Show I 1 MARRIAGE IN JAPAN the man usually marries before the eighteenth and the woman before the af fifteenth year but one wife is is recognized zed in in law although the man may have any number of concubines concus ines the position of the latter is is not considered dishonorable the legal wife cje must be equal to her husband in m rank and condition the forms and ceremonies ceremonies to be observed in in marriage are remarkably numerous and complicated on ent entering edn the dwelling of the bridegroom the bride is is clothed clothed in in white as a sign that she is k dead to her relations an infraction of the marriage relation 13 is always rs punished by death the wife must carefully avoid the slightest suspicion of infidelity since since it if she should even be seen alone in in the same room with a stranger her life is is forfeited the husband never receives strangers in in the presence of his wife the manners of the married women and their daughters are wholly modest and chaste quite as good a character as in m many countries where they are less liberal aeral ED I 1 |