Till^E ATlABJA-Tf^S. 
121 
i^a^s, tfo ascertain ishat ^tlieir AV-ife« -virginity is unspotted ; and if thfe 
contJi’ary 'proves to be the ^fact, they ‘either require a compensation in 
money from her father, or return Ijer lupon^lds hands. 
The hospitality of the Arabs is almost proverbial ; they are also 
civil to strangers, and v^ere not, when the Danish travellers visited 
their country, inclined to look upon Christians with that abhorrence 
wdiich characterizes so many of the followers of Mahomet. They d id 
not seem anxious to make proselytes. The Arabs have been accused 
of being' crafty and revengeful : the former ^charge does not at all 
apply to that part of the nation of which we are now speaking ; the 
latter does to a certain extent, since they are sometimes provoked by 
very gross insults to commit murder, and even to revenge themselvet 
on the relations of the offender ; but it -must be remembered, that 
the law of retaliation is prescribed by the Koran, and that a dispo- 
sition to revenge is therefore almost enjoined on Mussulmans. 
The dress of the Arabs is very simple ; large white trowsers, a blire 
and white striped shirt with very wide sleeves, a leathern girdle, a 
short jacket without sleeves, a«apot thrown over the shoulders, and 
a turban, consisting of a cap with a shawl twisted round it, together 
with a pair of slippers, constitute the w'hole of their attire. A short 
crooked knife or dagger is stuck into their girdle, and it is there that 
the poor carry their purses, smoking utensils, &c. A coarse shirt 
banging down to the knees, and girded round the loins, is all the 
clothing the labourers W'ear. The women’s dress is much like that of 
the men, but nose and ear-rings, together W'ith bracelets and rings 
round their ankles, are worn only by them. They also stain their nails 
red with benna, Lawsonia inermis, and their eye-lids with stibium. 
This nation is divided into two distinct classes of men, who differ 
materially in their habits and manners ; the inhabitants of the towns, and 
those of the desart : the latter are always encamped, and continually 
changing their place of abode ; the former, settled in cities and 
villages, are those of whom we now intend to speak. Their character 
appeared in a very favourable light to the Danish travellers, in 1762 
and 1763, but it may be feared that the wars in which the Wahhabis 
have involved most parts of Arabia, in these latter times, have bad a 
mischievous effect upon the habits of that people. The traders and 
public officers in the city, are indeed, often crafty and fraudulent, 
and sometimes 'Oppressive and rapacious, but the inhabitants of the 
villages are simple, inoffensive, and industrious; and surprisingly free 
from that fanaticism which is the genuine offspring of the Koran. 
They are often much oppressed by the exactions of tbeir rulers^ fat 
the imperfections of Mahomet’s system pervade every Mussulman 
government, and are felt under the unostentatious courts of Yemen, 
as well as under the splendid ones of Constantinople or Delhi. 
The education of the Arabs, as Niebuhr observes, (Besch. v. Arab> 
p. 27,) is so different from ours, that it must produce a vast difference 
of hebrts and character. Their children are removed from the harem, 
as we have before remarked, when they are five or six years old^ 
and from that lime are accustomed to sit for hours together with their 
fathers, Faniiliar intercourse with the other sex, and such amuses 
ments as music and dancing, are also considered as unlawful by the 
Q 
