pangled, a veil fringed with little pearls hung over
her face. Pagodas with tinkling gilt bells, sedan chairs full of silk
and cloth and goods of all kinds wuz carried in the procession by
coolies. Idols covered with jade and gilt jewelry, a company of little
children beatin' tom-toms and gongs, and the stuffed bodies of animals
all ornamented with gilt and red paper riggers wuz carried, and at
the tail end of the procession come the friends of the family.

The bridegroom wuzn't there, he wuz waitin' to hum in his own or his
father's house for the bride he'd never seen. But if the bride's feet
wuz not too large he would most likely be suited.

Miss Meechim said, "Poor young man! to have to take a wife he has
never seen; how widely different and how immeasurably better are such
things carried on in America."

Sez Arvilly, "What bridegroom ever did see his bride as she really
wuz? Till the hard experience of married life brought out her hidden
traits, good and bad? Or what wife ever see her husband's real temper
and character until after years of experience?"

Sez I, "That's so; leaves are turned over in Josiah Allen's mind now
as long as we've been pardners that has readin' on 'em as strange to
me as if they wuz writ in Chinese or Japan."

But then it must be admitted that not to see your wife's face and know
whether she's cross-eyed or snub-nosed is tryin'. But they say it is
accordin' to the decree of Feng Shui, and therefore they accept it
willingly. They have a great variety of good fruit in Canton--some
that I never see before--but their vegetables don't taste so good as
ours, more stringy and watery, and their eggs they want buried six
months before usin' 'em. I believe that sickened me of China as much
as anything. But then some folks at home want their game kep' till it
hain't fit to eat in my opinion. But eggs! they should be like Caesar's
wife, above suspicion--the idee of eatin' 'em with their shells all
blue and spotted with age--the idee!

CHAPTER XVI

We wuz all invited one day to dine with a rich Chinaman Robert Strong
had got acquainted with in San Francisco. Arvilly didn't want to go,
and offered to keep Tommy with her, and the rest of us went. The house
wuz surrounded with a high wall, and we entered through a small door
in this wall, and went into a large hall openin' on a courtyard. The
host met us and we set down on a raised seat covered with red cloth
under some big, handsome lantern