The Birmingham age-herald. [volume] (Birmingham, Ala.) 1902-1950, 1910-04-24

upon platforms with goods piled
around them. Here is one selling silks.
She has the most delicate pinks, blues
yellows and green's. all striped with
some other CAV color. They are iu-
tended for skirts. and will be wrapped
tight around the person and fastened
! with a knot at the waist See, girl
has come up and Is making q purchase.
/ The fair merchant takes cigar as big
as my wrist out of her mouth and lays
i 1t aside while she measures the goods
with yardstick A half dozen girls
are sitting on their heels nearby watch
ing the sale Their backs are turned
and l observe their silks skirts glued
to their plump bodies. The Burmese
maid wears neither corset nor hustle.
The skirt falls straight to the feet u-
4 closing the legs SO that they look like
double pipes wrapped in silk. The up
per part of the body is clad in a jack
i ct and shawl.
| Now look at the ears of those girls
! They are shaped like beautiful shells,
except at the lobes. which are elon-
gated and plugged with cylinders of
gold, silver amber. They are bare
headed. and their long black locks are
done up in knot on the crown. Every
girl wears two or more bracelets and
a diamond ring sparkles on the hand
OF the merchant as she measures the
cloth.
The Women do the Business
! Now turn about and look through the
bazars. There are thousands of women
buying and selling. and hundreds of ped
dlers moving about with trays on their
heads. Here comes one with fresh fruits
She has bowl of cocoanuts and bananas
and cries out her wares as she goes. Be
hlnd her is flower peddler, and further
on are maidens with vegetables, fish, fruit
and all sorts of things. A fish woman is
selling a trout from which she has
chopped off the head The fish beeds as
she handles 1t. She has plugs in her
ears and her lips are wrapped around a
mighty cigar at which she puffs as she
weighs out the fish.
we go to the street of the tailors Here
girls are sewing on machines worked by
hand. They will make you dress while
you wait. We stop before a pretty silk
seller, and buy yellow striped skirt to
send home. The girl sits on her feet, her
little brown toes peeping out of the pink
skirt which is wrapped tightly about her
She looks Innocent and feel safe in MAX
ing the purchase at her own price. She
offers me Whit from her cigar as ham
die the goods, and upon my refusing gives
1t to her sister and then comes down to
business. She pulls out one piece of bright
| silk after another and explains the good
points of each, laughing and chatting the
while. In the end l find I have paid
three times what I should, but the girl
was SO charming it was worth twice the
money.
Belle of the Baxars
| This girl was one of the bellies of the
bazaar, and typical of the fair maidens
Oh Burma She was as straight as a post
and as plump partridge and her rich
burmese dress was well fitted to show
all her beauties. The women here are clad
In two garments. One of these is Jacket
or silk, cotton or gauze which reaches
| TO the hips, and the other bright silken
skirt which is wrapped around the waist
and fails to the feet
| This skirt is square; it Is about five
feet In width, and is fastened by a half
hitch with an opening down at the front.
The skirt Is so tight that when the girl
walks rapidly she shows her bare legs to
the knee; but by throwing out the heels
and going pigeon-toed the folds are pre-
vented from parting to an immodest de-
gree. In lower Burma many of the
skirts are now sewn together at the
front on account of the comments which
foreigners have made upon the costume.
| These dresses are of different lengths,
and the richer women often have skirts
which trail upon the ground. The coors
are those of the rainbow the raost deli
cate hues being used My fair merchant
wore a jacket of gauze, and her skirt
reached as high as the armpits. The
| jacket was so thin that the brown skin
could be seen through the meshes. expos
Ing the neck, shoulders and arms. She
had beautiful face. Her eyes were
| large, soft and brown, with eyelids lust a
trifie oblique and -high-arching, delicate
brows. Her hair, which was glossy black.
was rolled up In a pyramid on the
crown, and fastened there with bright
golden comb. She wore a necklace of
n owls IN Id 4I
amber, and double string of pearls fell
as low as her waist She had seven gold
bracelets on each of her wrists, a dia-
mond ring on her finger and diamond
plugs in her ears. She was, / judge
about Is years Of age, but girls mature
here at ID, and she was a woman grown.
Ear Plugs and WomanhOod
| All the girls here wear ear plugs They
cannot enter society without them AS a
maiden approaches the age of coming out,
which is usually at II or 10, her ears
are bored, and the ceremony is as i'm
portant to her as the first long dress is
to her American sister. The ceremony
is formal, and 1t must be done when the
stars are propitious. The family consults
the fortune teller for this occasion, and
big feast is prepared. All the relatives
and friends attend in their best clothes
to witness the piercing. This is done by
a professional earborer who uses needles
of pure gold for the rich and silver ones
for the poor.
When the exact moment has arrived the
girl Is laid down upon mat in the back
of the room and her relatives hold her
there while the ear-borer thrusts the
golden needle through the lobe and twists
1t around into a ring. This he leaves in
the ear The other ear is treated like
wise.
While this is going on the bands play,
and after it there is feast. 1t takes the
ear some time to heal When it is quite
well the process of charging the hole be-
gins. The needle is pulled back and forth
until the sore heals. 1t Is then taken
out. and a little cylinder of finely rolled
gold is pressed in. This is gradually
opened from week to week, stretching
the hole larger and larger, the cylinder
being kept in until it grows to the proper
size. Such people as cannot afford gold or
silver put stems of elephant grass In
their ears, inserting stem after stem until
at last the hole in the lobe will contain
a bunch as big around as your thumb.
After the cars are well healed the plugs
or hollow pipes are inserted.
Some of the women stretch their ear
holes until they grow to an inconceiv-
able size. l have seen peasant girls
with ear holes so large that a napkin
ring could be thrust through one, and
1t is not uncommon to see a Burmese
maid with big cigar thrust through one
ear There was not a merchant In the
bazaar at Mandalay who could not have
used her ears for cigarette holders, and
but few who had ear plugs less than the
size of their finger tips.