The history of the condition of women in various ages and nations : $b Vol. 1 (of 2), Comprising the women of Asia and AfricaChild, Lydia Maria
History
The history of the condition of women in various ages and nations : $b Vol. 1 (of 2), Comprising the women of Asia and Africa
Child, Lydia Maria
Women -- History; Women -- Social conditions
In Congo, people of rank are often carried by slaves in a sort of
hammock swung upon poles, which is frequently protected from the sun by
an awning thrown over it. Women in all parts of Africa are often seen
riding on asses or oxen. They guide the latter by means of a string
passed through a ring in the nose; and they sometimes manage to make
these quiet beasts curvet and caper.
Apes, baboons, and monkeys, are exceedingly numerous in Africa. A woman
of the country of Galam, who was carrying some milk and millet to sell
in a neighboring village, was attacked by a troop of apes from three
to four feet high. They threw stones at her, and holding her fast,
beat her with sticks, until she dropped the vessel she was carrying.
She returned home much bruised, and the men formed a hunting party,
which killed ten of the savage animals, and wounded several others; not
however without getting sundry bites and bruises during the encounter.
The Hottentot race seem to be distinct from all other people, and
surpassing all others, even the Calmucks, in ugliness. The eyes are
long, narrow, and distant from each other; the eyelids do not form an
angle at the extremity near the nose, but are formed in a manner very
similar to the Chinese; their cheek bones are very high and prominent,
and form nearly a triangle with the narrow pointed chin; the complexion
is yellowish brown, like an autumn leaf; the hair grows in small tufts
at certain distances from each other; when kept short, the head looks
like a hard shoe-brush, but when suffered to grow, it hangs in the neck
in a sort of hard twisted fringe. An old Hottentot woman is said to be
a most uncouth and laughable figure; some parts of the body being very
lank, and others jutting out in huge protuberances of loose flesh. The
letter S gives the best idea of the curvature of their forms. The habit
of throwing the breast over the shoulder, in order to enable infants
to nurse while swinging at their backs, contributes not a little to
increase their deformity. Yet some of the women, when very young,
are said to be perfect models of beauty in the female form. Every
joint and limb is well turned and proportioned, and the hands and feet
are remarkably small and delicate, though they never wear shoes, or
sandals. Their charms, however, endure but a very short time. They are
old at thirty; and long before that time, their shape assumes those
strange and disgusting disproportions, for which it seems difficult to
account.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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