PROSTITUTION AMONG THE SEMI-CIVILIZED NATIONS. (continued 3)

The Muslim woman is proud of her husband, and fond of her children. Exceptions undoubtedly occur, in which the warmth of the Oriental temperament takes the form of refined and spiritual love; but these are rare. In their offspring they find the chief resource of their lives. They may become mothers at twelve years of age, and at fifteen commonly do so. They give proof of astonishing fecundity, bearing numbers of children, though ceasing at an earlier period than among Europeans. That is the critical occasion of their lives, but they who pass it safely often survive to an extreme old age. The manners of the country render it necessary that midwives only should attend at the accouchement, which is usually easy. When a physician is called in, he must feel his patient’s pulse through the sleeve of her garment, while her face is almost invariably wrapped in a veil. The utmost kindness, even in the indulgence of their most trifling whims, is shown to pregnant women. The absence of that sentiment which, according to English notions, should attach a wife to her husband, is made up by the stronger bond which binds a mother to her child. Upon this all the wealth of her affection is bestowed, and in that precious charge all her soul is centred. This feeling—the most pure and true of any that grow in the human breast—stands to the woman of Egypt in place of every other. A proverbial saying expresses the national philosophy upon this subject: “A husband is a husband; if one is lost another is to be got; but who can give me back my child?” To be childless is regarded as a signal misfortune, and with those who happen to be barren many devices are employed to remove the curse. Among these, one of the most curious is—to wash the skin with the blood of an executed criminal. Her fecundity, with her parental care, might be expected to prove itself by a flourishing population; but the blind rapacity and profligate contempt of human life exhibited by the tyrants who, in succession, have ruled Egypt, have been more than enough to neutralise the liberality of nature.

The Mohammedan is essentially an Epicurean. In him the object of nature appears perverted. Instead of the animal being made subservient to the intellectual man, the mind is devoted to gratifying the sense. His life is divided between praying, bathing, smoking, lounging, drinking coffee, and the gratification of the various appetites. Voluptuary as he is, therefore, the opulent Egyptian does not rest content with the four wives allowed him by the law. He takes as many concubines as he can afford. They are all slaves, and are absolutely at the disposal of their master, who may handle, whip, or punish them otherwise as he pleases, and incurs very slight danger by killing one of them. The same regulations as to blood affinity apply to them as to free women. A man when he takes a female slave must wait three months before he can make her his concubine. If she bear him a child which he acknowledges to be his own, it is free. Otherwise it is the inheritor of its mother’s bonds. She herself cannot afterwards be sold or given away, but is entitled to emancipation on the death of her lord. He is not, however, obliged to free her at once, though, if he have not already four wives, it is considered honourable to do so. A wife sometimes brings to the establishment a few handmaidens. Over these she has control, and need not, unless she pleases, allow them to appear unveiled in their master’s presence; but occasionally we find a wife presenting her husband with a beautiful slave damsel, as Sarah presented her bondwoman Hagar to Abraham. Rich men often purchase handsome white girls. Those of the humbler class are usually brown Abyssinians, for the blacks are generally employed in menial offices. Neither the concubine nor the wife is permitted to eat with the lord of the house. On the contrary, they are required to wait on him, and frequently, but not always, to serve as domestics. In consequence of this system, a great gulf lies between man and wife. His presence is viewed as a restraint in the harem, which, from all we can learn, is mostly lively and loquacious. Nor is this surprising, when we consider that the harems of aged men are so frequently filled with young girls in the fresh bloom of life, who can never learn to be fond of their husbands. The Egyptian proverb in reference to this is peculiarly apt. It describes an ugly old Turk with some beautiful youthful wives as “A paradise in which hogs feed.” Ibrahim Pasha introduced into his private apartments the amusement of billiards, which at once became a favourite recreation.

Though polygamy is not only licensed but esteemed, and concubinage unlimited, few Egyptians have more than one wife, or one female slave. Not more, indeed, than one in twenty, it is said, indulge in this kind of pluralism, and it is probable that concubinage might be almost altogether abolished by the suppression of the slave trade. At present the markets are continually supplied with girls kidnapped in various countries, and these are sometimes stripped and exposed naked to the purchaser’s inspection.

Satisfied as he generally is with one wife, the Egyptian Mohammedan is not by any means remarkable for continence. He may content himself with a single woman, but he may change her as often as he pleases, a privilege which is continually abused. The facility of divorce has had a most demoralising effect upon Egyptian manners.

A man may twice put away his wife and take her back without ceremony. If, however, he divorces her a third time, or deliberately unites in one act the effect of three, he cannot take her again until she has been married and divorced by another husband. The manner of divorce is sufficiently simple. The husband says, “I divorce thee,” and returns his wife about one-third of the dowry, with the effects which she brought at her marriage. He may do this through sheer caprice, without assigning or proving any reason; but when a woman desires to put away her husband, she must show herself to have suffered serious ill-treatment or neglect, lose the share of her dowry, and often go into a court of justice to prove her claim. With the man this is never required, as is indicated by the common proverb: “If my husband consents, why should the Kadi’s consent be necessary?”

A widow must wait three months, and a divorced woman three months and ten days, or, if pregnant, until delivery, before marrying again. The latter, in this case, must also wait an additional forty days before she can receive her new husband. Meanwhile her former proprietor must support her, either in his own house or in that of her parents. If he divorce her before the actual consummation of the marriage, he must provide for her more liberally. In case, however, of a wife being rebellious, and refusing to recognise the lawful authority of her husband, he may prove her to have offended, before a Kadi, and procure a certificate exempting him from the obligation to clothe, lodge, or maintain her. Thus she is desolate and without resource, for she dare not go to another home; but if she formally promise to be obedient in future, her husband must support or divorce her. When a wife desires to be freed from any man’s restraint and is unable to dissolve the union altogether, she may make a complaint and obtain a licence to go to her father’s house. In that case he, through sheer spite, generally persists in refusing to divorce her. Sometimes a man with a disagreeable mother-in-law quartered upon him, puts away his wife in order to be rid of both.

The slightness of the marriage tie, and the ease with which it may be severed, leads, as we have said, to a profligate abuse of the power thus assumed by the male sex. Numbers of men have, in the course of their lives, 10, 20, 30, or even 40 wives. Women, also, have as many as a dozen partners in succession. Some profligates have been known to marry a woman almost every month. A man without property may pick up a handsome young widow, or divorced woman, for about 10s., which he pays as dowry. He lives with her a few days or weeks, and then divorces her with the payment of about 20s., to support her in the interval during which she is prohibited from marrying again. Such conduct, however, is regarded as disreputable, so that few respectable families will trust a girl with any man who has put away many wives. The crime of adultery is laid down by the law as worthy of severe punishment. Four eye-witnesses, however, are necessary to prove the fact, and the woman may then be stoned to death. From the secluded nature of their lives, and from the nature of the offence itself, it is rarely that such testimony is to be had. Cases, therefore, scarcely ever occur before the public courts. Heavy and ignominious penalties are denounced against witnesses who make these charges and fail in the proof. Unmarried persons convicted of fornication may be punished by the infliction of one hundred stripes, and, under the law acknowledged by the Sumrh sect, may be banished for a whole year.

Egypt has in all times been famous for its public dancing girls, who were all prostitutes. The superior classes of them formed a separate tribe or collection of tribes, known as the Ghawazee. A female of this community is called Ghazeeyeh, and a man Ghazee. The common dancing girls of the country are often erroneously confounded with the Almeh—Awalim in the singular—who are properly female singers; though, whatever some authoritative writers may assert, they certainly practise dancing, as well as prostitution, especially since the exile of the Ghawazee. They perform at private entertainments, and are sometimes munificently rewarded. The Ghawazee, on the other hand, were accustomed to put aside their veils and display their licentious movements in public, before the lowest audience. The evolutions with which they were accustomed to amuse their patrons were commonly the reverse of elegant. Commencing with decency enough, they soon degenerated into obscenity, the women contorting their bodies into the most libidinous postures. The dress was graceful, but exposed a large portion of the bosom, and was frequently half thrown aside. The Ghawazee sometimes performed in the court of a house or in the open street; but were not admitted into the harems of respectable families. A party of men often met in a house, and sent for the dancers to amuse them. Their performances, on such occasions, were more than usually licentious, and their dresses less decent. A chemise of transparent texture, which scarcely hid the skin, and a pair of full trousers, was frequently all that covered them. Drinking copious draughts of brandy or some other intoxicating liquor, they soon laid aside even the affectation of modesty, and scenes took place like those with which the priests defiled the temples of India. Many of the women who thus degrade themselves are exceedingly beautiful. As a class, indeed, they are described as the handsomest in Egypt. They are distinguished, by the peculiar caste of their countenances, from all other females in the country, and there can be little doubt that they spring from a distinct race. They boast themselves of the Barmecide descent, but this is impossible to be proved. It has been conjectured that they are the lineal, as well as the professional descendants of those licentious dancers who exhibited naked—as these sometimes do—before the Egyptians in the age of the Pharaohs. Some imagine that the dancers of Gade, or Cadiz, ridiculed by Juvenal, were the prototypes of the modern Ghawazee; but it has been supposed, with more reason, that the Phœnicians introduced the practice thither from the East, where profligacy flourished at the earliest period.

