As the dresses worn among Persian ladies for indoor use only reach to the knee and are very much bouff , their wearers look like opera dancers. From beneath this kerchief the hair falls in innumerable plaits behind, sometimes reaching almost to the ground. The quantity of solid jewelry worn in honor of the bride is prodigious. Every one takes tea, every one crunches the sweets of various kinds which are piled on china dishes in huge trays in the center of the rooms. Conversation goes on, pipes are smoked by both men and women.
Messages pass between the two courtyards.
But the men remain in their quarters, and the women in theirs. At noon a heavy breakfast is served. They dance, they sing songs, indecent enough in themselves, but tolerated in the East on such occasions. More tea, more ices, more sherbet, more sweets. The bride meanwhile goes to the bath, whither she is accompanied by many of the ladies, the friends and near relatives of the family.