There is no command in the Quran that girls should be married so young, but the mothers declare that it was the command of Muhammad, and certainly he himself set the example by marrying a girl of nine. So when a mother thinks her girl is getting old enough to marry she begins to look out for a suitable husband, and talks things over with the mother or sister of any man she thinks likely. The man’s mother is allowed to see the girl, but not the man himself, so you see even the men cannot choose their own wives. Then the money matters are arranged. It is settled how much the girl’s father will give her, and how much her husband will settle on her, and there is often a great deal of haggling over this.
If a girl has a cousin who is the son of her father’s brother, he is considered the most appropriate husband for her, and it is considered an act of merit for him to marry her.
If a girl has a large dowry she can generally get a good husband as husbands go out there. If she is poor she has more difficulty, but a capable, industrious girl may do fairly well. But a penniless girl with nothing to recommend her fares badly indeed. When her mother fails to get any husband who is at all desirable instead of letting her girl remain single, she marries her to a madman or a drunkard or a deformed man, or someone utterly undesirable.
The engagement is celebrated by a formal sweet-eating to which the friends on both sides are invited.
The bride and her family prepare her trousseau, and she also has to make a complete suit of clothes for the bridegroom. In one town now it is customary for every well-to-do bride to have one European dress in her trousseau, and for her father to give her a table and chairs.
The wedding itself is a great affair, lasting a week, if the bride’s father can afford it, but only a day or part of a day in the case of poor people. The little bride in her finest clothes, of which she is very proud, looks very disconsolate and cries a great deal. No doubt the tears are sometimes genuine enough, for the child is leaving her home and going to people she knows little of, but even if she feels inclined to laugh and smile she must not do anything so improper.
After the wedding she must not leave her husband’s house for a year, but she may receive visitors.