It has been the pride of the Ghawazee tribes to preserve themselves distinct from all other classes of the population, to intermarry, and thus to perpetuate their blood unmingled. A few have repented their mode of life, and married respectable Arabs; but this has not often occurred. They never among themselves took a husband until they had entered on a course of prostitution. To this venal calling they were all trained from childhood, though all were not taught to dance. In this community of harlots, it is singular to find that the husband was inferior to the wife; indeed he was subject to her, performing the double office of servant and procurer. If she was a dancer he was generally her musician, and sat by quietly tinkling upon a stringed instrument, while she, his wife, exposed her person in the most indecent attitudes, and by every voluptuous artifice endeavoured to seduce the spectator. Profligacy never assumed a more infamous form than that of the husband assisting at the daily adultery of his wife. Some of the men earned a livelihood as blacksmiths or tinkers. Many of them, however, were rich, and the women, especially, were possessed of costly dresses and ornaments.

The Ghawazee generally followed the kind of life led by our gipsies, whom some, indeed, have traced to an Egyptian origin. Many, but not all, of the wanderers of this nation in the Valley of the Nile, ascribe to themselves a descent from a branch of the same family from which the Ghawazee claim to have sprung; but both traditions rest on doubtful testimony. The ordinary language of the Ghawazee is similar to that in use among the rest of the Egyptian population; but like all other unsettled, wandering tribes, they have a peculiar dialect, a species of slang, only intelligible to themselves. Most of them profess the Mohammedan faith, and they were accustomed to follow in crowds the pilgrim caravans to the sacred shrine at Mecca.

Every considerable town in Egypt formerly harboured a large body of the Ghawazee, who occupied a distinct quarter, allotted entirely to prostitutes and their companions. Low huts, temporary sheds, or tents, formed their usual habitations, since they were in the habit of frequently transplanting themselves from one district to another. Others, however, occupied and furnished handsome houses, trading also in camels, asses, and grain; possessing numerous female slaves, upon whose prostitution they also realized much profit. They crowded the camps and attended the great religious festivals, and on these occasions the Ghawazee tents were always conspicuous. Some joined the accomplishment of singing with that of the dance.

The inferior Ghawazee women resembled in their attire the common prostitutes of other classes, which also swarmed in Egypt. Many of these also, who were not Ghawazees, took the name, in order to increase the gains of their calling.

The system of marriage, to which we have slightly alluded, is worthy of more particular notice. The man who married a Ghazeeyeh was a low and despised creature. The saying is proverbial in Egypt, that “the husband of a harlot is a base wretch by his own testimony.” The law among the Ghawazee was, that a girl as soon as marriageable must prostitute herself to a stranger and then take a husband. He is constantly employed in looking for persons to bring to her, himself cohabiting with her only by stealth, for she would be exposed to shame and made the object of ridicule were it known that she had admitted her own husband to her embraces. Polygamy is unknown among the Ghawazee. In that community, indeed, as it existed previously to the edict of 1835, we find a system exactly the reverse of that in the midst of which it existed. The birth of a male child was looked upon as a misfortune, since he was of no value to the tribe. Women, on the contrary, were precious, because they were sought after by nearly the whole male population of Egypt. The Ghazeeyeh made it a rule never to refuse the offer of a person who could pay anything. The fashionable dancer, therefore, at country fairs, though glittering with golden ornaments, and arrayed in all the beauties of the eastern loom, would admit the visit of any rough and ragged peasant for a sum not exceeding twopence. In this manner, by seizing whatever was offered to them, they often accumulated wealth, dressed in superb attire, rich embroidery of gold, with chains of golden coins, and solid bracelets of the same costly metal. In many instances, when the Ghazeeyeh had lost or divorced her former husband, and become opulent upon the profits of her venal calling, she married some village Sheikh, who was proud of his acquisition. A virgin Ghazeeyeh was never induced to forsake her hereditary profession; but when she formed such an alliance, she made a solemn vow on the tomb of some saint, to be true to her new partner, sacrificed a sheep, and was generally faithful to her sacred engagement.

It was not only in the more populous cities and districts of Lower Egypt that the Ghawazee pursued their double calling of dancer and prostitute. Those in the Upper country were equally addicted to that immoral calling, and were, in proportion, equally encouraged. Even in the small villages a company of them was usually to be found, glittering in finery of gaudy colours, unveiled, and clothed only in those light transparent garments in which the members of the same sisterhood are represented on the monuments—a loose chemise of gauze, a scarf negligently hung about the loins, and loose trousers of the most delicate texture. Their dances were exhibitions of unrestrained indecency,—attitude, look, and movement being equally lascivious. They also sang and played on the viol, lute, tambour, lyre, or castanet. The common prostitutes of the meaner class excelled them, at least in the affectation of modesty. Many of the Ghawazee, however, appear sensible of the degradation to which they are consigned.

The dance of the Ghawazee was, to the Egyptians, what an opera ballet is in England—the representation of some episode, generally of love. Formerly there was, near Cairo, a little village called Shaarah, the Eleusis of modern Egypt, where the mystical rites of Athor were, until recently, celebrated. It was a collection of small mud huts, distinguished from those of the common people by superior cleanliness and comfort. Numbers of the Ghawazee dwelt here, and when Mr. J. A. St. John visited their abode, came out to meet him, dressed in elegant attire, with a profusion of ornaments. All were young—none were more than twenty, many not more than ten years of age. Some were exceedingly handsome, while others, to an European judge, appeared quite the reverse. In this village lived a considerable number of the Ghawazee. The greater part of their lives was passed in the coffee-house, where they lounged all day on cushions, sipping coffee, singing, and indulging in licentious conversation. In the great room a hundred might assemble, and here they were visited by the profligates of Cairo, to whom the village of Shaarah was a regular place of resort. In the towns they frequented the common coffee-houses, and in the smaller hamlets up the valley, they wandered all day among the dwellings, or reclined on benches in the open air until a boat with travellers appeared on the Nile, when they immediately hurried down to the shore and commenced their lascivious songs. The Arabs have the reputation of being extremely profligate, and when on their journeys never visited a city or village without paying a visit to the Ghawazee quarter. Indeed, the manners of the population have been debased under every vicious influence. A despotic government, an epicurean religion, and the spirit of indolence thus engendered, have encouraged among the men every species of crime against nature. The corruption which brought a curse on the Cities of the Plain is emulated in the cities of Egypt.

When Burckhardt wrote, about 1830, the number of males and females of the Ghawazee nation in Egypt was estimated at from 6000 to 8000. Their principal settlements were in the towns of the Delta in Lower Egypt, and, in the Upper country, at Kenneh, where a colony of at least 300 generally resided. The scattered companies generally formed a great concourse at Tanta, in the Delta, at the three annual festivals, when a vast multitude was collected from all parts of the valley. Six hundred Ghawazee have on such occasions pitched their tents near the town. During the reign of the Memlooks, the influence of these women was, in the open country, very considerable. Many respectable persons courted their favour. They were accustomed to dwell in the towns until the brutality of the soldiers—who sometimes killed one in a fit of jealousy—drove them into the rural parts. At each of their chief places of sojourn one was invested with the title of Emir, or chief of the settlement. She was entitled to no authority over the rest, yet exercised much influence by virtue of her dignity. In Cairo itself their number was small, and they inhabited a spacious Khan, or hotel, overlooked by the castle. “In a city,” says Burckhardt, “where among women of every rank chastity is so rare as at Cairo, it could not be expected that public prostitution should thrive.” This is a harsh judgment on the character of the Caireen females, and, according to the accounts of most travellers, it is unjust.

Before Mohammed Ali, instigated by the priests, made his awkward crusade against the Ghawazee tribes, the public prostitutes were put under the jurisdiction of a magistrate—an aga, or captain of the dancing girls. He kept a list of them, and exacted from each a sum of money by way of tax. He also acted as a censor on the general morality of the people. One of these agas took upon himself an extension of his jurisdiction, and whenever he found a woman, no matter of what class, who had been guilty of a single act of incontinence, he added her name to the list of common prostitutes, and extorted the tax from her, unless she could offer him a sufficient bribe, and thus escape the infamy. Nor was this all. To gratify private revenge, he sometimes inserted in his list the names of respectable ladies; but was at length detected and punished with death. Whenever a party of Ghawazee was engaged, they had to pay to their chief a sum of money and procure his permission to dance. This practice was pursued by persons who farmed the tax, until Mohammed Ali was smitten by a sudden reverence for morals, and made an attempt, characteristic of his vulgar genius, to abolish the profligacy of Egypt. In June, 1834, a law was published compelling the Ghawazee throughout the country to retire from their profession. It is said that the Moolahs, or Muslim bishops, objected to them, not on account of the impurities they practised, but because it was a scandal that women belonging to the race of true believers should expose their faces to infidels for hire. An agitation was raised on the subject; a storm of sacerdotal rage assailed the palace; and the viceroy, priest-ridden, banished all the dancers to Esneh, 500 miles up the Nile. There they were herded together, with a small stipend from government to keep them from starvation. The effect of this truly barbarian device was just what might have been expected. The profligacy, which had been chiefly confined to them, broke out in other classes, and demoralization advanced several steps further. It is said that the Moolahs repent their policy, since some additional burdens have been laid on them to make up for the loss of revenue.

