Note 83 — Chapter VI
Reading edition
23. We have then the etiquette by which the bride screams and wails as she is being carried away. When she reaches her new home she is lifted across the threshold by her husband, or carried inside in a basket. This was an old custom on the Scotch border,83 and may be as much a survival of the respect paid to the threshold as a reminiscence of marriage by capture. As she enters the door is barred by her husband’s sister, who will not allow her to enter until she is propitiated with a gift.