=HERE THEY COME!=

At last the groom appears at the top of the stairs, a glimpse of the bride behind him.  It surely is running the gauntlet!  They seemingly count “one, two, three, go!” With shoulders hunched and collars held tight to their necks, they run through shrapnel of rice, down the stairs, out through the hall, down the outside steps, into the motor, slam the door, and are off!

The wedding guests stand out on the street or roadway looking after them for as long as a vestige can be seen—­and then gradually disperse.

Occasionally young couples think it clever to slip out of the area-way, or over the roofs, or out of the cellar and across the garden.  All this is supposed to be in order to avoid being deluged with rice and having labels of “newly wed” or large white bows and odd shoes and slippers tied to their luggage.

Most brides, however, agree with their guests that it is decidedly “spoil sport” to deprive a lot of friends (who have only their good luck at heart) of the perfectly legitimate enjoyment of throwing emblems of good luck after them.  If one white slipper among those thrown after the motor lands right side up, on top of it, and stays there, greatest good fortune is sure to follow through life.

There was a time when the “going away carriage” was always furnished by the groom, and this is still the case if it is a hired conveyance, but nowadays when nearly everyone has a motor, the newly married couple—­if they have no motor of their own—­are sure to have one lent them by the family of one of them.  Very often they have two motors and are met by a second car at an appointed place, into which they change after shaking themselves free of rice.  The white ribboned car returns to the house, as well as the decorated and labeled luggage, which was all empty—­their real luggage having been bestowed safely by the best man that morning in their hotel or boat or train.  Or, it may be that they choose a novel journey, for there is, of course, no regulation vehicle.  They can go off in a limousine, a pony cart, a yacht, a canoe, on horseback or by airplane.  Fancy alone limits the mode of travel, suggests the destination, or directs the etiquette of a honeymoon.

=BRIDE’S FIRST DUTY OF THOUGHT FOR GROOM’S PARENTS=

At the end of the wedding there is one thing the bride must not forget.  As soon as she is in her traveling dress, she must send a bridesmaid or someone out into the hall and ask her husband’s parents to come and say good-by to her.  If his parents have not themselves come up-stairs to see their son, the bride must have them sent for at once!

It is very easy for a bride to forget this act of thoughtfulness and for a groom to overlook the fact that he can not stop to kiss his mother good-by on his way out of the house, and many a mother seeing her son and new daughter rush past without even a glance from either of them, has returned home with an ache in her heart.