Arab woman

“ The Arab women are most industrious: in addition to the ordinary cares of the family, they fetch the water, carrying it home from the well or river in large jars balanced on their heads; they drive the flocks to pasture, milking them night and morning; they spin the wool of the sheep and goat, and weave it into cloth for the men’s garments or for the tent canvas. In fact, there is hardly anything the Arab woman does not do, while her lord and master passes the time in scouring the country on horseback, or settling quarrels with his neighbours. ”

“ The educated and advanced Arabs of the towns have done much to disabuse the public of any false preconceived ideas concerning Arab womenfolk. Contrary to common belief the Arab woman is often the intellectual and{89} social equal of her spouse. ”

“ Why had Mohammed given her to me? Had he acted the part of a magnanimous servant, who sacrifices himself for his master, even to the extent of giving up the woman whom he had brought into his own tent, to him? Or had he, on the other hand, obeyed a more complex and more practical, though less generous impulse, in handing over this girl who had taken my fancy, to my embrace? An Arab, when it is a question of women, is rigorously modest and unspeakably complaisant, and one can no more understand his rigorous and easy morality, than one can all the rest of his sentiments. ”

“ I must, however, mention, that conjugal virtues are far from being so uncommon amongst the women of the wandering Arabs in Darfur and its neighbourhood. These women, being more intelligent, are more religious and more faithful than the Forians. Among them there is far more propriety. An Arab woman, for example, who has a son in an honourable position, will abstain from any love intrigue out of respect for his name ”

“ Brought up in ignorance, unable to read, write, sew, or do fancy work—in all my experience out here I have never known of a real Arab girl being sent to school nor a real Arab woman who knew the alphabet. Sold at a marriageable age, in many cases to the highest bidder, then kept closely secluded [Pg 150] in the house, is it any wonder that her health is undermined and when brought to child-bed there is no strength left? ”

“ The women, however, enjoy greater consideration than among the Fellahîn, and an old woman is sometimes admitted into the council, and becomes a power in the state—a privilege which has as yet only been claimed by a small minority in our own country.
The dress of the Arab women is remarkably becoming, and their appearance is imposing, as they sweep over the grass, in long trailing garments with ample hanging sleeves; their faces are swathed in a shawl head-dress, generally of dark colour, which is bound over the mouth, and leaves the nose and eyes exposed ”

“ By bracketing these two subjects together I do not wish it to be supposed that in Algeria the two are synonymous, though curiously enough there is none of that sordid atmosphere which is associated with women of easy morals in Europe. It is generally believed that the Arab man is a brute who uses women only for his pleasure, and that the Arab woman is a piece of furniture and accepts the situation. ”

“ Goodell and Bird reached Beirût, and on the 6th of December, 1824, they wrote as follows: "Mr. King's Arabic instructor laughs heartily that the ladies of our company are served first at table. He said that if any person should come to his house and speak to his wife first, he should be offended. He said the English ladies have some understanding, the Arab women have none. It is the custom of this country that a woman must never be seen eating or walking, or in company with her husband. ”

“ The Arab girls, as a rule, grow up in ignorance. It is not thought worth while to educate the daughter; and, indeed, it is regarded by many as destructive of the best order of society to give woman any opportunity which may cause her to desire to usurp the power which heaven has placed in the hands of men. There is, accordingly, little enlightened housekeeping, little to stimulate a woman's mind, little opportunity here for "the hand that rocks the cradle" to move the world. Sons grow up with little respect for their mothers, for there is nothing to make it otherwise. ”

“ But it will be long before any true idea of the dignity of woman enters the debased minds of Arab Mohammedans. The simple fact is that there is no moral purity or elevation among the men, and how can it be expected among the women. ”

“ I suppose it is the spirit of adventure, the desire for forbidden fruit, which characterizes all intrigues of this kind, but it is also the attitude of the woman who does not want to bind herself and prefers her free life until the day she is too old to enjoy it. Arab women are very capricious, and they love to have the man dancing attendance on them, bringing them presents, and never really the master of his own reason. ”

