Scotch Marriages. hereafter none shall be maryed except on Thursday immediately after sermon except in case of necessitie and that the persons to be maried enter the church before sermon, otherwise not to be maried that day." (The Ayr authorities were much more considerate of the time required by the bride's toilet and the excited state of all the wedding party than were their Dumfermline confreres. It was bad enough to be there all sermon time, for some in those good days preached five or six hours at a service). Not only were the people of Scotland pre vented marrying when they liked, but ap parently they could not don any kind of wedding-garments that they pleased, and their wedding-feasts were likewise restrained and curtailed by laws temporal and ecclesias tical. Among the statutes of King James the second we read, "That sen the Realme in ilk Estaite is great tumlie pured throwe sumptuous claithing, baith of men and women. The Lordes think is speidful, that restriction be thereof in this maner. That na man within Burgh that lives be merchandicc, bot gif hce be a person constitute in dignitie, as Alderman, Baillie, or uther gude worthy man, that ar of the Counccl of the towne, and their wives, weare claithes of silk, nor costly scarlettes in gownes, or furringes with mertrickes. And that they make their wives and dauchters in like manner be abuilyied gangand and correspondant for their estate, that is to say, on their heads short Curches, with little hudes, as at used in Flanders, England and uther cuntries. And as to their gownes, that na women were mertriekes, not letteis, nor tailes unfit in length nor furred under, but on the Haliedaie. . . . And as anent the commounes, that na Laborers nor husband men weare on the wake daye, bot gray and quhite, and on the Halie-daye bot licht blew, greene, redde, and their wives richt-swa, and the courchies of their awin making, and that it exceed not the price of XL pennyes the eluc. And that na woman cum to Kirk, nor mercat
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with her face mussailed or covered, that sche may not be ken, under the paine of escheit of the courchie.". . . (Nothing shows how far removed from us are the days of James II, of Scotland, than the suggestion that an alderman might be a person "in dignitie," or that any member of a town council could be a good worthy man. People have changed since that law was passed on "the sext daie of the month of March, the yeir of God ane thousand foure hundredth, fiftic-seven yeires." The law just recited was bad enough, but that wiseacre James VI of Scotland, "God's silly vassal " (as he was once called to his face), in 1581 made matters worse by for bidding all, except dukes, earls, and their wives, and a few others of high degree, wear ing or using in their clothing, or apparel, or the lining thereof, any " claith of Gold or Silver, Velvet, Satine, Damask, Taffataes, or any begairies, Frengies, Pasments, or broderie, of gold, silver or silk : or any Layne, Cammerage, or wollen claith" made and brought from any foreign country, under a penalty off1c1o for every landed gentleman, and 100 marks for every other gentleman, and £40 of every yeoman, for every day that he, his wife, son, or daughter trans gressed the law. Fortunately people were permitted to wear any of these forbidden ar ticles if they had them before the law was en acted, and any woman might wear "silk apparel" on her head as had been the cus tom in former days. Even this last law did not embody all the wisdom and ideas of that high and mighty Prince James on the superfluous usage of unnecessary sumptuousness in apparel by his northern subjects, so he fulminated an other blast against these evil doers, and in 1621 the Parliament enacted (among other things) that " None of our Soveraignc Lords Lieges, of whatsoever quality or degree, shall weare any cloathing of Gold or Silver Cloathe, or any Gold or Silver Lace upon their apparels, or any part of their Bodies
