The country women have greater freedom and far more influence with their husbands than do the women of the harem. Polygamy among the former class is rare, and hence the women are more highly regarded than those of the city. The peasant woman is industrious, engaged in some useful employment about the house or in the field. She buys and sells and gets gain for her husband and her home, and often is highly esteemed by him; but he will not let you know it, if he can avoid doing so. In public he always assumes the attitude of superiority. If but one can ride, it is the man and the children who sit upon the beast; the woman walks along at the side, carrying a bundle on her head or a baby at her breast--sometimes jogging along with both. If Arab and wife must both walk with burdens, the man carries the lighter load. And the woman must prepare the meal at the journey's end, while her lord reposes--and smokes. Excavators in the East have frequently found Arab girls who desired work, and with their baskets they would for hours carry out the earth with endurance apparently equal to that of the men. The Arab girls, as a rule, grow up in ignorance. It is not thought worth while to educate the daughter; and, indeed, it is regarded by many as destructive of the best order of society to give woman any opportunity which may cause her to desire to usurp the power which heaven has placed in the hands of men. There is, accordingly, little enlightened housekeeping, little to stimulate a woman's mind, little opportunity here for "the hand that rocks the cradle" to move the world. Sons grow up with little respect for their mothers, for there is nothing to make it otherwise. The husband, should he wish to divorce himself from his wife, simply orders her to leave his house, and his will is law. Civil government takes no cognizance of matrimonial affairs, and religious authority allows the husband to do much as he may see fit in his own house. [Illustration 4: _AN ORIENTAL WOMAN'S PASTIME After the painting by Frederick A. Bridgman She is not a companion, but only a gilded toy, a decorative object.... Among the higher class she is still kept in strict seclusion, and her time is passed in luxurious idleness, save for the hours she employs at her embroidery or tapestry. The garden, with its heavily perfumed blossoms, pleases her; the ceaseless plash of the fountain falls musically on her ear; all her physical needs are ministered to. But everything conduces to the dreaminess of her nature, to slothful habits; her activities are fettered by the law of Mohammed. After all, her garden is but an exquisite prison._]