Identifier: bywatersofcartha00loriuoft (find matches)
Title: By the waters of Carthage
Year: 1906 (1900s)
Authors: Lorimer, Norma Octavia, 1864-
Subjects: Tunisia -- Description and travel
Publisher: London : Hutchinson
Contributing Library: Robarts - University of Toronto
Digitizing Sponsor: MSN

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Text Appearing Before Image:
blue and gold zouave and the gorgeous red of his wide
sash. Of course the distinguishing fez is not wanting. But
I think I ought not to go into further details about this
Achmet of the blessed smile, or that most mountainous
Jewess (although I know all about how she is fattened
for the matrimonial market on puppie's flesh and oiled
liver, and how she is kept shut up, just like a chicken
in a coop in Sicily) until I have taken you up the Rue
d'Eglise and into the bazaars.
What a man's world a Moslem city is ! Except for
those grosses Juives and a stray Bedouin or two, you
scarcely ever see, in the native quarters, a female thing
—even a girl baby. Now and then an elderly Arab
woman of the humble class crosses the square. She might
be a creature of any sex or age, for she is nothing but a
shapeless bundle of white with a piece of black where her
face ought to be. She is veiled so closely—even though
she is certain to be elderly and ugly, otherwise she would
not be allowed out—that she can only see the ground
Text Appearing After Image:
Photo Garrigues, Tunis.

TYPICAL JEWISH MARRIED WOMEN.

Chapter II 21

just in front of her feet; yet if a man passes close to her
she will hold a coloured handkerchief over her dark eyes,
which are the only part of the woman not completely
disguised by clothes. These black masques or haiks,
as they are called, are said to be made of plaited horse-
hair, but they look to me like crepon. Such a complete
disguise as this for an every-day costume ought to be
rather helpful in the case of a romance or intrigue, for
all women look exactly alike. A man might easily pass
his own wife without suspecting who she was if she held
her handkerchief before her eyes, but few men would
be brave enough to follow an Arab woman or to gaze
ardently into her passionate gleaming eyes, for the
Tunisian Arabs have always been extraordinarily fanatical
about their women and their religion. Yet the Orient,
with all this charm of mystery, does not seem to me in
the least romantic. The Moors and Arabs are mystics,
philosophers, and sensualists, but there is no Sir Lancelot
amongst them.

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