It invariably takes place on the sixth day[50] of the increase of the moon in the Bengali month of May, when ripe mangoes--the prince of Indian fruits--are in full season. Then all the mothers-in-law in Bengal are actually on the _qui vive_ to welcome their sons-in-law and turn a new leaf in the chapter of their joys. A good son-in-law is emphatically the most darling object of a Hindoo mother-in-law. She spares no possible pains to please and satisfy him, even calling to her aid the supernatural agency of charms. Ostensibly and even practically a Hindoo mother-in-law loves her son-in-law more than her son, simply because the son can shift for himself even if turned adrift in the wide world, but the daughter is absolutely helpless, and the cruel institution of perpetual widowhood, with its appalling amount of misery and risk, renders her tenfold more so. On this festive occasion, the son-in-law is invited to spend the day and night at his father-in-law's house. No pains or expense is spared to entertain him. When he comes in the morning, the first thing he has to do is to go into the female apartment, bow his head down in honor of his mother-in-law, and put on the floor a few Rupees, say five or ten, sometimes more if newly married. The food consists of all the delicacies of the season, and both the quantity and variety are often too great to be done justice to. The perfection of Hindoo culinary art is unreservedly brought into requisition on such occasions. Surrounded by a galaxy of beauty, the youthful son-in-law is restrained by a sense of shame from freely partaking of the feast specially provided for him. The earnest importunity of the females urges the bashful youth to eat more and more. If this be his first visit as son-in-law he finds himself quite bewildered in the midst of superfluity and superabundance of preparations. Many are the tricks employed to outwit him. With all his natural shrewdness, and forewarned by the females of his own family, he is no match for either the playful humor and frolics of the young, sprightly ladies. Sham articles of food cleverly dressed in close imitation of fruits and sweetmeats are offered him without detection in the full blaze of day, and the attempt to partake of them excites bursts of laughter and merriment. The utmost female ingenuity is here brought into play to call forth amusement at the expense of the duped youth. In their own way, the good-natured females are mistresses of jokes and jests, and nothing pleases them better than to find the youthful new comer completely nonplused. This forms the favorite subject of their talk long after the event. Shut up in the cage of a secluded zenana, quite beyond the influence of the outside world, it is no wonder that their minds and thoughts do not rise above the trifles of their own narrow circle.