Omaha daily bee., 1890-05-24
WOMEN OF ARABIA.
Their Heavy Street Dress and Gauzy
House Attire.

The Arab woman, save in rare and
pleasant exceptions, is hardly what the
poets and painters have shown us, writes
h. l.. Wakeman in the Cincinnati Times
Star. If she be graceful or beautiful it
is extremely difficult to discover it, and
she possesses neither of these attractions
after she is twenty-five, for she is n
wife at twelve or fourteen years of age,
whatever that station or condition means
among the Arabs. All there is about
this being TO become ecstatic over is
that subtle prompting of poetic fancy
which ever, to the male mind peculiarly,
blooms like the rose in any soil of APP
parent coyishness and mystery in the
gentler sex. The Arab woman is simply
u vacuOus, insensate, Volceless and
dreamless human animal, sheeted like
the dead in the streets and dead to the
world when within the four windowless
walls where the majestic being who
owns her keeps her penned.
The dress of the Arab woman is all
concealng upon the street and allre-
vealing in her homo. The outer garment
is the haili. white. usually of wool some
times of silk, often of cotton. 1t is fire.
quently twenty feet in length, and nearly
two yards wide. Beneath this is pre-
cisely four articles of apparel, a gauze
chemise, an unstitfened corset or bodice,
frequently massively embroidered and
bejeweled, pantaloons reaching to the
feet and comprising countless yards of
material, and the tantalizing jur tied
tightly around the face and falling
about twelve inches below. Most women
not satisfied with this retirement, or
perhaps more strictly speaking, most
women whose husbands are not satisfied
with this obscuration, further hide the
face by bringing the hail down over one
side of the forehead, so that but one eye,
n dark eyebrow and u tiny patch of the
forehead are visible.
Their feet are usually incased in brown
or yellow slippers: danglets and banglets
of indescribable jewelry tinllle and chime
from wrists, ankles and concealed portions
of the figure; and q in this swathing
of ghostly hawk, with bumped bodies
and mincing steps, those who are al
lowed upon the streets at all wriggle,
glide and scurry along, like a bevy of
graves upon the heights. But this priv
ilege of waddling about like II lot of
sheeted spooks is by no means univer-
sal one. The young and fair see the sun
light only through the open courts of
their dwellings, or from the white ter
race for brief hour toward sunset. Only
the aged and safe are permitted to visit
the mosques, with the exception that on
Fridays, in company with servants or
elders, little excursions are allowed to
the marabouts or sacred temples, and the
khoubas at the cemeteries as at Belcour,
where they are allowed the cheering di-
version of filling with water the little
cups resting ut the head of the tombs;
for the birds drink from these and fly to
heaven with greeting from the souls at
rest beneath.
Indoors the dress of these women is
ETHEREAL enough for the most fervid ar
lists fancy. They never see in their
home any male but their husbands and
children. The climate, like that of
Cuba in winter, and excessively hot
from May until October, has also much
to do with this. There are rarely but
two garments for everyday home wear.
One is gauZe chemise, through which
the olive-hued form is clearly revealed.
The other is the wide, ample trousers,
terminating just below the knees, and
almost as heecy and gauzy in effect. The
lOwlier women are bare-legged, bare
footed and barc-headed at home. Wives
of the wealthier Arabs will don pink,
yellow or blue gauZe silk hose and dainty
yellow babouches or slippers.
Their hair will be coiled in simple
Grecian knot and fastened with some
huge jeweled ornament, and perhaps II
tiny skull cap, richly embroidered, will
rest coquettishly on one side of the head.
But all are bedecked with jewelry.
The poorer are fond of FURNISHED copper
bands about the arms, wrists and ankles,
or brilliant quartz and glass cubes and
crystals strung on pack thread, encircle
their necks. The rich are abluZe with
jewels, principally pearls, emeralds and
sapphires, badly set but always genuine
and of great value. There is Il legend
in Algicrs that the hidden riches of the
wealthier Arabs, principally comprising
jewels, exceeds the sum total in value of
all coin, plate and jewels otherwise pos
sessed by all natiOnalities in the white
city"