13â VOYAGE TO SENEGAL. 
familiarized with wickedness, and are instructed to commit a 
crime witli as much pleasure as they would do a good action. 
A plurality of wives being permitted amongst the Moors, a hut 
is seldom seen v 'ith less than eight or ten children. The women 
live together under the same tent, and are witnesses of the partial 
attachment of the husband^, without betraying any marks of 
jealousy. 
The tent destined to receive a new married couple is orna- 
mented with a little white flag, and the bridegroom has a basd 
round his forehead of the same colour ; and whether he be 
young or old, or be married for the first or sixth time, he is air 
ways decorated with the symbol of virginity. 
On the day of the ceremony the bridegroom causes a camel 
to be killed, for the purpose of regaling the guests. The bride^, 
with the women and young girls of her acquaintance, dance all 
day round a kettle-drum, and their motions are of a most in- 
decent kind. They dance singly, and one after the other. She 
who begins the performance stretches out her neck, and makes 
the most shocking grimaces, which are repeated by the specta- 
tors with astonishing precision. They beat time with their 
hands ; and at length all the company put themselves in motion. 
The day after the wedding the bride , is separated from her 
husband, and her friends wash her from head to foot ; they after- 
wards comb her^ plait her hair, redden her nails, and clothe her 
in a new drapery. She then pays visits through the camp, and 
in the evenrng is taken back to her spouse. 
The Moors are extremely fond of their women and children, 
by whom they in return are tenderly loved. It is difficult to re- 
concile these sentiments of affection with the obdurate and 
barbarous conduct which they display in their families. For 
the slightest fault the offender is corrected ^yith a revolting degree 
of severity ; and the girls are always ill used, as they are in- 
different both to the father and to the mother. 
Nothing can exceed the joy of the parents on the birth of a 
son. 1 he mother has neither doctor nor widwife to assist her ; 
and she is most frequently alone and extended on the sand at the 
time of her accouchement. She immediately lays down her in- 
fant, takes some milk to refresh herself, and then goes to bed 
for the night. The mother who gives birth to a son, in order to 
testify her joy, blackens her face for forty days. On the birth 
of a daughter, she only daubs it half over, and keeps it «so no 
longer than twenty days. A woman so disguised is a horrid and 
disgusthîg spectacle. 
It is difficult to form an idea of the pride and ignorance of th^ 
Moors ; they think themselves the finegt people in the world^ 
