CH. XXV.] The Social Position of Women. 2 1 5 



In mental qualities the women of the desert are 

 far below the men, their rano-e of ideas bcinor ex- 

 tremely limited. Some few of them, however, get 

 real influence over their husbands, and even throuo-h 

 them over their tribes. In more than one Sheykh's 

 tent, it is in the woman's half of it that tlic politics 

 of the tribe are settled. 



