Democratic Sentinel, Volume 17, Number 31, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 18 August 1893 — A Georgia Marriage Ceremony. [ARTICLE]

A Georgia Marriage Ceremony.

A justice of the peace in Sandersville, Ga., being called upon to perform a marriage ceremony, is accused of concluding with, “By the authority vested in me as an officer of the Stat ■ of Georgia, which is sometimes called tho Empire State of the South; by the fields of cotton that lie spread out in snowy whiteness around us; by the howl of the coon dog, and the gourd vine whose clinging tendrils will shade the entrance to your humble dwelling

place; by the red and luscious heart of the watermelon whose sweetness fills the heart with joy; by the heavens ar.d earth, in the presence of these witnesses, I pronounce you man and wife.