Under the old system, when all the known prostitutes paid a tax, the amount contributed by those of Cairo alone was 800 purses, or 4000l., which was a tenth of the income-tax on the whole population. This will suggest an idea of the numbers in which they existed. The Ghawazee formed the chief element in this system of prostitution, and Mohammed Ali imagined that with one stroke of the pen he could obliterate this blot on the social aspect of Egypt—he who had so worn himself out with licentious pleasures that his physicians had to persuade him to disband an army of concubines which he had kept at the expense of his miserable people. At once prostitution was denounced as a crime. The Ghazeeyeh daring to infringe the new law was condemned to fifty stripes for the first, and imprisonment with severe labour for the second, offence. The punishments of these and of all other women were illegal, according to the code of the Prophet. It has, however, been a blessing to the Mohammedan population of the East that their great lawgiver left his frame of legislation, for, invested with the authority of religion, it has been some check on the caprice of tyrants.

The men, also, who were detected encouraging the Ghawazee were made liable to the punishment of the bastinado. Legal enactments, however, cannot purify the morals of a whole community. Prostitution was abolished by law, but remained in practice as flagrant as ever. The Egyptians borrowed a device from the Persians. When a man desires to have intercourse with a woman of the prostitute class, he marries her in the evening and divorces her in the morning. The dowry he pays her is no more than she would receive were this transaction not to take place. She dare not apply for the usual stipend to maintain her afterwards. Even these connections are often kept entirely secret. The dancing has been more successfully suppressed, for many of the performances were public; but the Europeans, as well as the rich natives, frequently indulge by stealth in the prohibited amusement.

The Almehs, at least since the banishment of the Ghawazee, dance, and prostitute themselves, as well as sing—though their name implies neither practice, meaning simply “learned or accomplished women.” When an entertainment of the kind is given, it is usual to choose for the scene a lonely house in the outskirts of the city, surrounded by a garden with a high wall. There, with the windows veiled, parties meet, and the dancers are introduced. Women with children at the breast come sometimes to take part in these abominable orgies; but do not usually, unless excited by the men, develop all their powers of licentious expression. Occasionally a party of soldiers breaks in on the forbidden revel, and the girls are carried off to prison, where stripes, or, perhaps, sentences of banishment, await them.

There are, however, in Egypt considerable classes of women solely devoted to prostitution, who practise none of the accomplishments in which the Almeh and Ghawazee excel. Among them is a peculiar tribe called the Halekye, whose husbands are tinkers or horse and ass doctors. They wander about the country like gipsies, and most of the women engage in prostitution. Prostitutes of the common order swarm in all the cities and towns of the valley. In and about Cairo they are particularly numerous, whole quarters being inhabited exclusively by them. Legislation is powerless to suppress their calling. Their dress differs from that of the other sorts of women only in being more gay and less disguising. Some even wear the veil and affect all the airs of modesty. Many are divorced women, or widows, or wives of men whose business has obliged them to go abroad. The wives of many of the Arabs, if neglected for a short time, slide easily into prostitution. When Ibrahim Pasha was away on the expedition to Syria, it was said that on his return the soldiers would find all their wives courtezans; but this, of course, was a satire.

Numbers of the common prostitutes in Cairo have been accustomed to sell pigeons and other birds in the different bazaars. Hence has arisen a proverb, that a person who marries in the bird-market must divorce his wife next morning. We find in these popular sayings many indications of the features which mark the system in Egypt. We have some in allusion to the shouts and disorderly conduct of persons issuing from the brothels in the morning, and others describing the career of the prostitutes themselves. “The public woman who is liberal of her favours does not wish for a procuress.” “If a harlot repent she becomes a procuress.”

One reason assigned for the practice of early marriages is, the proneness of the young men to be seduced by prostitutes. It is only just, however, to observe, that in Alexandria, though it is considered the refugium peccatorum of the Mediterranean, the European community has preserved itself to an unusual degree uncontaminated by the general corruption of the male population.

The women of Egypt, as we have already observed, are, in point of morals, far superior to the men. They are generally silly and childish, because they are treated as soulless creatures and children; but, on the whole, their character is not so degraded by unnatural vices as that of their male rulers. These generally are coarse voluptuaries, in whom little except the animal appetite is developed.

We perceive in Egypt the illustration of some signal truths. We find there the proper fruits of Oriental despotism; we see the results of a vulgar barbarian attempt to reform public morals. We witness also the influence of its position upon the character of the female sex. Women in Egypt have been made by their social laws what the originator of those laws considered them to be—the mere servitors of man. In the prostitute system of the country we discover some singular features, which contribute to render modern Egypt, in relation to our actual subject, one of the most interesting regions in the East. The Christian population we do not notice, because it is composed of fragments of races which will be noticed in their proper countries[77].

Of Prostitution among the States of Northern Africa.

A very brief notice is all that is required by the other States of northern Africa. They are distinguished from the barbarous communities of that region by having assumed the forms of regular society, which places them under a separate head, but, in relation to our subject, they present little that is characteristic. In describing the condition and morality of the female sex in other Mohammedan countries we shall meet with nearly all the features offered by Algiers, Barca, Morocco, Tunis, and Tripoli. Nevertheless, on account of the extraordinary mixture of the population, some curious details are observed. Turks, Christians, Arabs, Jews, Berbers, and Moors mingle in the cities of those States. The last, however, form the mass, and it is to them our remarks must apply.

The Moors of northern Africa possess all the vices, and scarcely any of the virtues, of the Mohammedans of the East. They are proud, ignorant, sensual, and depraved, without any of that high spirit of honour which often, in the oriental Muslim, half redeems his character.

The treatment of women among the Moors answers exactly to this view. They are regarded as the mere material instruments of man’s gratification. Accordingly their whole education is modelled so as to render them fit to serve the lust of a gross sensualist. Among the more elevated nations of Asia, men sometimes tire of their wives’ company, because they are simple beauties, without animation of mind, seeking the society of educated courtezans, more for their wit and vivacity than for their meaner and more material accomplishments. But, with the Moors, the animal appetite is all that they seek to satisfy. A woman with daughters does not train them in seductive arts; she feeds them into a seductive appearance—as pigeons and doves are fed in certain parts of Italy. They are made to swallow daily a number of balls of paste, dipped in oil, and the rod enforces their compliance. This practice is adopted as well by the inmate of the rich man’s harem as by the courtezan; for to be plump, sleek, and fair, are the objects of their common ambition. A girl who is a camel’s load is the perfection of Moorish beauty. Thus intellect and sentiment are not the possessions to recommend her, but fat.

It is strange that the woman’s character does not correspond altogether with her mode of life. Heavy, corpulent, and sensual, she is, nevertheless, alive to the keenest feeling. Hot impulses, untameable in their outbreak, characterize her sex. Rivarol once said, that in Paris the veins of the women were full of milk; but in Berlin, of pure blood. Pananti says that in the Moorish woman fire is the circulating fluid. Fiery hearts, indeed, are general among the women of the East; and are as remarkable in Egypt as in Morocco, where Oriental passions seem to spring from African soil.

Immured as the wives of rich men are in splendid harems, and rigidly excluded from intercourse with the other sex, they seek their whole enjoyment in the gratification of their passions or their senses. Their time is spent at home, or at the bath, lounging on cushions, sipping coffee, smoking, gossiping, or multiplying the devices of the toilette.

The Moors are extravagantly jealous. Some have been known to slay their women before proceeding on a long journey; others have forbidden them to name even an animal of the masculine gender. They are, therefore, entirely shut up within the walls of the harem; muffled under mountains of ungraceful black drapery as they move along the streets; or secluded from the sight of the world in the impenetrable recesses of the bath. There they exhaust all the ingenuity they can command in the perfuming and decoration of their persons.

Many have wondered why women thus prevented from displaying themselves should be so untiring in the offices of vanity. The reason, however, is clear. In the Moorish harem all that a wife or concubine has to look to is the favour of her lord. If she succeed in charming him, her lot is far more happy than under any other circumstances. Besides, it is not only to please him that she labours. The mortification of her rivals is an additional source of triumph, for in the narrow sphere of the harem, where the nobler qualities of the mind have no room for development, the meanest naturally flourish most profusely.

The marriage laws of Mohammedan countries in general prevail in the Barbary States, with slight modifications. The husband has more absolute control over the wife. Few take more than one, though polygamy is universally allowed. Opulent men, however, sometimes indulge in the full complement of four, besides a number of concubines. Though the betrothal usually takes place at an extremely early age, the actual union seldom takes place until the bride is twelve or thirteen, when, as a poet of Barbary expresses it, “The rose-bud expands to imbibe the vivifying rays of love.”

An extensive system of professional prostitution prevails in all the cities of these States. In Algiers and Morocco they are particularly numerous. The low drinking shops are crowded with men, and the loose characters of the town have each a companion who is a harlot. The public dancers all belong to this sisterhood. They exist in large numbers and are very much encouraged by both sexes. The women in the baths, after steeping their bodies in warm water until every nerve is relaxed, and all their limbs are softened into a voluptuous languor, lie on cushions and sip coffee, while dancers, attired in a slight costume, display their licentious arts, and Almeh sing songs equally lascivious. These prostitutes are of various classes, from the low vulgar wretches, encouraged by the French soldiers in Algiers, to the wealthy courtezans who live amid luxury and splendour.

