girl herself. "Among
the Arabs of Sinai the young maid comes home in the evening with
the cattle. At a short distance from the camp she is met by the
future spouse and a couple of his young friends and carried off
by force to her father's tent. If she entertains any suspicion of
their designs she defends herself with stones, and often inflicts
wounds on the young men, even though she does not dislike the
lover, for, according to custom, the more she struggles, bites,
kicks, cries, and strikes, the more she is applauded ever after
by her own companions." After being taken to her father's tent,
where a man's cloak is thrown over her by one of the bridegroom's
relations, she is dressed in garments provided by her future
husband, and placed on a camel, "still continuing to struggle in
a most unruly manner, and held by the bridegroom's friends on
both sides." She is then placed in a recess of the husband's
tent. Here the marriage is finally consummated, "the bride still
continuing to cry very loudly. It sometimes happens that the
husband is obliged to tie his bride, and even to beat her, before
she can be induced to comply with his desires." If, however, she
really does not like her husband, she is perfectly free to leave
him next morning, and her father is obliged to receive her back
whether he wishes to or not. It is not considered proper for a
widow or divorced woman to make any resistance on being married.
(J.L. Burckhardt, _Notes on the Bedouins and Wahabys_, 1830, p.
149 et seq.)

Among the Turcomans forays for capturing and enslaving their
Persian neighbors were once habitual. Vambery describes their
"marriage ceremonial when the young maiden, attired in bridal
costume, mounts a high-bred courser, taking on her lap the
carcass of a lamb or goat, and setting off at full gallop,
followed by the bridegroom and other young men of the party, also
on horseback; she is always to strive, by adroit turns, etc., to
avoid her pursuers, that no one approach near enough to snatch
from her the burden on her lap. This game, called _koekbueri_
(green wolf), is in use among all the nomads of central Asia."
(A. Vambery, _Travels in Central Asia_, 1864, p. 323.)

In China, a missionary describes how, when he was called upon to
marry the daughter of a Chinese Christian brought up in native