NOTE 19.--_On the opinions of the Arabs respecting Female Beauty._ The reader should have some idea of the qualifications or charms which the Arabs in general consider requisite to the perfection of female beauty; for erroneous fancies on this subject would much detract from the interest of the present work. He must not imagine that excessive fatness is one of these characteristics; though it is said to be esteemed a chief essential to beauty throughout the greater part of Northern Africa: on the contrary, the maiden whose loveliness inspires the most impassioned expressions in Arabic poetry and prose is celebrated for her slender figure: she is like the cane among plants, and is elegant as a twig of the oriental willow.[47] Her face is like the full moon, presenting the strongest contrast to the colour of her hair, which (to preserve the nature of the simile just employed,) is of the deepest hue of night, and descends to the middle of her back. A rosy blush overspreads the centre of each cheek; and a mole is considered an additional charm. The Arabs, indeed, are particularly extravagant in their admiration of this natural beauty-spot; which, according to its place, is compared to a globule of ambergris upon a dish of alabaster or upon the surface of a ruby.[48] The eyes of the Arab beauty are intensely black, large, and long; of the form of an almond: they are full of brilliancy; but this is softened by a lid slightly depressed, and by long silken lashes, giving a tender and languid expression, which is full of enchantment, and scarcely to be improved by the adventitious aid of the black border of koḥl; for this the lovely maiden adds rather for the sake of fashion than necessity; having, what the Arabs term, natural koḥl. The eyebrows are thin and arched; the forehead is wide, and fair as ivory; the nose, straight; the mouth, small; the lips are of a brilliant red; and the teeth, "like pearls set in coral." The forms of the bosom are compared to two pomegranates; the waist is slender; the hips are wide and large; the feet and hands, small; the fingers, tapering, and their extremities dyed with the deep orange-red tint imparted by the leaves of the ḥennà.[49] The person in whom these charms are combined exhibits a lively image of "the rosy-fingered Aurora:" her lover knows neither night nor sleep in her presence, and the constellations of heaven are no longer seen by him when she approaches. The most bewitching age is between fourteen and seventeen years; for then the forms of womanhood are generally developed in their greatest beauty; but many a maiden in her twelfth year possesses charms sufficient to fascinate every youth or man who beholds her.