A late traveller was introduced by a friend to “a Moorish lady.” She occupied a fine house, situated, however, in a narrow and retired street. Its architecture was rich, and on the door being opened, signs of wealth became everywhere apparent. The visitor was ushered into a spacious apartment, roofed with graceful arches, and hung with rich-coloured silks. A lamp burning amid piles of freshly-gathered flowers, stood on the table. Reclining on a luxurious divan, with a tiger-skin spread at her feet, was a woman of extreme loveliness, attired in a superb costume. Though of a fair and brilliant complexion, her hair was jet black, braided with curious art and bound up with strings of pearl. Its heavy tresses were partly concealed by a tiara of crimson, figured with gold. Diamond drops hung from her ears; corals and gems sparkled round her neck.

A garment, of a fabric almost transparent, was folded over her bosom, and fastened with a golden ornament. A loose pelisse of blue brocade, confined at the waist with a cymar of embroidered silk, displayed the contour of her figure, and full trousers of muslin were furled about her limbs. Her cheek was tattooed with a blue star, and her nails were stained pink with henna. She was waited upon by a negro girl wearing a white muslin turban ornamented with a rose, the leaves and stem of which were gilded. Elegant in her manners, easy in her mode of address, this woman appeared to the uninitiated traveller the model of feminine grace. When he took his leave, however, his friend undeceived him, with an apology, and he discovered that he had been conversing with a Moorish prostitute.

This sketch of a woman, belonging to the class, may serve to show the extent to which some of them are encouraged. Indeed the society of the dancers, who are all prostitutes, is a favourite recreation with the Moors of all classes. The women, as we have said, belong to various grades, from those who debase themselves by their obscene postures in the low coffee-houses, to those who display their more elegant licentiousness to amuse the wealthy. A man, entertaining a party of friends, sends for a company of dancers to enliven them in his kiosk or pavilion. There, amid the fumes of tobacco, and sometimes of strong liquors (for the precepts of the Koran are often disregarded), these unhappy women descend from ordinary immodesty to the most degrading obscenity, until the orgies become such as no pen could describe. When the master of the feast is particularly delighted with the beauty or the dexterity of any girl, he performs a favourite act of gallantry by dropping a few golden coins into her bosom. The whole company is liberally rewarded[78].

Of Prostitution in Arabia, Syria, and Asia Minor.

In whatever countries the Mohammedan religion has been established, to describe the condition of women would be generally to repeat the accounts already given. Their character varies in different populations, but everywhere the laws to which they are subject are substantially the same.

In Syria and Asia Minor the marriage code is, among the Muslims, precisely similar to that of Egypt and Turkey, and so also in Arabia. In Natolia, especially, the influence of the Prophet’s law is powerful, and the comparative simplicity of its inhabitants leads them to respect the boundaries laid down to their indulgences. Possessing within their own country all the materials of prosperity, they might, with virtue and industry, become once more a powerful and wealthy race; but misgovernment adds yearly to the mass of their corruption, and they perish in misery and servitude.

In such countries ambition sees no path but that of reckless crime, and mental activity only stimulates to sensual pursuits. Accordingly profligacy flourishes in the cities of Asia Minor, though in the thinly-peopled tracts there is perhaps more purity of manners than in any other Mohammedan country, except Arabia. Polygamy, permitted as it is by the law, is far from being generally adopted. In 1830, the extensive city of Brussa contained only a single man who had more than one wife. Women are secluded to some extent, but enjoy great freedom. Loved and indulged they are, but not respected; and, consequently, their morals are inferior to those of the Bedouin wives.

The Christians, who are so freely tolerated among the Mohammedan population of Asia Minor, preserve very much the customs of Europe, except in the lesser details of their life. In the rich provinces of Syria, Arabs, Greeks, and Ottomans have mingled, bringing each some characteristic habits to modify the general social scheme. The pastoral and the Christian tribes are by far the most moral.

Among the Maronites of Lebanon, who hold our faith, a rigid code exists, with purity of manners; but, as among the ancient Germans, the severe law is only the moral influence in action. The law, without the feeling which upholds it, would be powerful; which constitutes the difference between a community which frames its own code according to its own spirit, and that which receives decrees from the caprice of a ruler. If a man among the Maronites seduce a girl, he must marry her; should he refuse, fasts, imprisonments, and even blows are employed, which force him to submit. The illicit intercourse of the sexes, married or unmarried, is reprobated by the sense of the community, and the profession of prostitution is unknown. On the whole, this may be described as a simple and comparatively innocent race, removed above the profligacy which ferments around them.

The Druses, also, are distinguished by the same characteristics; they do not permit polygamy, and marry very young. A man may divorce his wife, however, by only saying, “Go;” or if she ask permission to visit her relatives, and he concede it, without enjoining her to return, she must consider herself put away. In spite of this facility such separations scarcely ever occur. An adulteress is mercilessly put to death by the hands of her friends. One who commits fornication suffers a similar punishment, but in this case the father may pardon her if he choose. The tenderness of the parent sometimes induces him to spare his child, though her guilt may stain the honour of his house; but brothers, it is said, never relent, visiting the sin of their sister with unsparing sternness.

Prostitutes and dancing girls are common in all the cities and towns of Syria, but they are never met with among any of the pastoral or nomade tribes. In Asia Minor and Palestine the same circumstance is to be observed.

There is little to remark upon in the habits or characteristics of the class, which is similar to others of the same sisterhood in Egypt, Turkey, and other parts of the East[79]. Since, therefore, little could be gained by dwelling at length upon these countries, we quit them, and pass to a region which, if the spirit of romance still remains on earth, may be described as its chosen home.

In Arabia we find a system of manners at once unique and beautiful. In saying this, however, we allude to the Bedouins, or representatives of the true Arab race, who preserve their original simplicity in the rainless plains of their ancient country. In the cities of the coast, and wherever the fertility of the soil has attracted a crowded population, vice has introduced itself, and the graces of the shepherd state have quickly disappeared. In surveying the civilization of Arabia this distinction must always be held in view.

Many natural circumstances combine to influence the natural character of the Arabs in their native region. A country whose sunny and sandy plains alternate with tracts of hills and valleys of the richest bloom, has been their home. In the mountains of Yemen wet and dry seasons alternate, but over the desert hangs a sky of perpetual blue,—bright, dry, and warm; while, during the summer solstice, a sun almost vertical floods the waste of rock and sand with insufferable light, parching the face of all nature.

In this extraordinary region the Arabs live; some, as we have said, in cities or villages, some in separate families, under tents. An independent patriarchal form of government has been preserved in complete unity with their simple system of manners. Their religion is that of Mohammed, though various interpretations of his law have divided them into numerous sects. Differing, as they do, in their scheme of education from Europeans, it is difficult for us to understand their character. The boy grows up until five years old under his mother’s care; then, without a graduation, he is taken to his father’s side. From the companionship of women and children he passes at once into the society of men.

The Arabs hold the female sex in high estimation. They exclude women, indeed, from all public assemblies, preclude them from the use of strong liquors, and hold them from infancy to womanhood under tutelage; but they restrain themselves as well, and their general demeanour is modest, sober, and grave. Those in the fertile province of Yemen are more vivacious than those of the sterile plains. Nevertheless the men love society. Every village has its coffee-house full of gossipers, and every camp its place of rendezvous.

The women of the family occupy the interior of the house or tent; they are secluded to some extent, but not in the extravagant degree described by some writers. A man will not salute one in public, or fix his eyes upon her. Strangers, in general, are not allowed to converse with them, and they are expected to pay great deference to the ruling sex, but they are neither disguised nor immured. Veils they wear, but do not hide their faces with that religious care considered indispensable in some countries. Among many of the tent-dwellers, women drink coffee with strangers; and in some of the communities towards the south they are allowed to entertain a guest in their husband’s absence. Indeed it may be said, that they are in Arabia more free than anywhere else in Islam, and proverbially abstemious in the gratification of all their appetites. All the household duties are performed by them. They fetch water, drive flocks, and wait on the men; but they are loved and respected, notwithstanding, and no claim is held so sacred as that by which a mother exacts duty from her son. There is, indeed, something admirable in the simplicity of these desert tribes, where the wife sits within her husband’s tent, weaving her own garments from the wool of his flocks.

Where several families are congregated, the females visit each other, assemble together, and exchange every pleasant service. They meet in the evening to sing to the young men of the tribe, and many romantic assignations are kept in the little secluded valleys in which Arabia abounds. The well is the favourite spot of rendezvous.

The dances of the Arab girls, who perform before the men, are not only decent but elegant and romantic—totally in contrast to those of the Ghawazee. These amusements are as much for their own gratification as that of the other sex, for sometimes no males are present. Nor are they forced to exhibit when disinclined. Sometimes when the young men have offended the maidens of a tribe, they assemble night after night, but no damsels appear to dance or sing. All this indicates considerable purity of manners. The Mohammedan marriage law prevails among all the Arabs of the peninsula, though its details are modified by their system of manners. A man is expected, though not compelled, to take the widow of his deceased brother. A man has an exclusive right to the hand of his cousin, but is not compelled to marry her. He, however, must finally renounce his claim before she can be taken by any one else. Each may have four wives and as many concubines as he pleases. Two sisters may not be had at once; but one being divorced, the other may be taken.

