I had an example of what instinct will do in the fear of being seen by some one outside of the family circle. Mme. Naidu and I called upon a Mohammedan lady who was strictly “purdah.” We were taken into a drawing-room furnished in European fashion, where the father-in-law of our hostess was chatting with another gentleman. The stranger left immediately, but the father-in-law remained to talk with me while Mme. Naidu went in search of the mistress of the house. She returned soon, and said to the man, “You must leave,” and after his departure the lady entered. When she sat down she noticed that one of the blinds of the window was open, and she drew her sari across her face and spoke to Mme. Naidu, who went to the window and closed the blind. Even that did not satisfy her, and a servant was called, who saw that all the windows were securely closed and that no one could possibly look into the room from the outside. It seemed a useless precaution to me, as the windows opened on to a garden, and no one could pass unless some member of the household. She laughed apologetically and said: “I know what you think, but I cannot sit here with any degree of comfort if I think some one, a servant or one of my husband’s guests, might pass by. It is instinct; my mother and my mother’s mother were ‘purdah’ women, and it is in the blood.”
She asked us to come to her rooms and look at some new clothing. Her rooms were big and rather bare, as are most rooms in this hot country, but the furniture was all European. Bed, dressing-table, and chairs all looked as if made in England or France. She had a servant bring her pan-box. This giving of pan is the first thing offered to a guest on arrival and the last thing on going away. Her pan-box was of silver, about nine inches wide by twelve long. It had a shallow tray in the top, in which was kept in tiny compartments the betel-nut and spices. In the bottom of the box, covered with a damp cloth, were the leaves. The hostess takes a leaf, covers it with a thin layer of lime, and with a pair of scissors breaks a betel-nut into small pieces, puts it with half a dozen different spices into the leaf, folds it up, sticking a clove through the leaf as a fastener, and hands it to the guest. The guest removes the clove and places the leaf in the mouth, where it makes a huge bunch on the side of the face until it is slowly masticated. It gives forth a juice which colours the inside of the mouth and the teeth a dark red, but not permanently, as it rinses quite easily. The pan has a spicy taste, and leaves the mouth feeling deliciously clean, I presume owing to the lime in it. Many of the great houses have a servant or slave whose only duty is to make pan for the inmates of the zenana. One such servant said she made five hundred a day and her wrist became quite lame from time to time caused by cutting the betel-nut.
Our hostess had a box of clothing put in front of her on the floor, and she showed us a beautiful collection of saris of woven gold cloth made in Benares, long tunics of embroidered chiffon-like gauze, and trousers of heavy gold and silver goods, almost like tapestry.
I asked them to tell me the duties of a high-class lady of Hyderabad. Mme. Naidu laughed and said—
“About eight o’clock in the morning my lady yawns, and a slave-girl will say, ‘Will not the Begum rise?’ and the Begum will slowly get out of bed and allow her slave to brush her teeth with powdered charcoal and wash her face and hands. Then she would sit down upon a mat and have her hair dressed, while other slaves came in with articles of dress or of the toilet. Soon the other women of the household would join her, and they would chew betel-nut and talk and gossip until about ten o’clock, when a large tray would be brought in with breakfast, consisting of rice and curry and sweets. After breakfast, more friends or relatives come in, and the sewing women and higher servants, and they all talk and laugh together. In the afternoon the silk merchants may send their wares or the jewellers their bracelets and rings and precious stones, which are brought into the zenana by women. These shopwomen are great gossips, and tell all the news from other zenanas—who is engaged and who married and what presents were given, etc. The women shop and haggle, and perhaps buy and perhaps do not, and by the time the merchants leave it is time to eat again. In the evening the husband or the sons visit the women’s quarters and brings the Begum the news of the world of men outside, and then it is time to sleep again.”
A great many women—nearly all Indian women, in fact—attend personally to their households. For instance, I went with one of my friends, who belonged to a very rich and powerful family, to call upon her mother, and found her and her daughter-in-law sitting in the courtyard preparing the vegetables for dinner. All ladies know how to cook, and think it no disgrace to prepare the dinner with their own hands. If a guest is to be especially honoured, the mother or wife will prepare the meal for him. In a Hindu community, where the food must be cooked by a person of their own or a higher caste, where no one of a lower caste is even allowed to look into the kitchen, it might cause great annoyance if the women of the household did not know how to cook, as even in India the mistress has the servant question with which to contend from time to time.
In these old families in Hyderabad there are a great many people under the one roof. The patriarchal family life prevails—that is, the sons bring their wives to their father’s home, and a large house shelters many families. The mother is the head of the women’s quarters and her word is law. Innumerable servants and poor relations are ever present, and to our Western eyes disorder and chaos seem to reign. There are some old families in this city that keep up the state of princes or petty kings. There is one great lady who is surrounded by a bodyguard of amazons, women dressed as soldiers, who salute and present arms with military precision when her courtyard is entered by a visitor.
We went from the house of our young hostess, loaded down with pan and fruit, to the home of a colonel in the Nizam’s bodyguard. His wife is “purdah,” but his daughter is allowed to be seen in public. In the drawing-room was a man tuning the piano, and Mme. Naidu said to the daughter, “Your mother cannot come here. There is a man.” The daughter replied: “Oh, it is all right, he is blind.” The mother had travelled extensively in Europe, Egypt, and Turkey. While abroad she went about freely as any European, only becoming the secluded Indian wife while in her own country. Her daughter was to be married and she showed me the clothes for the trousseau. There were about fifty complete outfits, made of gorgeous Benares cloth, heavy with gold. This clothing lasts a lifetime, and is handed down from daughter to daughter, as styles do not radically change. The mother told me that the custom of giving so much clothing is dying out, and money is given instead, allowing the daughter to buy from time to time, according to her fancy.
While we were talking the husband came in. He was dressed in English riding clothes, and was a very up-to-date man-of-the-world. The moment he entered, the mother and daughter, who up to this time had been chatting affably and freely, became silent. They virtually did not speak a word while he was in the room, but became at once true Indian women, silent before that superior being—the man.