“ Immediately his frank laugh had disarmed her. "It's easy enough to find life's essence, its real meaning, here in Tunis amongst the Arabs. Because these Arabs—they are not like us—they do not think when they feel. They do not consider emotion a problem in abstract dynamics as we do. Life—yes—it's easy to find it here!"
"Is it?"
"Yes. If you have two qualities, my dear. Curiosity—and pluck."
"One and the same thing in a woman's philosophy!"
"You are bright!"
He had poured himself another drink of cognac, had pointed from the hotel balcony at the little Arab town squatted below. She had looked ”

“ You would use the same words if you were talking with a Moslem, and spoke of a dog, a hog, a donkey, a girl or a woman.
They do not think much of girls in Syria. The most of the people are very sorry when a daughter is born. They think it is dreadful, and the poor mother will cry as if her heart would break. And the neighbors come in and tell her how sorry they are, and condole with her, just as if they had come to a funeral. In Kesrawan, a district of Mount Lebanon near Beirût, the Arab women 237have a proverb, "The threshold weeps forty days when a girl is born." ”

“ At the theatre at Basra, when European films were shown, the Arabs always laughed very much at the amount of kissing that white folk indulged in. It seemed to strike them as an extraordinary way of passing the time.
Arab women are not beautiful. Their faces are aquiline, their cheek bones high, and their lips coarse. Their figures are lithe and they walk well, with a sinuous swagger. ”

“ I was in a fair way to win, now, for it was a dazzling opportunity for an Arab. He pondered a moment, and would have done it, I think, but his mother arrived, then, and interfered. Her tears moved me—I never can look upon the tears of woman with indifference—and I said I would give her a hundred to jump off, too. ”

“ They are in fact doing harm to their homeland and their people. They are trying, consciously or unconsciously, to dissipate their people's potential and hinder its progress.
The women of our country are the descendants of the immortal Arab women who fought valiantly side by side with their men folk, wrote the poetry of chivalry and glory and participated in the great Arab heritage of civilisation. ”

“ We are not told the numerical result of the Dewân of Omar, but the population of Kûfa and Bussora may give us a standard to judge of the vast exodus in progress from Arabia, and the rapid strides by which the crowded harems multiplied the race. Arab ladies, as a rule, married only Arab husbands; but the other sex, besides unlimited indulgence in servile concubinage, were free to contract marriage with the women of conquered lands, whether converts or ‘people of the Book;’ for marriage is lawful between a Moslem and females of the Jewish and Christian faith. ”

“ But when there was one leader to rally round, one faith to propagate, one Paradise for those who fell in conquering the heathen, the wild children of the Desert proved that they could conquer foreign countries as well as defend their native sands. During the early days of Islamism, a vast number of women, many belonging to the highest rank, followed their relatives to battle, and fought for or against the Koran as bravely as the men—nay, more than once it was the valour of the Arab women that retrieved the fortunes of the day. ”

“ The Arab women are not black, there are even some exceedingly fair. They are more corpulent than the men, but are not much esteemed.-- The Abyssinian girls, who are bought for money, are greatly preferred; among other reasons, because their time of bearing children is longer; few Arabian women have children after the age of twenty. ”

“ By the time that the fire has expired the scenting process is completed, and both her person and robe are redolent of incense, with which they are so thoroughly impregnated that I have frequently smelt a party of women strongly at full a hundred yards' distance, when the wind has been blowing from their direction.
The Arab women do not indulge in fashions. Strictly conservative in their manners and customs, they never imitate, but they simply vie with each other in the superlativeness of their own style ”