The disparity between the sexes in point of number, which has been asserted by some travellers, does not appear to exist. Polygamy, a privilege of the rich, is seldom practised even by them. Many wealthy Bedouins, who could well maintain a harem, declare they could not be happy with more than one companion. The law obliges a man to pass at least one night in every week with each of his wives, and this has assisted in checking the practice.

The Mohammedans of Arabia are accused of selling their daughters; but they do not often bargain them away for profit. They naturally prefer a wealthy before a poor son-in-law, and receive a bounty from him; but they richly portion out the bride. She is further endowed by her husband. The contract drawn up before the Kadi stipulates not only what she is to receive upon her marriage, but what she may claim in case of a divorce. In many cases a sheikh of substantial fortune takes a poor son-in-law, gives him the sum necessary to be paid before the judge, and exacts from him in return only a pledge of such an amount, in the event of repudiation, that it can never take place. The wife, not being compelled to vest all her property in him, is, in some measure, free from his authority. She is, indeed, more supreme in the household than in most countries, and is even more happy, because she can insist upon a divorce if ill-used. Some men, indeed, take two wives, and some even three, but these instances are so few that, though the sexes are numerically equal, almost every man may have a wife. In the towns, soldiers and domestics are more frequently married than in Europe. No insult wounds an Arab woman more than to compare her to a fruitless tree. In this way the evils of polygamy, in the cities, are counteracted. A maiden past the marriageable age is ashamed of her virginity, and a widow without children is miserable until she finds a new partner. There are no retreats whither celibacy may fly for refuge from the taunts of the world. Every woman, consequently, is desirous to marry; but those who are taken by pluralists bear fewer children than those who have no rival under the roof. In the house of a polygamist, each woman, feeling she has to contend for favour, seeks by unnatural means to increase her own attractions, to seem more voluptuous than she is, and thus injures her natural powers. Concubinage is more common than polygamy. The sheriff of Mecca has numerous female slaves, and his high example is followed by many wealthy men in the luxurious and corrupt populations of the cities. In the desert it is more rare, and, indeed, scarcely ever practised, except where a father presents his son with a beautiful bondmaid, that he may be satisfied with her, and not enter the towns in search of prostitutes.

In Mecca, the sacred city of the Mohammedan faith, nearly all the wealthy men maintain concubines, but, if they bear children, must, unless their complement of four wives be already complete, marry them or incur public reproach. Some of these voluptuaries, who look on women only as a means to gratify their animal appetites, marry none but Abyssinian wives, because they are more servile, obsequious, and voluptuous than those of pure Arabian blood. Foreigners arriving at that city with the caravan bargain for a female slave, intending to sell her at their departure, unless she bear offspring, in which case she is elevated to the position of a wife. Under any circumstances, to sell a concubine slave, is by the respectable part of the community, regarded as disreputable. Speculators, however, sometimes buy young girls, indulge their sensuality upon them, train them up, educate them, and sell them at a profit. No distinction is made among the children, of whichever class of mothers they are born.

It is one sign of pure manners among the simple communities of Arabia, that chastity is highly prized. When the young Arab marries a girl, he sometimes stipulates in the contract that she must be a virgin. Of this he desires to assure himself by examination. If the outward signs are wanting, the bride’s father has to prove the circumstance accidental; should he fail in this, the fame of her innocence may be destroyed, and she may be driven from home overwhelmed with shame. In many of the nomade communities it is the invariable rule to put away a bride immediately after the discovery of any suspicious sign, and in the hills of Yemen the laws are equally severe. The man who marries a woman disgraced by incontinence shares her infamy unless he send her back to her father.

The dwellers in towns, estimating less highly the worth of feminine virtue, laugh at a man who dishonours his family on account of such a circumstance. A man finding that his bride is not a virgin demands compensation from her father, keeps her a short time, and then puts her away privily, as Joseph was minded to do with the mother of Jesus. Many also understand that nature has refused the sign to some females, and that it is unjust to condemn a woman on the strength of a circumstance which a hundred accidents may have caused. If adultery be committed by the wife, the law condemns her to have her throat cut by the hand of her brother or father; but in general humanity prevails against the written code, and this horrible punishment is seldom inflicted. The usual manner of visiting such an offence is by summary divorce, which is indeed easily to be obtained for trivial causes, or for no cause at all. In towns an agreement before the Kadi, in the desert a lamb slaughtered before the door of the tent, is all the ceremony needed. The simple pronunciation of the word “Go” is, in many parts, sufficient. Men of violent passions abuse this privilege, and it is said that some, not more than 40 years of age, have had as many as 50 wives; but it is utterly untrue to say that such instances are frequent. The existence of the pure and true sentiment of love, which is so rare in Mohammedan countries, is admitted to prevail in Arabia; the natural jealousy of the male sex, the superior wisdom of their regulations respecting the intercourse of the sexes prior to marriage, the independence of the women, and the lofty system of morals distinguishing the Bedouins of the desert, are totally incompatible with such a flagrant profligacy in the use of divorce. Were it the case, the complete confusion of society would ensue; whereas no region in the world presents spectacles of happier homes than the plains of Arabia, with their tents and wandering tribes. Women are comparatively free, being tolerated even in religious differences, which implies a high estimate of their intellectual qualities. The republican spirit of the desert assigns them, indeed, their natural position, and, though much is required from them as modest women, little is exacted from them as an inferior sex.

Some of the peculiar customs among the various communities of Arabia are curious enough to require notice. Before the Wahaby Conquest it was customary among the Deyr Arabs for a man to take his daughter, when marriageable, to the market-place—where all such engagements were formed—and proclaim her for disposal, crying aloud, “Who will buy the virgin?” The Bedouins of Mount Sinai still adhere to their singular practices. A man desiring matrimony makes a bargain with some one who has an unmarried daughter, and if able to settle it, sticks in his turban a sprig of green, which signifies that he is wedded to a virgin. The bride’s inclinations are not beforehand consulted. She must go home with her husband, and submit for one night to his embraces. If she be not pleased, however, she may in the morning go home, when the contract is dissolved. Among the wealthier tribes of the East, no price is paid, and every girl is free to choose a partner. Modesty, with them, is regarded as the finest grace of the sex. It is genuine and unassailable. The bride even is sometimes so coy, that her husband is obliged to tie her up and whip her before she will yield to him. A widow’s marriage is disreputable, and assailed with every demonstration of disrespect. This proves that divorce among them is unfrequent. Among the Nazyene, a tribe on the peninsula of Sinai, a girl, when given in marriage, flies and takes refuge among the hills, where she is supplied with food by her relations. The bridegroom goes in search, and when he finds his bride, must pass the night with her in the open air. She may repeat the flight several times, and indeed is not expected to live with her husband until a whole year has elapsed or she has become pregnant. Various other customs characterise different tribes; but in every feature of Arabian manners we discover a simplicity and purity as admirable as it is rare. Conjugal infidelity is rare in the desert. Fornication scarcely ever happens, and common prostitutes are unknown. In the crowded towns on the coast, however, there are numbers of professional prostitutes, licensed to carry on their calling, who pay considerable sums to the magistrates for the enjoyment of their privileges. In Mecca they are extremely numerous, and for the most part inhabit the poorest quarter of the city. In Dhyrdda, also, they are extremely numerous, but the population of that place is almost exclusively foreign. These women bear scarcely any children. When, during the early years of their vocation, they are capable of producing offspring, they employ artificial means to ensure abortion. The seeds of the tree whence is obtained the balm of Mecca, are used for that purpose.

In the mosques of the sacred city, prostitutes collect in great numbers, and are largely encouraged by the Moolah or priestly class, who find them a source of profit. Those of the more indigent description inhabit a particular quarter, but the others are dispersed amid the general mass of the population. They are more decent in their outward demeanour than the same class in the East and in Europe, and it requires a practised eye to detect, amid the throng of veiled women circulating in the streets and bazaars, those of the venal sisterhood. Contrary, however, to the rule which prevails in England, they are almost the only females who frequent places of worship, which is on account not of their devotion, but of their effrontery, the prejudices of Mohammedans being against it. The Bedouins near cities sometimes frequent the brothels in their neighbourhood; but these belong to the class the manners of which have been vitiated by intercourse with strangers.

In what numbers the prostitutes of the Arabian cities are found we know not, nor do we discover anything remarkable in their manners or modes of life. It would, consequently, be unprofitable to dwell on them. We have to notice, however, in connection with Arabia, two remarkable customs, one of which exhibits to us a class of male prostitutes, if such a term may be allowed, and the other a species of hospitality, now very rare, except among the grossest communities.

