Meer Hassan Ali, B.: Observations on the Mussulmauns of India: descriptive of their manners, customs, habits, and religious opinions ; made during a twelve years residence in their immediate Society (Band 1) (London, 1832)

348 MARRIAGE UNNECESSARILY EXPENSIVE.

ing the expenses of a wedding : this I conceive
to be one great error in the economy of the Mus-
sulmaun people,—unnecessary expense incurred
in their marriage ceremonies, which hampers
them through life in their circumstances.
Parents, however poor, will not allow their
daughter to be conveyed from their home,
where the projected union is with an equal,
without a seemingly needless parade of music,
and a marriage-portion in goods and chattels, if
they have no fortune to give beside; then the
expense of providing dinners for friends to make
the event conspicuous, and the useless articles
of finery for the girl's person, with many other
ways of expending money, to the detriment of
the parents' finances, without any very sub-
stantial benefit to the young couple. But this
dearly-loved custom cannot be passed over; and
if the parents find it impossible to meet the
pecuniary demands of these ceremonies, the girl
has no alternative but to live out her days
singly, unless by an agent's influence she is
accepted as a dhollie wife to some man of
wealth.