Of the social relations at Tozar, Mr Davis says:—“My first impression, on visiting several families, was such as to induce me to believe that greater domestic happiness prevailed here than in the Mohammedan cities on the coast. The females are not kept in distinct and separate apartments, nor do they even cover their faces when in the presence of strangers, but appear perfectly free, and seem exceedingly affable.” A closer examination, however, sufficed to show that the regulations of Mohammedanism in regard to females produced very much the same results here as elsewhere. Marriage is usually contracted very early,—so that it is no uncommon thing to see boys of thirteen and fourteen in possession of wives of eleven or twelve, or even younger; and the result, here as elsewhere, is, that girls of twelve look as old as European females do at twenty, and at thirty they are almost fit to be placed on the retired list. Indeed, as Colonel Dow in his _Ferishta_ says, polygamy in the East is founded very much on natural causes, as, owing to early marriages, and the effects of the climate, a man there keeps his vigour long enough to see two or three wives bloom and fade in succession. Moslems consider it wrong, and even sinful, if a man has reached his twentieth year without marrying. The young couple are joined together on the good faith of their parents or relations; for they are not permitted to see each other before the nuptial night. Certain persons, however,—generally old women, relatives of the parties—are sent from the man, who examine the lady, and bring him back a report of her bodily accomplishments. If the man finds himself disappointed, he has a right to send her back to her parents, without restoring to her the portion that was promised her,—or rather, the price that was to be paid for her, as the wife is bought by the husband. The young damsels, it must be allowed, take all pains to avoid so lamentable a catastrophe. “Excessive obesity,” says Mr Davis, “is considered the perfection of female beauty among the Mohammedans on the coast; hence a young woman, after she is betrothed, receives gold or silver shackles upon her hands and wrists, and is fed so long till these are filled up. A kind of seed called _drough_, and their national dish _coscoso_, are used for the purpose. The young lady is literally crammed, and some actually die under the spoon.”