f next day, the young couple
were then conducted home. The young wife, assisted by her female
friends, undressed and got to bed, then the young man was sent into bed
by his friends, and then all the marriage party entered the bedroom,
when the young wife took one of her stockings, which had been put in bed
with her, and threw it among the company. The person who got this was to
be the first married. The best man then handed round the glass, and when
all had again drank to the young couple, the company retired. This
custom was termed _the bedding_, and was regarded as a ceremony
necessary to the completion of the marriage; and there can be little
doubt that it is a survival of a very ancient ceremony of the same
family as the old Grecian custom of removing the bride's coronet and
putting her to bed. This particular form of ceremony was also found in
Scotland, and continued to comparatively modern times. Young Scotch
maidens formerly wore a snood, a sort of coronet, open at the top,
called the virgin snood, and before being put to bed on the marriage
night this snood was removed by the young women of the party. This
custom is referred to in an ancient ballad.

"They've ta'en the bride to the bridal bed,
To loose her snood nae mind they had.
'I'll loose it,' quo John."

On the morning after some of the married women of the neighbourhood met
in the young wife's house and put on her the _curtch_ or closs cap
(_mutch_), a token of the marriage state. In my young days unmarried
women went with the head uncovered; but after marriage, never were seen
without a cap. On the morning after marriage the best man and maid
breakfasted with the young couple, after which they spent the day in the
country, or if they lived in the country, they went to town for a
change. Weddings were invariably celebrated on a Friday,--the reason for
this preference being, as is supposed, that Friday was the day dedicated
by the Norsemen to the goddess, Friga, the bestower of joy and
happiness. The wedding day being Friday, the walking-day was a Saturday;
and on Sunday the young couple, with their best man and best maid,
attended church in the forenoon, and took a walk in the afternoon, then
spent the evening in the house of one of their parents, the meeting
there being closed by family worship, and a pious advice to the young
couple to practise this in their own house.

If the bride had been courted by other sweethearts than he who was no