144 
CIRCASSIANS. 
the purity, and illustrious names, of his descent. When the 
first child of the marriage is born, the father of the bride pays 
up the residue of her fortune to the husband ; presenting her, at 
the same auspicious moment, with the distinguishing badges of 
a married woman, (never put on with this tribe, until offspring 
is the fruit of union,) which honourable marks are, a long white 
veil, over a sort of red coif; all the rest of the dress being 
white also. Indeed, white is universal with the women, married 
and single ; but the men always wear colours. The wife has the 
care of her husband’s arms and armour; and she is so habitually 
anxious he should not disgrace them, that if she have the most 
distant idea he has used them with less bravery, in any particular 
action, than his brethren, she never ceases assailing him with re¬ 
proach and derision, till he washes away the stain of imputed 
cowardice, either in the blood of his enemies or his own. At 
present, the professed religion of these people is Mahometan ; 
but this sort of female heroism, speaks more like the high mind 
of a Spartan virgin, or a Roman matron, than one of the soul¬ 
less daughters of the Arabian prophet. Formerly, the Christian 
faith had made some progress amongst them, but not a vestige 
of its ordinances is now to be found. Hospitality, however, is 
an eminent virtue with the tribe of the true Circassians ; and it 
is a no inconsequential one, in these remote regions of savage 
men, and more savage hostility. One of the courtesies pe¬ 
culiarly reserved by this tribe, to do honour to strangers, I have 
already mentioned ; that of admitting them to the sacredness of 
their domestic hearths : but this sort of welcome goes still far¬ 
ther, and even to a preposterous length (to say the least of it) 
amongst other tribes of the Caucasus, and particularly that of 
the Kisty. When a traveller arrives at one of their abodes, the 