In the Arabian province of Hedjaz no unmarried woman may pass within the boundary or enter the mosque. As, however, many rich old widows and persons whose husbands have died by the way arrive with every pilgrim caravan, some device is necessary to procure them admission without breaking the law. A number of men, therefore, live in the frontier towns, who, upon the arrival of every concourse, hire themselves out to the women, marry them, live with them while they pass through the sacred territory, receive a munificent sum for their services, and are then divorced. If one of these individuals chooses to insist on keeping the wife he has procured, she cannot help it; but such an act would be attended with great discredit and the loss of a very profitable occupation. Eight hundred men are sometimes employed as temporary husbands, and a number of boys are continually trained that they may inherit the calling. On the various roads to the shrine of Mecca congregate a number of women, with somewhat of a sacred character attached to them. They are prostitutes, but not indiscriminate in their connections, since they offer to bear to wealthy pilgrims children, who are considered as born under a fortunate auspice.

Among the Merehedes, on the frontiers of Yemen, a custom far more revolting has existed from ancient time, and still prevails. A stranger arriving as a guest is compelled to pass the night with the wife of his host, whatever her age or condition. Should he succeed in pleasing her he is honourably treated. If not, she cuts off a piece of his garment, turns him out into the village, and leaves him to be driven away in disgrace. When the Wahabis conquered the Merehedes, they forced them to abandon this odious practice; but some misfortunes ensuing to the tribe, they were all imputed to this sacrilegious infringement of an ancient law. The custom was therefore restored. Some other female of the family, may, however, be substituted for the wife, but young virgins are never sacrificed to this barbarous hospitality[80].

Of Prostitution in Turkey.

There is one general system of manners pervading the Mohammedan world. In examining, therefore, the moral aspects of the various countries in which the religion of the Prophet is established, we find little in each to distinguish it from the rest. In Turkey exists the same civilization as in Egypt, though its population is more corrupt. 25,000,000 souls inhabit a region which would support twice as many, and yearly the work of decay is going on.

The Osmanlis, a race of Scythian extraction, have held Turkey during 400 years, receiving, however, large infusions of Persian and Mongolian blood. The wealthier people their harems with the beauties of Georgia and Circassia; the humbler intermarry with Servians, Bulgarians, Albanians, and Greeks, so that the original physical characteristics of the race have been greatly modified. Their moral nature has changed also, but in a less degree. Proud, sensual, and depraved in their tastes, they are too indolent to acquire even the means of gratifying their most powerful cravings. Their pride is satisfied with the recollection of former glories; their lust looks forward to the enjoyments of paradise, crowded, as they believe, with celestial creatures devoted to the delight of their senses. Immersed in an atmosphere of epicurean speculation, the Turk whom poverty does not compel to labour for his bread passes the day in lounging on cushions, smoking, sipping coffee, winking with half-closed eyes on the landscape, dreamily indifferent to all external objects. Even the poor indulge in this idleness. They measure out the amount of labour sufficient to keep them from want, and spend the rest of their lives drowsily awaiting the sensual bliss promised them by their prophet in heaven. During this lethargy passions more violent than are known to Europeans sleep in their breasts, and when these are excited, the Turk cannot be surpassed for brutal fury. All his ideas are gross. He is able to imagine no authority not armed with whip or sword. Moral power is to him an incomprehensible idea. It is, perhaps, for this reason that the Osmanlis have conquered so much, and possessed so little talent for governing what they acquired.

This notice of the Turkish character is necessary, because it corresponds exactly with their estimation of the female sex. The person alone is loved. Intellect in a Turkish woman is a quality rarely developed, because never prized. It is no part of her education to learn to read or write. To adorn herself, to dress in charming attire, to beautify her face, to perfume her hair, and soften her limbs in the bath or with fine ointments, is the object to which she applies her mind; and when, thus decorated, she lounges on a pile of cushions in the full splendour of her costume, her delight is some spectacle which will stimulate her passions and intoxicate her with excitement. Turkey is thus the empire of the senses.

Polygamy, authorized by the Prophet’s code, is not now so frequently resorted to as formerly. It is growing into disrepute, and the female sex, upon which the laws relating to property have conferred much independence, are generally averse to it. Men marrying wives equal in rank to themselves frequently engage in their first marriage contract not to form a second, and the breach of this agreement is viewed as a profligate abuse of manners. The practice of polygamy was once, however, very prevalent among the higher orders, and contributed much to corrupt as well as to diminish the population. In the families of those Mohammedans who indulge in a plurality of wives, the children are fewer than in those of the Greeks, Armenians, and Jews, to whom polygamy is not permitted.

The offspring of married women, also, in the middle ranks of life is more numerous than in the wealthier harems. Indeed, the sex in Turkey is naturally prolific; but the growth of the nation has been checked by this among other causes. To account for the origin of the practice in Turkey many ingenious theories have been framed. It appears easy, however, to find its origin. The men are naturally sensual, and have never been accustomed to respect the female sex. When, therefore, an individual’s wealth allowed him, he naturally made use of it to multiply the sources of that animal enjoyment, dearer to him than any other earthly pleasure. Some have supposed that polygamy was necessitated by the numerical disparity of the sexes; but this does not seem the case. In those cities and towns where the women are in greater numbers than the men, we find that they are purchased in large numbers from the neighbouring villages or in the markets, to furnish the harems of the opulent.

The social code of Turkey requires a woman to preserve herself in strict seclusion. The privacy of her apartments is so great that, unless on very rare occasions, no male is allowed to enter them except the master of the house. There are only certain days of the year in which a brother, an uncle, or a father-in-law can be admitted, or on festive occasions, such as a birthday or ceremony of circumcision.

The usages of the country do not even permit a man to see his wife before marriage. In this respect the Turks are more jealous than their written law, for the Prophet advised his friend to obtain a glimpse of the woman whom he designed to receive into his bed. She may gratify her curiosity by seeing him, but such an occurrence is not frequent. This severe separation of the sexes has given employment to a class of professional matchmakers, who, as in China, make considerable profits by their calling, and often gain money under fraudulent pretences. The beauty and temper of the woman are exaggerated to the man, who, on the other hand, is described to the lady as possessed of every heroic qualification. They are mutually deceived; they rush into a marriage, and perhaps in a few days a divorce is required. Children of three or four years are sometimes betrothed, and married when they are fourteen. This interference of the parents leads often to evil results, for the youth, who is forced to accept his father’s choice, sometimes hates his bride before he sees her, and resolves to take a concubine as soon as circumstances permit.

Each family deputes an agent to promote the satisfactory settlement of the transaction, while the girl herself, under her cloudy veil, sits in her harem to await her fate. To expose her face to a strange man’s gaze would be regarded as a species of prostitution. Her fortune is, therefore, decided for her. The terms of the contract are laid down in a document, which is signed by witnesses, and the woman is then called “a wife by writing.” This is concluded some days before the actual rite of wedding; but the whole interval is occupied with ceremonies, rejoicing, and liberal displays of hospitality. A man in Constantinople usually reckons on spending a year’s income on the occasion of his marriage. The average of this, in the middle ranks, is from 2000 to 2500 piastres.

On the appointed day the union, which is a mere civil contract, though blessed by religious rites, is concluded. The bridegroom is conducted by an Imaum, or priest, to the entrance of the bride’s chamber, and there a prayer is uttered, to which all his friends make response. He is then left alone, standing outside the door. He knocks three times. A slave-maid admits him, going out herself to fetch a table with a tray of viands. While she is gone the husband endeavours to uncover his wife’s face, in which, after the usual coy resistance prescribed by custom, he, of course, succeeds. Meanwhile the damsel returns, and they eat together. The meal is very quickly dispatched, and a bridal couch is spread on the floor. Then the bride is taken into a neighbouring room, where she is undressed by her mother and her friends, after which the newly-married pair are left alone. Among the most popular stories connected with Ottoman manners, is that of the sultan throwing his handkerchief to the woman he chooses as the companion of his pillow, and the imitation of this practice by great men in their harems. This, however, is a fanciful invention, repeated by some travellers who desired the world to suppose they were intimate with the secrets of the seraglio. When the sultan chooses any one of his women to pass the night with, he sends an eunuch with a present to inform her of the intended honour. She is taken to a bath, perfumed, attired in beautiful garments, and then placed in bed. The story of her creeping in at the foot of the couch is also a fable. The first chosen is the chief in rank.

The first of these fanciful accounts was probably suggested by a custom still practised among some of the Bosnian communities in western Turkey, where manners are more simple than in the eastern provinces. The young Muslim girls are there permitted to walk about in the daytime with uncovered faces. A man inclined to matrimony who happens to be pleased with the appearance of one of these maidens throws an embroidered handkerchief, or some part of his dress, over her head or neck. She then returns to her home, considers herself betrothed, and never again exposes her features in public. This is the usual preliminary to marriage; but it is probable that the lover has more than one look at his mistress before he makes the sign.

Even the sultan’s concubines are purchased slaves, since no free Turkish woman can occupy that position. Occasionally he gives one away to a favourite pasha, who looks with pride upon the acquisition, and glories in the refuse of a palace. Little girls, about seven years of age, are much prized as slaves, and are often sold for upwards of a hundred guineas.

