oor and the bottle
broken: when the married pair have entered, the husband is offered a
spoonful of honey, of which he takes half and gives the rest to his
wife. There gifts of sweetmeats, dried fruits, etc. are given to the
guests.[21] In Avola a spoonful of honeyed almonds is presented to each
of the lady-guests--in Marineo (province of Palermo) and in Prizzi clear
honey and a sip or two of water.

The house of the wedded pair is ornamented with flowers, as we learn
from the popular Sicilian song: "Flowers of roses: the bride when she
returns from the church finds the house adorned with flowers." The
marriage _pro verbo de praesenti in faciem ecclesiae_ is termed
_'nguaggiarisi_ (and hence the dress above mentioned, _l'abitu di lu
'nguaggiu_), but the contracting parties are not yet man and wife; and
to become so it is necessary to undergo another religious ceremony,
which consists in hearing mass and kneeling before the altar holding a
lighted wax candle while the priest bestows on them the benediction _pro
sponso et sponsa_. The old legal grants (_concessi_) to young girls who
married could not, nor can they now, be claimed without this ceremony;
and the bride does not enter into possession of the legacy which she has
acquired until she shows to the proper person the certificate of her
parish priest that she has been married and espoused (_'nguaggiatu e
sposatu_). The latter ceremony may take place within a year after the
marriage. Widows, according to the Roman ritual approved by Pope Paul V.,
were not formerly, nor are they now, ever _espoused_: nevertheless,
in the seventeenth century there were many examples[22] of widows
blessed a second time in the parish church of St. Hippolytus in Palermo.

We are face to face with a newly-married couple in the midst of people
who have a good breeding of their own; and we, who measure our words and
are ashamed to eat our soup with a wooden spoon, must enter their
cottage and take part in the poor but sincere, joyful and cordial
festival of the evening. Let us betake ourselves for a short time to
Trapani, and look in on one of those modest houses during a
wedding-night.

When the bride and groom return from the church they find at the house
of the former a drink prepared from the milk of almonds and some small
cakes. While at table the groom leaves his wife a moment to go to his
father's house, and returns when the meal is half finished. He remains
with her until midnight,