In no country is this arrangement of terms carried on with more caution and completeness than in Russia. The young man goes to the house of his proposed bride, and counts over the dresses, and examines the furniture, and sees to the whole with his own eyes, before he commits himself to the irrevocable bargain. In high life such things are conducted with more apparent delicacy, but the facts are ascertained with accuracy, the business being in the hands of a broker or a notary. The _trousseau_ is exposed in public before the wedding day. And this publicity has long been as unblushing as the customs that are now becoming fashionable in New York. The publication in the newspapers of intended marriages; of descriptions of bridal dresses and presents; of the names and _toilettes_ of guests at fashionable parties; the value of jewels worn, &c., now common and approved in the highest circles of American society, is the same thing with the exposure to the public gaze of a bride’s dowry in Russia. At Whitsunday there is a curious custom, which is gradually giving way with the advance of civilization. The young people of a neighborhood come together, and the girls stand in a row, like so many statues, draped indeed, and not only draped, but dressed in their best, and painted too; for the young ladies, and the older ones also, of this country use cosmetics freely, and a box of lady’s paint is a very common present for a young man to make to the girl he likes. Behind the row of girls are their mothers; the young men having made known their choice, the terms are settled between the parents of the parties. The ladies in Russia are very anxious to marry, because they have no liberty _before_ marriage. They are kept constantly under the maternal eye until they are given up to the husband, and then they take their own course, which is a round of gayety and dissipation, only regulated by their means of indulgence. The Greek Church, like the Roman, permits no divorce, but the Emperor, like the Pope, can grant special dispensations. The marriage ceremonies vary, as in all countries, according to the rank and wealth of the parties. A procession is sometimes met in the streets; and the Emperor’s carriage would, at any time, turn out and give the right of way to a bridal party. It pleases me always, in a strange country, to find that social enjoyments are so equally distributed over the earth, varying in kind and degree, indeed, according to the religion and civilization of the people, but still all of them having their own ways and means of making themselves happy. CHAPTER XXXI. FINLAND.