WOMEN UNDER POLYGAMY
cosmetics, you will understand that such rude and inartistic arts of the toilet can only add to the observer's sense of dissatisfaction."
The wealthy owner of a seraglio often selects those Circassian women who are most susceptible to blushing. A capacity for blushing adds to a girl's monetary value in the harem market.
The custom of the women of the Abode of Bliss is to dress in their daintiest attire for the pleasure of their husbands in the home; but out-of-doors they often wear plain and unattractive clothes. When not invited to the presence of the pasha, the girls often wear dowdy, untidy costumes in the harem.
Romantic love, based upon highly refined sentiment and mutual esteem, as it is understood in the older Western nations, is perhaps rarely associated with polygamy and love in the harem. Nevertheless, in the single marriages, which are the rule amongst the greater number of Turks and Egyptians, there is often intense conjugal devotion.
In a very ancient collection of Aryan maxims, by Halâ, there are sentiments which show that the love of men and women was not wholly of the senses. A lover speaks thus: "As in sickness without a physician; as living with relatives when one is poor; as the sight of an enemy's prosperity—so is it difficult to endure separation from you."
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