tightly the whole hand. If it is a priest, emeer, or high officer of any kind, the back of the hand must be kissed. This is strictly enforced, and the neglect or refusal is a great of fense. The clergy are particularly stringent in claiming this mark of respect. The more common mode of salutation is to raise the hand to the breast, or to the lips and forehead. Friends who have been long separated embrace, and kiss either one or both cheeks, and generally each shoulder. This kissing among men strikes us as very odd, but there are numberless references to it in the Bible. The "brethren" are often enjoined by the apostles to salute one another with the kiss of brotherly love and holy charity. The women kiss each other on all occasions, and ad nauseam; but the different sexes are very reserved in their mutual salutations, and do not even touch each other's hands.

Arab ladies, particularly the married, are extravagantly fond of silver and gold ornaments; and they have an endless variety of chains, bracelets, anklets, necklaces, and rings. It is also quite common to see thousands of piastres, in various coins, around the forehead, suspended from the neck,

tached to the back of the head-dress, which spreads over the shoulders, and falls down to the waist. These jewels can not be taken for the husband's debts. A poor man often

BRACELETS.

еха

NECKLACE.

EAR-DROPS.

goes to prison for a few piastres, while thousands glitter and jingle on the dress of his wife. This is very provoking to the creditor, who knows that his money has been purposely attached to these inviolable ornaments, so that he may not get hold of it. Married women are much more eager after ornaments than unmarried. The former also adorn themselves more elaborately, and endeavor to add to their beauty by wearing gay flowers, by painting their cheeks, putting kahl around their eyes, and arching their eyebrows with the same, and by staining their hands and feet with henna. It is considered indelicate for the unmarried thus to deck themselves, and conveys an impression highly injurious to the girl's moral character. They do not even wash their faces, or at least not openly. It is one of the strange anomalies of Oriental society that the tailors make the ladies' dresses; but, as their garments are infinitely large, and never designed to fit, there is no measuring needed, nor trying on of garments under the hand and eye of the tailor. This, in some degree, removes

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the objections on the score of delicacy, but not on that of propriety and economy.

Oriental women are never regarded or treated as equals by the men. This is seen on all occasions; and it requires some firmness to secure to our own ladies proper respect, especially from men-servants. They pronounce women to be weak and inferior in the most absolute terms, and in accordance with this idea is their deportment toward them. Even in polite company the gentlemen must be served first. So the husband and brothers sit down and eat, and the wife, mother, and sisters wait and take what is left. If the husband or the brothers accompany their female relatives any where, they walk before, and the women follow at a respectful distance. It is very common to see small boys lord it over both mother and sisters in a most insolent manner, and they are encouraged to do so by the father. The evils resulting from this are incalculable. The men, however, attempt to justify their treatment of the women by the tyrant's plea of necessity. They are obliged to govern the wives with the utmost strictness, or they would not only ruin their husbands, but themselves also. Hence they literally use the rod upon them, especially when they have, or imagine they have, cause to doubt the wife's fidelity. Instances are not rare in which the husband kills the wife outright for this cause, and no legal notice is taken of the murder; and, in general, the man relies on fear to keep the wife in subjection, and to restrain her from vice. She is confined closely, watched with jealousy, and every thing valuable is kept under lock and key; necessarily so, they say, for the wife will not hesitate to rob her husband if she gets an opportunity. There are many pleasing exceptions, especially among the younger Christian families. But, on the whole, the cases are rare where the husband has not, at some time or other, resorted to the lash to enforce obedience in his rebellious household. Most sensible men readily admit that this whole system is a miserable compensation to mitigate evils flowing from the very great crime of neglecting the education of females; and, during the last few years, a

change has taken place in public sentiment on this subject among the intelligent Christians in Lebanon and the cities along the coast, and a strong desire to educate the females is fast spreading among them.

Among these minor manners and matters, we are always struck with their writing materials, and their mode of using them. They do not carry ink-horns now, as the prophets and scribes of old did, but have an apparatus consisting of a metal or ebony tube for their reed pens, with a cup or bulb of the same material, attached to the upper end, for the ink.

This they thrust through the girdle, and carry with them at all times. When they are to write a letter, for example, they open the lid of the ink-bulb, draw out a long reed pen from the tube, double over the paper, and begin from the right side of the page, holding the paper in the hand, without any other support. They have a stereotyped introduction, overloaded with flowers and compliments, and richly seasoned with love, no matter to whom they are writing, friend or enemy. After this rigmarole, which, if it have any meaning, is an egregious lie, they make a formal epitome of the letter which they are to answer, repeating it, word for word, as is so often done in the Bible. They date at the bottom, but rarely mention the place; and I have often been at a loss to discover who the writer was, and where to address my reply. Young men of business in the cities are adopting our mode of dating. Nearly every body wears a