Nothing more charming could be devised than the dress peculiar to the female followers of Zoroaster. Until she marries the Parsee girl wears wide trousers fashioned from brilliantly-hued silk or satin, and the hems of the legs are adorned with bands of embroidery in quaint designs of birds and beasts worked in the most gorgeous tints. Her inner garment is a long sleeved jacket of white muslin, over which comes the sadra, or loose, square tunic lacking sleeves, and distinguished by the magnificence of its embroideries. The hair, divided in the centre and hanging down behind, is crowned by a little circular cap of black velvet covered with gold and silver embroidery and studded with seed pearls, while on the feet are gaily-embroidered slippers. Etiquette decrees that before her wedding the Parsee woman must submit to having her head shaved, a martyrdom which is responsible for the nun-like band of white material drawn low on the forehead. She continues to wear the trousers, but exchanges the decorative sadra for an even more superb sari. This voluminous drapery is of gold-bordered muslin in warm weather, at other seasons a long, straight piece of silk or satin wondrously coloured and exquisitely embroidered. It is wound round and round the body, outlining it tightly at the back, and hanging in straight folds in front, each evolution being accomplished in pleats, to attain sufficient fulness; and finally the end is drawn over the head, concealing one ear and leaving the other exposed, a practice which explains the single earring worn by Parsee women. In warm weather the sari is of muslin and boasts a wide gold border. The principal item in the wardrobe of the Hindu woman is likewise the sari, which she arranges as the Parsee does hers. The texture varies according to the means of the wearer. The poor employ cotton, but they invariably endeavour to have an ornamental border of some kind. The simply-made skirt reaches to the ankles, and the chuli, a short-sleeved jacket of diminutive proportions, terminates immediately below the bust, leaving the middle of the figure uncovered excepting for the sari. The hair is twisted in a heavy coil low down on the nape of the neck, a style rendered necessary by the custom of carrying weights on the head. The poor Hindu, distrustful of other securities, invests such worldly wealth as he possesses in jewellery for his wife, who appears laden with bracelets, of painted wood or coloured glass. As many as twelve rings jingle from the much-pierced rim of either ear, while an ornament, frequently of preposterous size, is affixed to one nostril, and in addition there are anklets, necklaces, and toe and finger rings.