Rensselaer Union and Jasper Republican, Volume 8, Number 32, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 27 April 1876 — Coptic Weddings. [ARTICLE]

Coptic Weddings.

A gentleman who witnessed a Coptic wedding in Cairo sayS that when the two brides entered the room they were guided to their places. There was not the slightest sign of recognition between them and their respective bridegrooms, and from the beginning to the end there was no more slim of life in them than if they had been two mummies. There was a great deal of swinging of censors, and the priests, one after the other, read and spelled a ceremony in Coptic, a language that is little understood even by the Copts themselves; but it was not until the service drew to a close that anything was said to the two couples, when an embroidered scarf of some Hch texture was handed to the officiating clergyman, and this he bound round the head of the bridegroom, and then passing it directly from the crown of his head repeated tbe process of winding it about the head of the bride. After this the priest placed a kind of crown or frontal aiadem of gold on the head of each person, which was worn until the conclusion of the ceremony. The priest also received and blessed two rings in each case, for the bridegroom and bride, and then, after what appeared to be an exhortation, the brides were ledjaway by their attendants, and the two bridegrooms descended to attend the entertainment of their, gdesta. . JIt is never too late for amule to serve his country. An ahimal of the kind, thirty-eight years old, kicked a thief to death in Georgiatrrthe other night, and fifteen 1 dollars has already been subscribed as a sinking fund.to buy oats. "