Note 30 — Chapter I · THE SOCIAL ORGANISATION

When a marriage has finally been arranged an evening is appointed for the ceremony. In the North Andaman this is as follows. The bride is seated on a mat at one end of the dancing ground, her relatives and friends sitting near her. Torches or heaps of resin are lighted near by, so that the ceremony may be seen by the on-lookers. The bridegroom is seated with his friends at the other end of the dancing ground. One of the older and more respected men addresses the bride, telling her that she must make a good wife, must provide for her husband such things as it is the duty of a wife to obtain or make, must see that he does not run after other women, and must herself remain faithful to him. He then addresses the bridegroom to the same effect, and taking him by the hand or arm, leads him to where the bride is seated and makes him sit down beside her. The relatives and friends weep loudly, and the young couple look very self-conscious and uncomfortable. The shyness of the young man is such that he often attempts to run away, but he is caught by his friends, who are prepared for such an attempt. After some minutes the officiating elder takes the arms of the bride and bridegroom and places them around each other’s necks. After a further interval he again approaches and makes the bridegroom sit on the bride’s lap30. They sit so for some minutes and the ceremony is over. The other members of the community generally have a dance on such an occasion, but in this the newly wedded pair do not join. A hut has already been prepared for them, and all their friends make them presents of useful objects with which to start housekeeping. They retire shyly to their new hut, while their friends continue dancing. The day after the ceremony the bride and bridegroom are decorated by their friends with white clay. For a few days the newly married couple are very shy of each other, hardly venturing to speak to or look at one another: but they soon settle down to their new position in the life of the community. During the early days of their marriage they are abundantly supplied with food by their friends. They are not addressed or spoken of by name, but if their names be A and B, the husband is called “the husband of B” while the wife is called “the wife of A.”