A Marriage is Arranged continues...

When this was being done, my grandmother invoked the blessings of the family gods and goddesses and made offerings to them all. But she forgot to invoke the blessing of “Nagini Devi”, a serpent shrine, about a mile from our house in whose ‘jurisdiction’ we were supposed to be living. Suddenly from one corner of the house a small snake put out its head. We all saw it and were frightened. My grandmother now remembered that she had forgotten to ask for Nagini Mata’s blessings. She immediately made her obeisance to the serpent and fed it milk. It drank the milk and disappeared.

As was the custom then, coins were thrown on the palanquins of the bride when it passed through Nurpur City. A feast was given at village Mamoon where father had some lands.

Another event is also fresh in my mind. Rai Bahadur Sukh Dial was an old friend of father. They had practised at the Bar together at Dharamsala. In 1910, he was practising at the Punjab Chief Court. Father had always given the customary present (Neonda) at weddings in Sukh Dial’s family. For my marriage, he offered father Rs. 210 as ‘neonda’, a big amount in those days. Father had been giving Rs. 51 as ‘neonda’ on such occasions. The Rai Bahadur said that it was a custom in his family to add up all the ‘neondas’ received to date and in return to offer a sum larger than what had been received till then. Father had to take Rs. 210 but at the next wedding in the Rai Bahadur’s family he had to offer Rs. 251.

I had to wait for two years to see the face of my wife! She was mostly at the house of her parents while I was at Lahore studying.

A great Darbar was held at Delhi in 1911 on the occasion of the coronation of George V. I attended this Darbar with father who was on the management committee of the Mela held at the Bela on the. side of Jumna behind the Red Fort.

to be continued...