San Antonio daily light. [volume] (San Antonio, Tex.) 1886-1907, 1889-06-21
THE BURMESE WOMEN.
A LAND WHERE BUSINESS is TRANS
ACTED BY THE LADIES.


and Their Big Cigars-EquaI in All Things
Save Religion.
The women of Burmah are the most ad-
vanced women of the east The japanese
wife is addressed as slave by her husband
and she never appears to help him entertain
his guests. The Corean madam has no right to
60 on the streets except after dark, and the
small footed Chinese girl is the slave of her
mother-in-law. She has no rights that her hus-
band is bound to respect, and he can sell her
when he is tired of her. The Siamese girl
though step higher in the order of human
rights, has to support the family, and she is,
according TO the law, the property of the
king. The Malay woman is secluded in the
hareuPof her husband, and the millions of
women of India, Egypt and Turkey are never
seen upon the streets The Burmese girls are
the brightest characters of the country, and
their gaysilks, bright eyes and graceful figures
fill every place with color and beauty. They
mix with the men and they have equal rights
in property and social standing with their
husbands
THE BUSINESS WOMAN.
During the first years of the marriage the
man must live with and help support his mo-
ther-in-law, and he is by no means the master
of the house. The woman holds the purse.
She is the business man of the family, and
though at times it is said that wife beating
takes place in Burnah, such instances are
few and far between heard of one today
in which a man, enraged by a shrewish wife,
attempted to strike her A crowd gathered
around and she tainted him, saying: BEAT
me! beat me!' The man raised his stick and
brought it down again and again within an
inch of the woman's back, but did not dare
to strike her.
The business of Burmah is managed by the
women as much as is the business of France.
The city of Rangoon has about 49, 600 peo-
pie, and it is the center of trade of Lower
Burmah. Much Of the native business Is
done in immense bazars covering many
acres. These bazars are rooted with heavy
wood or iron to keep out the sun, and some of
them cover several blocks. Their interiors
are divided up into streets, whicE cut one
another at right angles.
These streets are walled with cases of goods
of all kinds, which rise from the back of a
ledge five feet wide and as high as a chair
seat. Upon these lodges the bazars sellers
sit with their goods piled around and behind
them, and in these baZars the Burmese
women compete with merchants from all
over the east They are as sharp at a bar
gain as the Parsee merchants and the tur-
baned Mahometans who have stalls adjacent
to them, and the Burmese manufactures
of all kinds are sold by them. Without edu-
cation in arithmetic and without knowing
how to read and write, they can count profit
and loss like so many lightning calculators
l bought some silk of one of them today
The price first asked was three times what
finally gave, and the girl who sold me made,
doubt not, 25 per cent. profit.
She was typical Burmese beauty, and she
sat with her legs crossed fat on the straw
mat of her booth, with shelves of silks behind
her and with gay eolored cloths ON the floor
all around her In her mouth was Burmese
cigar at least foo5 long and full inch in
thickness. She offered me a Whit when
looked at her goods, but upon my refusing
she handed the cigar over to her sister and at
tended to business Pulling down one piece
of bright silk after another, she spread them
out on the mat before me and chatted and
laughed while she sold. Girls mature here at
Is and II, and this bazar daisy was perhaps
l6 years old. She was as straight as a post
and as plump as a partridge, and her rich
Burmese dress was well fitted to show out her
beauties.
DRESS AND RELIGION.
The Burmese woman are clad in two gar
ments. One of these is jacket of silk or
cotton which reaches to the hips, and the
other is the tamehn. This is a wide strip of
bright silk about five feet square, which is
wrapped around the waist and the limbs and
fastened with twist at the front. 1t has the
effect of tight American pull-back without
the hustle, put on without underskirtS. The
opening of the skirt is at the front, but the
women walk with a throwing out of the bare
heels, which prevents the folds opening to an
immodest degree. The wealthier ladies wear
their dresses SO long that they trail upon the
ground. The cOlors are those of the rainbow,
and the most delicate of yellows. of pinks and
of blues are used.
Burmese women are treated well il the
family, and they are the equals of the men
in family affairs. They have their say in all
business matters, and the only place in which
their inferiority is noticeable is in religion.
The Burmese are Buddhists, and Buddhist
woman has no chance to go to heaven save
by her soul at death passing into the body Of
man. If she is wonderfully pious during
this life such transmigratiOn may take
place, and note that the chief worshipers at
the pagodas here are women. Buddhist
teachers put women much lower in the scale
of morality than man, and they maintain
that the sins of one woman are equal to the
sins of 5000 of the worst men that ever lived.
There are about two hundred million Budd-
hist women in the world, and none of them
have any other hope of Immortality than this,
Living as they do, the Burmese cannot
have much of home life. The houses of the
great majority are more like tents than any
thing else. They are made of plated bamboo
walls matched with palm leaves, which are