Rensselaer Union, Volume 7, Number 17, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 14 January 1875 — A Druidical Wedding. [ARTICLE]

A Druidical Wedding.

The following description of a marriage in the Druidical days is given in Saintine’s “Myths of the Rhine”: At a place where two roads meet the cracking of a whip is heard; hogs, sheep and small oxen are driven aside to make way for a kind of procession consisting of grave and solemn men and women. It is a wedding. Two young people have just had their union blessed by the priests under the sacred oak. The bride is dressed in black and wears a wreath of dark leaves on her head. She walks in the midst of her friends. A matron who walks on he» left holds before her eyes a white cloth; it is a shroud, the shroud in which she will be buried one of these days. On her right a Druid intones a chant in which he enumerates in solemn rhythm all the troubles and all the anxieties which await her in wedded life. From this day, young wife, thou alone wilt have to bear all the burden of your united household. „ You will have to attend the baking oven, to provide fuel and to go in search of food; you will have to prepare the resinous torch and the lamp. You will wash the linen at the fountain, and you will make up the clothing. You will attend to the cow and even to the horse, if your husband requires it. Always full of respect, you will wait on him, standing behind him at his meal 8. If he expresses a wish to take you with him to war, you will accompany him to carry liis baggage, to keep his arms in good condition, and to nurse him if he should be sick or wounded. Happiness consists in the fulfillment of duty. Be happy, my child. What is still more strange is that this dolorous wedding song, but, slightly altered, is still in some parts of France at this day addressed to brides by local minstrels. —A man was seen coming out of a Texas newspaper office with one eye gouged out and his nose spread all over his face like a piece of raw beef, and one of his ears chawed off. To a policeman who interviewed him, he replied: “ I didn’t like an article that 'peared in the paper last week, an' I went ter see the man who writ it. He war thar, stranger.” —A farmer’s daughter has just missed being a heroine. Seeing her father's barn on fire she got a pail of water, ran toward the blaze, and —fainted on the way. The barn was destroyed, and her father, rating her intentions by the low standard of her failure, warmed her shoulders with a strap. Worthy of Note. —An exchaage says there is scarcely a day passes that we do not hear, either from persons coming into our office, or in some other way, of the success of Johnson’* Anodyne lAniment in the! cure of ■-coughs and colds so prevalent all about town just now. If we can benefit the readers of this paper any by recommending Larsons' Purgative P'U* to be the best anti-hilious medicine in the country we are willing to do so. We have had about as good a chance to know as anyone. . Among the great institutions of this country the Bryant & Stratton Business College and Telegraph Institute of Davenport, lowa, stands prominent in the front rank. Its loca tion, the finest in the West, its elegant rooms, large corps of the best Instructors, together with boarding arrangements‘at less than half the usual cost, is drawing hundreds of students from all parts of the country.