“Fashion is as much regarded by the Musulmāne ladies as by the English; they will not do this or that, because it is not the fashion.
“It is general amongst the higher and the middle classes of females in Hindostān to be able to read the Kuran in Arabic (it is not allowed to be translated), and the Commentary in Persian.
“The ladies are very fond of eating fresh whole roasted coffee. When a number of women are sitting on the ground, all eating the dry roasted coffee, the noise puts me in mind of a flock of sheep at the gram trough.
“The most correct hour for dinner is eleven or twelve at night: they smoke their hooqŭs all through the night, and sleep during the day.
“Nothing can exceed the quarrels that go on in the zenāna, or the complaints the begams make against each other. A common complaint is ‘Such an one has been practising witchcraft against me.’ If the husband make a present to one wife, even if it be only a basket of mangoes, he must make the same exactly to all the other wives to keep the peace. A wife, when in a rage with her husband, if on account of jealousy, often says, ‘I wish I were married to a grass-cutter,’ i.e. because a grass-cutter is so poor he can only afford to have one wife.
THE GRASS-CUTTER AND GRAM-GRINDER.
فاني پارکس
“My having been married some thirty or forty years, and never having taken another wife, surprises the Musulmāns very much, and the ladies all look upon me as a pattern: they do not admire a system of having three or four rivals, however well pleased the gentlemen may be with the custom.”
Colonel Gardner admired the game of “La Grace.” I requested him to take a set of sticks and hoops for the ladies of his zenāna: he told me afterwards they never took any pleasure in the game, because it was not the dastūr, the custom.