Grant County herald. [volume] (Lancaster, Wis.) 1850-1968, 1903-07-01
WOMEN OF THE ORIENT.
No Place Ia All the World So Good as
Cairo to Study Them.

NO race Ia All the w ORD 30 0oou oS
Cairo to Study Them.
In no other city of the Orient has
one so good an opportunity to study
the women of the east as in Cairo.
In this, the smelling pot of the
Moslem races, Persians, Arabs, Turks
and Greeks, together with a half
dozen other races, dwell side by SIDE,
mixing with the native Egyptians.
Women of all these races are on pa
rade every afternoon on the Mousky
or Mohammed-Ali street, the shopping
street for the rich residents. All these
women walk abroad heavily yelled,
each one closely accompanied by
eunuch. In these afternoon prone
nades-for shopping is with them
mainly an excuse for sort Of half
freedom-they show by their eyes,
which are the only parts Of their
faces not hidden by their wells, that
they would not be averse to little
Irritation, but the alert, sc0wling
eunuch keeps them moving on. The
masculine acquaintance of the Mo-
hammedan woman of Cairo is limited
to her husband and her attendant eu-
much.
The promenade is their one glimpse
of freedom Otherwise they dream
their lives away in vacuity. None OF
them can read. Education is not per-
mittcd to eastern women. They have
no part, practically, in the Mohamme-
dan religion, which Is mans faith.
This ignorance and vacuity of life be-
Longs to all classes, high and low.
Their life is an animal one. Under
these circumstances, it is not strange
that the women of the Orient are usu-
ally better and finer physical speci-
mems than their men. They have moth
ing to do but cultivate their bodies.
The Copts are exceptions. They are
Christians, and, while the men hem
their women about to an extent I'M
known in the west, they are still free
as eagles as compared to the Mos
lem women. Even among the CoptS,
however, there is a certain amount of
polygamy.
If the life Of the aristocratic woman
is one of vacuity, that of the low
caste woman is one Of absolute slav-
cry. They are made burden bearers
from the age of 10 or IL. They, too,
are fine animals.
1 have often watched group Of
these women sitting at rest along the
river banks There they sat, staring
at nothing and doubtless thinking Of
the same thing. AS is usual In
Egypt, the flies were thick and ven
omous. 1 myself had to keep small
horse hair wisp busy warding them
from my head and eyes. But there
these women sat with the flies swarm
ing over their eyes, their lips, their
threats, and never SO much as lifted
hand. A cow or horse would have
dashed out vigorously, but they made
no move.
"What is the use?'-that was their
thought, if they thought of the mat
ter at all-"They would only come
back again"
11l&u anu 1OW, IASh duO pOOl, lhNAA
lot is one of legal slavery. Marriage
is a purchase. The market price of
girls. has been falling steadily, until,
in the lower classes, a girl without ex-
ceptional charms is a drug on the
market. Fifty dollars, or even less,
will purchase a good animal, sound in
wind and limb. was much amused
by talk which 1 held with young
Arab of fashion, man of exceptional
intelligence. He was about TO be
married. His father had just bought
him a wife, whom he had seen for
the first time. He was tremendously
elared over the fact that she was a
large, fine specimen of woman, and
was correspondingly grateful to his
father for the iberality of the gift.