Life in the harems of Constantinople is similar to that in those of Cairo. It is a round of sensual enjoyment, in which vanity is almost the only relief to the grosser appetites of humanity. The bath is the favourite place of resort. Lady Wortley Montague has left a celebrated description of one of these palaces of indolence. The ladies, perfectly naked, walked up and down, or reclined in various attitudes on heaps of cushions, attended by pretty slaves, who handed them coffee or sherbet. They delighted in the voluptuous movements of the female dancers, of which the public class in Turkey, as in Egypt, is composed of prostitutes. It struck them with surprise and disappointment that Lady Mary did not take off her clothes as they did; but she showed them how she was cased up in her stays, so that she could not strip, which they imagined was an ingenious device of her jealous husband.

The morals of the Turkish women in general are described by most writers as very loose. The veils which were invented to preserve their virtue, favour their intrigues to dispose of it. The most watchful husband may pass his wife in the street without knowing her. Thus they live in perpetual masquerade. The places of assignment are usually at Jews’ shops, where they meet their paramours, though very seldom letting them know who they are. “You may easily imagine,” said Lady Montague, “the number of faithful wives to be very small in a country where they have nothing to fear from a lover’s indiscretion.” This may be taken, however, as an exaggerated view, for her ladyship was accustomed to breathe the impure moral atmosphere of courts, and cared little for the character of her sex in any part of the world.

The wife in Turkey holds this check upon the caprice of her husband—her property belongs to herself, and if she be divorced she may take it away. The widow, also, is inviolable in her harem, not only against private intrusion, but against the officers of the law. If a woman’s husband neglect her, that is, if he fail to visit her once a week, she may sue for a separation, which may be easily effected before a Kadi. If she commit adultery, he may also sue; but if the divorce takes place by mutual consent no formality whatever is required. As in Egypt, a man may marry a woman twice after divorcing her; but the third time he must not take her again, until she has been had and put away by another person.

Women, in Turkey, regard as an object more pitiable than any other the childless wife. With them to be barren after marriage is viewed as more disgraceful than with us to be fruitful before. All sorts of quackeries are resorted to by them to prolong and increase their powers of child-bearing, so that many kill themselves by the dangerous devices they employ. It is common to see a woman who has borne thirteen or fourteen children; some in the middle ranks bear from 25 to 30. They pray for the birth of twins, and are usually good mothers, though some have expressed themselves indifferent whether all their children lived or half of them were swept off by the plague. The single instance of superior refinement observable in Egypt is also remarkable here. Midwives only attend the bed of child-birth. There are no accoucheurs. Female practitioners also cure diseases; though an European physician is sometimes admitted to feel a pulse or even to see a patient’s face.

Among the humbler classes the condition of the women resembles very nearly that of our own country. Their morality is generally superior to that of those wealthier inmates of the harems whose indolence seduces them into vice.

The dancing girls of the public class of Turkey resemble, in all respects, those of Egypt. They are prostitutes by profession; but they do not appear to be so numerous in that country as formerly. Their performances, however, are prized by all classes, and they dance as lasciviously in the harem before women, as in the Kiosk before a party of convivial men. Those who perform in public indulge in every obscenity, and vie with each other in their indecent exhibitions. Their costume is exceedingly rich both in colour and in material. Frequenting the coffee-houses by day, they pick up companions, whom they entertain with songs, or tales, or caresses until nightfall, when preliminary orgies take place, and they disperse, with their patrons, to houses in various parts of the city, generally in the more narrow, tortuous, and remote streets. The outsides of these habitations are usually of a forbidding, cheerless, dirty aspect, but the interior of those belonging to the wealthier chiefs of the dancing girls are fitted up with every appurtenance of luxury.

One of the most extraordinary features in the social institutions of Turkey is the temporary union, or marriage of convenience, which is adopted by many. It is, indeed, strictly speaking, simple prostitution. A man going on a journey, and leaving his wife behind, arrives in a strange city, where he desires to make some stay. He immediately bargains for a girl to live with him while he remains in the neighbourhood; a regular agreement is drawn up, and he supports her, and pays her friends, while he has her in his possession. The Moolahs declare this to be one valuable privilege of the male sex in Turkey; but the engagement does not appear to be valid before the law, if contracted expressly as a temporary union. But this is not necessary. The facility of divorce renders all such precaution useless. The man, therefore, takes the girl, nominally as his wife, but virtually as his mistress, until he is tired of her, or wishes to depart, when she returns to her friends and waits the occasion of a new engagement.

Such is, in outline, the social system of Turkey with reference to the female sex[81].

Of Prostitution in Circassia.

A peculiar interest attaches to the nation inhabiting that isthmus, with its stupendous mountains, which forms the natural barrier between Asia and Europe; and is, perhaps, still the least known region in the ancient world. The Western Caucasus comprehends an immense district commencing at the middle Kuban, and terminating with Georgia. It is peopled by various tribes, claiming a common descent, and governed by princes, elders, and nobles. The Circassians are a brave and civilized, hospitable and courteous, race, resembling the ancient Swiss; and they present a singular system of manners varying considerably with the different tribes.

There is a race, known as the Abassians, which is considered the aboriginal nation of the Caucasus,—described by Strabo as a predatory people,—pirates at sea, robbers on land; characteristics which they have to this day preserved. They are, however, in other respects, virtuous, dwelling in fixed habitations, strangers to the worst vices of civilized life, and humble in their desires. Their religion, a compound of Judaism, Christianity, and Islamism, permits polygamy; but, as a wife is expensive, they are usually contented with one, who is more the companion than the menial of her husband. The women are exceedingly industrious; employing themselves in a variety of pursuits, and tasking themselves far more than is essentially necessary in order to procure ornamental clothes. To reward them for this they are allowed full liberty, are free in their social intercourse, and, if they wear a veil, wear it only to screen their complexions from the sun. Their costume is highly elegant, and their state is indicated by the colour of their trowsers—white being that for the virgin, red for the wife, and blue for the widow.

The laws these people have made to protect their own morals, have, in some degree, answered their purpose. Illegitimate children have no claim to a share of the patrimony, and can legally claim no relationship with any one. Should they be sold as slaves there is no one bound to ransom; should they be assassinated there is no relative expected to avenge their death. Nevertheless the inherent kindness of the Abassians mitigates the effect of these harsh laws. Illegitimate children are rarely treated ill, and their legitimate brothers often make with them a voluntary partition of property.

But when a man marries a barren woman, he is allowed to take a concubine, whose children inherit no disability on this account.

When a man dies, be his rank what it may, the social law confers on his wife the superintendence of the household, and she administers the property without division until her death, when it is divided among the sons. Should any of the daughters remain unmarried, their eldest brother is bound to support them until a suitor appears, when he may make as good a bargain as he can.

Severe laws have been enacted against immorality. The man detected in illicit intercourse with a married or unmarried woman is tried before the elders of the community, who rarely fail to punish him, either by a fine or by perpetual banishment. The dishonoured wife is returned to her parents, as well as the girl, and sold as a slave. The dowry which her husband had given for her is returned to him. If the guilt have happened in the family of a prince, it can only be washed out by the blood of one, if not both, of the criminals. So bitter, indeed, is the shame which such an occurrence brings upon a house, that they who have been so disgraced often retire to some desolate part of the Caucasus, there to hide themselves from the obloquy which ever afterwards attaches to their name.

When a man desires to divorce his wife, he must declare before a council of elders the reasons for such a step; and if these be not perfectly satisfactory he is obliged to pay the parents of the women a sufficient amount to recompense them for the burden thus thrown upon their hands. Should the woman, however, marry again before two years have expired, this sum is returned. Frequently a maiden having formed some romantic attachment, and hating the man chosen as her husband by her parents, flies alone into the woods, and hides until her friends proclaim themselves willing to concede her desires. Occasionally, also, two warriors select the same girl to marry, and in this case a duel is fought—sometimes with fire-arms—the victor carrying off the prize. Similar laws and usages prevail among the Circassians, except that the wealthier men among them seclude their wives, and are altogether more Turkish in their manners. On the whole, however, the patriarchal institutions of this singular and romantic people are admirable for the effect they produce, since the Circassians and Abassians are exceedingly pure in their morality.

Among the Circassians themselves, with the exception of the prouder nobles, women are not secluded. The wives and daughters of a house are often introduced to the traveller, and unmarried girls are frequently seen at public assemblies. One singular custom, however, is observed, which is that the husband never appears abroad with his wife, and scarcely ever sees her during the day. This is not from neglect or scorn, but in accordance with ancient habits, and a desire to prolong the first sentiments with which the bridegroom approaches his bride.

All Circassian women wear, until they are married, a tight corset of leather, which makes their complexion sallow, and hurts the figure, as all unnatural compression does. The consequence is, that the young wives are infinitely more beautiful than the maidens; and the charms of the women of this race are celebrated throughout the world. The reason assigned for this strange custom is, that it is shameful for a virgin to have a full bosom. When a girl has been chosen and purchased, her future husband comes to the house, places her on horseback, gallops away, and conveys her home. Then, when all the people are supposed to be asleep, the bridegroom first unlooses the abominable ligatures which confine the bosom of his bride. He does not, until some time has passed, live with her openly.

