like pale sherry, and has a taste which is peculiarly its own. Sweet
saké is very delicious, and it may be bought in all the degrees of
strength and of all flavors and prices. As the Japanese always drink
their wine hot, a copper kettle for heating saké is a necessity in every
household. On ceremonial occasions, such as marriages, the saké-kettles
are of the costliest and handsomest kind, being beautifully lacquered.
Bride and groom being ready, the wine-kettles, cups and two bottles are
handed down. Two pretty servant-maids now bring in a hot kettle of wine
and fill the bottles. To one bottle is fastened by a silken cord a male
butterfly, and to the other a female. The two girls also are called
"male" and "female" butterflies. The girl having the female butterfly
pours out some saké in the kettle, into which the girl with the male
butterfly also pours the contents of her bottle, so that the wine from
both bottles thus flows together. Then the saké is poured again into
another gilt-and-lacquered bottle of different shape.

Now the real ceremony begins. On a little stand three cups, each
slightly concave and having an under-rest or foot about half an inch
high, are set one upon another, like a pagoda. The stand with this
three-storied arrangement is handed to the bride. Holding it in both
hands while the saké is poured into it by the male butterfly, the bride
lifts the cup, sips from it three times, and the tower of cups is then
passed to the bridegroom and refilled. He likewise drinks three times,
and puts the empty cup under the third. The bride again sips thrice from
the upper cup. The groom does the same, and places the empty cup beneath
the second. Again the bride sips three times, and the bridegroom does
the same, and they are man and wife: they are married. This ceremony is
called san-san-ku-do, or "three times three are nine."

Like a wedding at once auspicious and _distingué_, the nuptials of Kiku