“ Although the Arab race is considered a strong one, we find among the women every ill to which their flesh is heir, unrelieved and oftentimes even aggravated by their foolish native treatment. A [Pg 143] mother's heart cannot help but ache as she hears the Arab mother tell of the loss of two, three, four, or more of her children, the sacrifice perhaps to her own ignorance. The physical need of the Arab women is great and we pray that it may soon appeal to some whose medical training fits them to administer to this need in all parts of Arabia. ”

“ It very often happens, too, that an Arab is sincerely attached to a wife possessed, even in the best portion of her age, of few charms, and that the lasting favourite among two or more wives is not the most handsome. ”

“ There is no divorce court among the Arabs. They are not sufficiently advanced in civilization to accept a pecuniary fine as the price of a wife's dishonor; but a stroke of the husband's sword or a stab with the knife is generally the ready remedy for infidelity. Although strict Mahometans, the women are never veiled; neither do they adopt the excessive reserve assumed by the Turks and Egyptians. The Arab women are generally idle, and one of the conditions of accepting a suitor is that a female slave is to be provided for the special use of the wife. ”

“ I have been striving to show that there is a crying need for work among the Arab women and that there are ample opportunities for service. I appeal to the women of the church whose sympathies have so long gone out to heathen women everywhere, not to have less sympathy for them, but to include Mohammedan Arabia and her womanhood more and more in their love, their gifts, and their prayers. ”

“ Will you not pray that they may learn to value the Pearl of Great Price?
A visit any morning in the week to the dispensary at Bahrein, would soon convince you that here too the Arab world is slowly but surely turning downside up. Women learn to their delight that they have equal right to sympathy with men, and they need not wait until the men are helped first. The Arabs are very ignorant of medicine and their remedies are either foolish or cruel. ”

“ Ignorance, superstition, and sensuality are the characteristics which impress themselves most strongly at first upon one who visits the Arab harem, but there are those, too, among the women who are really attractive. It is a dark picture, and we do not urge the need of more workers because the fields are white to harvest. We ask that more offer themselves and be sent soon, rather, that, after they have learned the difficult language, they may be able to begin to prepare the ground for seed-sowing. ”

“ The sombre, tyrannical master and husband, the infantile and enslaved wife,—that is our general impression of the Oriental ménage. Yet even Arab wives are not dumb animals, and all men that are born of women are born to be henpecked. ”

“ Arabian poetry is full of a chivalrous reverence for women. Allowing for difference of language and [Pg xvi] the varieties of human nature, it is much more reverent than a great deal of the poetry of our own country to-day. In the old days, says an ancient writer, the true Arab had but one love, and her he loved till death. The Bedawy or Arab of the desert, though he was not above a certain amount of gallantry of a romantic and exciting order, regarded women as divinities to be worshipped, not as chattels to possess. ”

“ She writes on the condition of 163woman among the Arabs, and refutes an ancient Arab slander against women that they are cowardly and avaricious, because they will not fight, and carefully hoard the household stores. ”

“ Subsequent to this, rich men would buy the lives of girls devoted to inhumation, and Sa Saah thus rescued many, in one case giving two milch camels to buy the life of a new-born girl, and he was styled "the Reviver of the Maidens buried alive."
The following Arabic Proverbs having reference to women and girls will illustrate the ancient Arab ideas with regard to their character and position, better than volumes of historic discourse:
"Obedience to women will have to be repented of." ”

“ Among the desert tribes the women of all classes of society frequently have their faces unveiled; but, as they approach the great trade-routes and the cities, they closely enwrap the face so that only a pair of glittering black eyes peep out. Without regard to class distinctions or age all Arab women are passionately fond of jewelry of all kinds, finger-rings, anklets, bracelets, chains, and brooches. ”

“ A rosy blush overspreads the center of each cheek; and a mole is considered an additional charm. The Arabs, indeed, are particularly extravagant in their admiration of this natural beauty spot, which, according to its place, is compared to a drop of ambergris upon a dish of alabaster or upon the surface of a ruby. The eyes of the Arab beauty are intensely black, [132] large, and long, of the form of an almond: they are full of brilliancy ”