The Moors are extremely fond of their women and children, by whom they in return are tenderly loved. It is difficult to reconcile these sentiments of affection with the obdurate and barbarous conduct which they display in their families. For the slightest fault the offender is corrected with a revolting degree of severity; and the girls are always ill used, as they are indifferent both to the father and to the mother. Nothing can exceed the joy of the parents on the birth of a son. The mother has neither doctor nor midwife 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 infant, 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 disgusting spectacle. It is difficult to form an idea of the pride and ignorance of the Moors; they think themselves the finest people in the world, and suppose that the sun rises for them alone. “Contemplate that planet,” said a Moor to a Christian slave; “it is unknown in thy country: during the night you are not enlightened like us, by that orb which rules on our days and our fasts, or by those luminaries which fill the celestial arch, and indicate the hours for our prayers;—(he alluded to the stars.) You have no trees, nor camels, nor sheep, nor sand, nor goats,” continued he; “nor are your women made like ours. You do not inhabit the earth, but are born, live, and die in your houses that float on the sea.” The greatest luxury of a Moor is to see his wives and daughters richly dressed, and on them he exhibits all his opulence by ornamenting their ears, arms, and legs with rings of gold and silver. They have no knowledge of the arts and trade, though they make in a rude manner, pikes, knives, and even kettles, from the native iron which is furnished to them by the Negroes. Everything else for which they have occasion comes to them either directly or indirectly from the Europeans. They are a pastoral kind of people; and when at peace, rear great numbers of oxen, cows, sheep, goats, and horses. They make their oxen carry burdens, and cross rivers, on which occasions they ride them like horses.