride’s relatives who are present. Then begins “placing on the table”. The purchase, properly speaking, is now made. The bride’s father demands a full price, then reduces it, and finally they come to terms. They pay twenty or thirty roubles of this “table money” to the bride, and never more. After this comes the “crown money”, which amounts to sixty roubles additional. Then they agree about the fur coats and other articles of dress to be given to the bride. Finally the bride’s father demands “pies”, together with a vedro (3.25 gallons) of spirits, a small barrel of beer, a shoulder of cooked meat, and a cake for the girls, into which a pear has been baked. The bride is not present on these occasions.
On the day fixed for the “feast of holy pies” the bridegroom’s relations assemble at his house, and, after refreshments, drive in a long procession to the home of the
- ↑ This reads like a wooing custom, though the words “agreed upon” show the two parties must have met before.
