The morning news. [volume] (Savannah, Ga.) 1887-1900, 1891-07-26
LIFE IN ASSYRIA.
Girls Bought for Csmels and Sheep.
Cheap Products and Labor.

OAAS DOuSHJ TOT CsmelS ana SnSSp.
Cheap Products and Labor.
From the Chicago Herald.
| Men live on 6 cents day in Assyria.
Assyrian women, otter 100 years of Chris
tian labor, are bought and sold; are made
to work with oxen at the pillow, and have
as little liberty as in the days of Codmus.
Men who pay Sc day to live and ladies
who ride to shops in victorias thought over
these things az they left lhe Lincoln Park
| Congregational church Sunday night
Amen Rasi, born on Mount Lebanon, told
these things in broken English.
Amen Rasi is a tall, handsome Assyrian,
with skin as rich as the cinnamon silks
made at the foot of the mountain on which
| ne was born. He looked into the curious.
bright eyes Of girls and told them that, had
they been born Assyrians in AS syria, they
| could not go upon the streets unless their
faces were concealed; that they could
neither receive nor make a call among
women without their husbands consent,
and that If at any time. even BY accident.
they were seen by any man, or in any
way recognized one, no one would marry
| them.
He said that once two couples-a tall man
and short woman and short man and a
tall woman-stood before priest to he we'd
the priest placet the tall man and the tall
woman and the short man and the short
woman together. and none of the four knew
whether 1t was right or not, neither of them
knowing the other. But the parents hastily
objected and placed the tall mau by the
| short woman and the short man bv the tall
woman, as that was the way of the con-
| tracts
! Then Mr.. Rasi showed how these contracts
I were made. He left the pulpit and presently
man wrapped up in ricn Assyrian raiment
went up and sat upon the floor. MIR. Rasi
came back and squatted beside him:
II would very much like, he said, "for a
| girl who is yours to be wife to my son
Isaac"
II would be honored," returned the man,
with very unmissakable American accent
How many have your
Three"
chow much years have they r
"One is fifteen, one twenty and one twenty
FIVE"
Don't talk to me about the TWENTY-FIVE
nor the twenty; they are never fit to marry.
How much do you charge for the little
one ?"
Five camels. four horses, three sheep
and $50.
BAH can buy 100 women for SO
much"
But no little ones"
30, think So"
"Well, you can't have mine for a cent
less"
81 pay"
But even then Isaac did not get the
little one, because few minutes later
Mr. Rasi returned as another man, and
by doubling the price secured the girl for
his son Jacob.
Then Amen Rasi looked at the Young
men, whose patent feathers cost them 81,
and told them that people In Assyria paid
! 50 cents for a suit of clothes. The common
people, he said, paid 25 cents day for
house rent, 3 cents for twenty-five pounds
of cabbage aud cents for five pounds of
turnips. Fifty loaves of bread were turned
out at baking, and men sometimes ate four
| and five loaves at a meal He waited for a
moment, and then, turning to blackboard
| behind him, said: They are so bign and
and be drew circle that would enclose q
thanksgiving platter.
Speaking OF Assyrian cities, he said that
when in the garden of Sidon the rain fell
upon the orange and lemon trees and
knocked the fruit upon the ground a hun
dred could be purchased for cents. He
said that IN Damascus there are 150, 900 Mo
hammedans, 80, 900 Christians, and 500
Jews. In the city there is a building
haunted by John the Baptist's ghost. The
door of the room III which he is said TO have
been beheaded is never opened The Mo
| hammedars say that once, long ago, some
one opened 1t and the Baptist's blood flowed
out over the city to depth Of five inches.
1t was the custom of worshipers to leave
their shoes outside the temple. There we're
| sometimes 800 or 400 pairs standing in a
row, and the poorer people hurried through
their prayers first, and then carefully
selected the finest footwear in the row,
| thereby illustrating the great cleverness of
the Assyrians.