An idea prevails among the vulgar in Europe, that the Circassians sell their daughters as slaves to any Turk or Persian who may desire to buy them. This is not correct. They are particularly careful as to the position and birth of the individual who desires to intermarry with them, and the sale is no more than takes place among their own people, as well as among all the nations inhabiting the Caucasus. Great precautions are taken to secure the happiness of the girls, and long negotiations frequently produce no bargain. It is true that in the bazaars of Constantinople, and the principal towns of Asia Minor and Persia, numerous girls are sold under the name of Circassians, but they are mostly Abassians, or the children of Circassian peasants, or children ravished from the neighbouring Cossacks, or slaves procured from those base Circassian traders who have given in their adhesion to Russia. Many of the girls, being trained to such ideas from childhood, prefer the Turkish harem to the life they follow among their native hills. Some come back after having obtained their liberty, and bring accounts, in the most fluent language, of the voluptuous joys they have indulged in in their luxurious prisons; but generally the race is dearly attached to its freedom.

Throughout the Caucasus we have found a high scale of manners. Prostitution, as a profession, is unknown. In one of the simple tribes, still under patriarchal rule, a girl who took up such a calling would be so shunned and abhorred by the rest of her countrywomen, that she would speedily be compelled to fly beyond the bounds of their territory, that is, if she escaped being sold as a slave or put to death by her indignant friends. The parental authority, more moral than legal, is a great check upon profligacy, since a man of whatever age, if he have a father living, pays obedience to him, and fears to incur his reproof. It is therefore delightful to point out a country surrounded by gross and profligate nations, where simplicity of manners still prevails, and where the female sex is as happy and as highly esteemed as it is modest, chaste, and virtuous[82].

Of Prostitution among the Tartar Races.

The immense region of Central Asia, little known and seldom visited, has been the cradle of great nations, which have exercised a mighty influence on the fortunes of the world, and may again become conspicuous in history. It is, therefore, interesting, as well as important, to inquire into the characteristics of the populations which still cling to its soil. They are divided under many names, and among the most remarkable are the hordes of Kirghiz Kazaks, who wander between the borders of the Caspian Sea on the west, and the fortified line which forms the southern frontier of the Russian Empire. On the east it is divided by a similar chain of posts from the Chinese dominions, but towards the south the limits of their wanderings are unknown. Over this vast steppe a various climate prevails; but the whole is particularly marked by extremes of heat and cold, while the soil is composed of alternate deserts of sand and pasture, where rain during the greater part of the year is exceedingly scanty. A short and delicious spring, a burning and dry summer, a short and miserable autumn, which speedily darkens into a long, bitter, and gloomy winter—such are the influences to which these hordes are subject. Forests, patches of green, salt lakes, springs and rivers of fresh water, a few rich valleys, and some rocky hills, vary the aspect of the wilderness which is their home; but generally it is a blank and monotonous waste. All these circumstances are enumerated, as they may be supposed to have formed, or at least to have modified, the character of the Kirghiz Kazaks. They are divided into three principal hordes—the Great, the Lesser, and the Little—amounting altogether to from 2,000,000 to 2,400,000 souls. Engaged perpetually in wandering from place to place, they have nevertheless certain spots, belonging by prescriptive rights to particular tribes, where they encamp for the coldest months of the winter. Their manners afford a faithful picture of the ancient patriarchal life, not, indeed, the poetical life of Arcadia and the pastures of Israel, but that of the Scythians, as represented by Herodotus, or the Bedouins in their original simplicity. Forming a nation of shepherds, they appear to live only on and for their flocks, accustoming themselves little to the use of arms, and, though perpetually on horseback, seldom engaging in the chase. They dwell in huts or temporary habitations of strong wickerwork, covered in with fleeces; and in the interior of these singular habitations much comfort, elegance, and even sumptuous luxury may often be found. Nevertheless they are a robust, hardy race, possessing very indistinct ideas of property, and, though addicted to sensual enjoyments, long lived, and seldom visited by epidemic diseases, except when the small-pox is brought among them from Siberia.

Their manners with respect to the character and treatment of the female sex are simple, but, in comparison with other pastoral races, somewhat coarse. In costume the woman differs little from the man. Both men and women adorn themselves with ornaments of silver, gold, or coral, or even pearls and other gems, and in this reciprocal display of vanity we discover a token of equality between the sexes. It is difficult to ascertain the religion of these hordes, but it is apparently a crude mixture of Mohammedanism and Paganism. The Muslims have attempted to disseminate their doctrines widely, but few of the Prophet’s laws have been accepted so readily as that which allows a plurality of wives—which the Kirghiz indulge in whenever they can afford the amount to be paid for a bride according to the usages of their nation.

The Kirghiz are immoderately addicted to voluptuous pleasures, and are extremely idle. It is curious to remark, however, that while the men are distinguished by their indolence, the women are fond of exertion, occupying themselves, as much from inclination as from necessity, with the affairs of the household, with attendance on the flocks, and with the manufacture of garments. Their recompense is to be treated as servitors by masters who are sometimes proud and harsh; but the labour of the women is not compulsory, nor are they shut up in harems, or forbidden to mix with the other sex. The seclusion of females, indeed, is not a custom. Their manner of living exposes them to every temptation; jealousy has little power to watch, and the wife’s virtue is, for the most part, left to guard itself.

Though, as we have said, the Kirghiz, when they are rich enough, eagerly avail themselves of the privilege of polygamy, few possess wealth enough to enable them to marry more than one wife. This circumstance prevents them from indulging in that pride which impels a man to shut up the partner of his pillow from every eye but his own. They who have seraglios must follow a steady and uniform course of life. The Tartar’s tent offers few obstacles to curiosity or intrigue. Turks and Persians who keep a harem usually possess slaves also, whose labour permits their mistresses to lounge idly on silken cushions; but as the Kirghiz loves to be indolent, he is constrained to let his wife be as active as she pleases, and is never so happy as when she saves him the trouble of moving from his couch, by going everywhere and doing everything herself. But on horseback he is proud of motion, which accounts partly for the migratory habits of the hordes, though the nature of their country is the chief cause of their nomade manner of life. Women consequently enjoy their liberty, and to their love of industry they join a goodness of heart and a warmth of affection which extort praises from many travellers.

The great check upon polygamy is, as we have noticed, the cost of the Kalyms, which is to be paid for every woman. This price varies in amount, from five or six sheep, and occasionally less among the poor, to 200 or 500 or even 1000 horses among the rich. To these are added different household effects, with, on rare occasions, a few slaves, male or female. Out of these payments a considerable share goes to the Mohammedan Moolahs who frequent the steppes, and who are attracted thither no less by their profitable occupation of marrying the people than by religious zeal. The Kalym increases with the number of wives. The second costs more than the first, and the third than the second, and so forth, which enables none but a very wealthy man to keep a harem. The khan of the Little Horde, who was lord over nearly 1,000,000 men, had sixteen or seventeen wives, besides fifteen concubines, whose offspring, however, were all on an equality. This patriarch had 42 sons and about 34 daughters. Young men usually take their first wife not according to their own choice, but under their father’s direction. As to girls they are always under their parents’ control, and many are affianced during infancy.

The first arrangement made when a marriage is in contemplation is to fix the amount of the kalym, and the date on which it is to be paid. These preliminaries concluded, the Moolah consecrates the transaction by asking three times of the parents of the bride and those of the bridegroom, “Do you consent to the union of your children?” and reading prayers for the happiness of the married couple. Witnesses and arbitrators are then chosen, who may decide future disputes, should any such arise, and the nuptials are terminated by a feast and various kinds of merry-making. The man then begins to pay a kalym, or else his father does this on his behalf; and the parents of the girl occupy themselves with getting ready a trousseau for their daughter—among the articles of which it is essentially requisite to include the tent which the bride is to occupy when she is finally delivered over to her husband. While the kalym remains unpaid the marriage is suspended; though the bridegroom may pay visits to the maiden he has chosen, and even live with her, provided he engages not to take away her chastity.

Among some tribes these preliminary meetings are conducted with much ceremony; in all they are often the first interviews which the husband has with the woman who is to be his wife. When once, however, a part of the required amount is paid, neither can retract without disgrace. Ruptures, indeed, rarely, if ever, take place; partly because no young girl dare to assert a will of her own, and partly because the man does not care to rebel against a union which he is free to break when he desires.

Frequently, however, the bride and bridegroom, during their preliminary visits, anticipate the final nuptial ceremony; in which case this is usually hastened, though the whole amount of kalym may not have been paid. They are led, richly clothed if possible, into a tent, where various rites are performed. The husband then departs, but immediately comes again on horseback and demands his wife. Her parents refuse to yield her, when he enters, bears her off by force, places her across his saddle, and gallops away to his tent, which during many hours after is sacred against all intruders. This custom, however, is not universal.

If a man finds his wife not to be a virgin, he may disgrace her, send her home, and demand from her father the restitution of the kalym, or one of his other daughters who happens to be chaste, without payment.

As every woman brings with her dowry a new tent, so each wife, when a man has more than one, dwells in a separate habitation. The first is styled the “rich wife,” and exercises superior authority over all the rest. Though she may have disgusted her husband, he is bound to distinguish her by respect; while the others, entirely equal among themselves, remain always in a certain dependence on her. Prudent husbands divide even the flocks belonging to the different women, that the children of each may justly inherit her property. The chief wife may quit her husband, if she can show any grave cause for separation, and return to her parents, but the others have not that privilege.