Woman’s life in the harem of the Mohammedan is but little better. The code of morals is a very loose one, and the degradation of women beyond our pen to describe. The women of the harems are divided into three classes: The Rhadines, or legitimate wives. The Ikbals, or favorites, out of whose ranks the Rhadines are chosen, and Ghienzdes or “women who are pleasing to the eye of their lord,” and who have the chance to advance to the rank of Ikbals. If the wife of a Turkoman asks his permission to go, and he says, “go,” without adding, “come back,” they are divorced. If he becomes dissatisfied with the most trifling acts of his wife, and tears the veil from her face, that constitutes a divorce. In the streets, if a husband meets one of his numerous wives, he never recognizes her, or ever introduces her to a male friend. A Mohammedan never inquires after the female portion of the household of his friend. The system is full of cruelty and despotism. In Mohammedan countries women suffer from the low opinion held of them by men. The prophet said: “I stood at the gates of hell, and lo! most of its inhabitants were women!” And yet, strange to say, while the religion of Islam denies that woman has a soul, it teaches a sensual paradise. In fact, in all nations where the Bible is unknown, woman is the slave of man’s lust. She is a drudge or a toy, whose reign is as short-lived as her personal charms. She may not be trusted out of sight of her guardians, though the masculine members of the family are anything but choice in their associations. Indeed, in some countries a woman can not visit even her own mother without being carried in a palanquin or guarded by slaves. One of the strangest, saddest sights we ever saw was at Mersina, in the Levant. Passing a field one day there were six native women (noble in form and of beautiful olive complexion) hoeing what looked to be cucumbers, while a step or two in their rear stood a negro, a full-blooded Nubian, with a long stick, like an ox-goad, in his hand, evidently their master. In Ceylon, when it was proposed by a missionary to teach women to read, one native said to another, “What do you think that man is talking about? He wants to teach the women to read! He’ll be wanting to teach the cows next!” Such is the disrespect in which women are held by heathen people. Five words describe the biography of women in all lands where the Bible is not known: Unwelcomed at birth; untaught in childhood; uncherished in widowhood; unprotected in old age; unlamented when dead. Such, in brief, is the treatment of womanhood in lands where the Bible is a sealed book, and truly, in comparison with their heathen sisters, women living under the blessed teachings of Christianity are “clothed in white raiment.”