POMPEIAN TOKENS.
Marc Monnier, in his “Wonders of Pompeii,” says that the latest excavations have revealed the existence of hanging covered balconies, long exterior corridors, pierced with casements frequently depicted in the paintings. There the fair Pompeian could have taken her station in order to participate in the life outside. The good housewife of those times, like her counterpart in our day, could there have held out her basket to the street-merchant who went wandering about with his portable shop; and more than one handsome girl may at the same post have carried her fingers to her lips, there to cull (the ancient custom) the kiss that she flung to the young Pompeian concealed down yonder in the corner of the wall. Thus re-peopled, the old-time street, narrow as it is, was gayer than our own thoroughfares; and the brightly-painted houses, the variegated walls, the monuments, and the fountains gave vivid animation to a picture too dazzling for our gaze.
ARABIAN SALUTATION.
Eastern salutations take up considerable time. When an Arab meets a friend, he begins, while yet some distance from him, to make gestures expressive of his very great satisfaction in seeing him. When he comes up to him, he grasps him by the right hand, and then brings back his own hand to his lips, in token of respect. He next proceeds to place his hand gently under the long beard of the other, and honors it with an affectionate kiss. He inquires particularly, again and again, concerning his health and the health of his family, and repeats, over and over, the best wishes for his prosperity, giving thanks to God that he is permitted once more to behold his face. All this round of gestures and words is, of course, gone over by the friend too, with like formality. But they are not generally satisfied with a single exchange of this sort: they sometimes repeat as often as ten times the whole tiresome ceremony, with little or no variation.
Some such tedious modes of salutation were common, also, of old; so that a man might suffer very material delay in travelling if he chanced to meet several acquaintances and should undertake to salute each according to the custom of the country. On this account, when Elisha sent his servant Gehazi in great haste to the Shunammite’s house, he said to him, “If thou meet any man, salute him not; and if any salute thee, answer him not again.” (2 Kings iv. 29.) So, when our Lord sent forth his seventy disciples, among other instructions, he bade them “salute no man by the way;” meaning that their work was too important to allow such a waste of time in the exchange of mere unmeaning ceremonies. (Luke x. 4.)
THE OLD ROMAN CODE.
This code defined with great accuracy the nature, limits, and conditions of the right of kissing, although we do not find that property of this nature holds a place among the incorporeal hereditaments of our laws. The Romans were very strict, and only near blood-relations might kiss the women of the family at all. The kiss had all the virtue of a bond granted as a seal to the ceremony of betrothing, in consequence of the violence done to the modesty of the lady by a kiss!