There is not, therefore, the most distant suspicion in their composition that females are equal to males, or girls to boys. It is as if the members of the body should revolt, and the hands and feet proclaim themselves superior, or even equal, to the head.
The women of Turkey know very well, and gracefully submit to facts, which are stubborn things. They never think of denying that
“Women first were made for men,
Not men for them.”
There are countries where the condition of woman is indeed miserable, and where, also, they are unconscious of their own degradation, and willingly toil and drudge in the service of men; content with the slightest proofs of affection with which their lords may honor them—indeed, any concession to their woman nature is thankfully received.
To be bought and sold is a matter of course. In China, the purchased wife is suddenly transported into the family of a man, whose name even she has never heard. There she is the slave of the whole establishment. The husband may beat her with impunity, reduce her to a state of starvation, or hire her out, if he fancies to do so.
The Hindoo forces her to immolate herself on her husband’s funeral pile—after having spent a lifetime in his slavery and service.
Such barbarities are unknown in Turkey. For in no country in the world are mothers more respected, wives more tenderly cherished, and children more idolized. If, in the relative position of the sexes, men rank above women, it is because the man is considered as the vital principle, and the woman the material. Hence the man loves and cherishes the woman, who in return regards him with reverence and respect; and any deviation from these reciprocal affections, would be considered as the greatest breach of decorum.
There are certain acts of politeness which devolve altogether upon the lords of creation in the most exquisitely civilized regions of the world, which are however sometimes reluctantly performed—but, as usual, such matters are reversed in the East, where even the sun rises at a different hour. There the Efendi graciously receives a glass of water at the hands of his too happy Hanum; his pipe and his coffee are gracefully served by some fair Hebe of a wife or sister, who naturally considers herself as the helpmeet for her spouse, as did Eve, the first and fairest of woman kind.
The reluctance they feel to have their ladies appear in general society does not arise from any want of deference and respect on the part of the men, but rather from an intuitive desire to guard and protect them from public scandal.