also more affable to Gentiles than were the other women of
Palestine, and modern travellers inform us that both these
characteristics are still preserved. Geikie says: "The free air of their
mountain home seems to have had its effect on the people of Nazareth.
Its bright-eyed, happy children and comely women strike the traveller,
and even their dress differs from that of other parts.... That of the
women usually consists of nothing but a long blue garment tied in round
the waist, a bonnet of red cloth, decorated with an edging or roll of
silver coins, bordering the forehead and extending to the ears,
reminding one of the crescent-shaped female head-dress worn by some of
the Egyptian priestesses. Over this, a veil or shawl of coarse white
cotton is thrown, which hangs down to the waist, serving to cover the
mouth, while the bosom is left exposed, for Eastern and Western ideas of
decorum differ in some things.... In a country where nothing changes,
through age after age, the dress of to-day is very likely, in most
respects, the same as it was two thousand years ago, though the
prevailing color of the Hebrew dress, at least in the better classes,
was the natural white of the materials employed, which the fuller made
even whiter."

We are not informed on the authority of the Gospels as to Mary's age
when she was espoused to Joseph the carpenter. The apocryphal _Gospel of
Mary_ states that she was fourteen, while the _Protevangelion_ places
her age at twelve, which is in accordance with the custom of the East,
where girls mature much earlier than with us. The betrothal consisted of
mutual promises and the exchange of gifts in the presence of chosen
witnesses, followed by the engaged couple ceremonially tasting of the
same cup of wine, and was ended with a benediction pronounced by a
priest or a rabbi. After these solemn espousals the relation between
Mary and Joseph was as sacred as though marriage had really taken place;
the only difference was that the couple did not yet live together. The
woman was not allowed to withdraw from the contract, and the man could
not fail to fulfil his promise unless he gave her a formal bill of
divorcement for cause, as in the case of marriage; the laws relating to
adultery were also applicable. Yet many months might intervene between
the date of the betrothal and that of the marriage.

What took place during this interval in the life of the Virgin is a
mystery which it would be a vain atte