No.1.A long stick of coral.
2, 2.Small pieces of amber.
3, 3, 3.Little silver bells.
4, 4.Silver or brass wire.

In addition to these ornaments, the Fezzan woman fastens to the top of her head silken cords, on which are strung a number of silver rings, and which hang on each side pendant to her shoulder. The ears of ladies of rank are bored in two places, and in each hole is fixed a thick silver ring. In ordinary dress they wear nine or ten rings of horn or glass on each arm, four or five of which are taken off on all great occasions, to make room for a silver armillary of four inches breadth. They wear at the same time strong rings of brass or silver just above the ankle bones. The necklace consists of a silk riband, to which are fixed ten or twelve pieces of agate, and in front a round silver plate. The meaner women wear merely a string of glass beads, and curl their hair above the forehead into large ringlets, into which severally is stuffed a paste made of lavender, carraway-seeds, cloves, pepper, mastick, and laurel leaves, mixed up with oil.

The women of Fezzan generally have a great fondness for dancing and every amusement, and the wanton manners and public freedoms which, although Mahometans, they are permitted, astonishes the Mahometan traveller. They dance publicly in the open places of the town, not only in the day-time, but even after sunset. Two or three men stand together with their tambourines; the women immediately form a circle round; the men beat a tune, and those in the circle accompany it with singing and clapping of hands; a girl then advances dancing towards the drummers; the men, as she approaches near, join in the dance and press towards her; on which she makes some steps backwards, and then falls on her back with her body and limbs stiff and perfectly straight, when the women behind catch her in the fall, a few spans from the ground, and toss her in the air, whence she descends on her feet. The men then resume their station in the centre, and a second female dancer repeats the sport, which is successively engaged in by each brisk damsel of the circle.

The men of Fezzan are much addicted to drunkenness. Their beverage is the fresh juice of the date tree, called lugibi, or a drink called busa, which is prepared from the dates, and is very intoxicating. When friends assemble in the evening, the ordinary amusement is mere drinking; but sometimes a singing girl, or kadanka, is sent for: kadanka is a Soudan word, and answers to the term almé used at Cairo.

The song of these Fezzan girls is Soudanic. Their musical instrument is called rhababe: it is an excavated hemisphere, made from a shell of the gourd kind, and covered with leather; to this a long handle is fixed, on which is stretched a string of horse hairs longitudinally closed and compact as one cord, about the thickness of a quill. This is played upon with a bow. I was once of a party with Sidi Mintesser, the brother of the sultan, at a small house, some distance from the palace, when he ordered a Kadanka to be brought, and with whom he soon after withdrew. On her return to the company, she was asked with a significant smile where she had been. She immediately took up her instrument, played upon it, and sung, in the Arabian language, “Sweet is Sidi Mintesser, as the waters of the Nile, but yet sweeter is he in his embraces; how could I resist?” As a natural consequence of the great freedoms allowed to the sex in Mourzouk, there are more women of a certain description to be found in that capital, than in any other of the same extent and population; and the general character of improvidence, and consequent misery and distress, belong as fully to the frail sisterhood of this place, as of any other.

There are various sorts of venereal disorders prevalent in Fezzan; that imported from Soudan is the worst. The common lues venerea brought from Tripoly and Cairo, is called franzi, or the frank evil. For the cure of either species they use salts, and the fruit handal, (colycinth), as powerful cathartics; and the sores, if any, are at the same time washed with natron water, or dissolved soda. These remedies seldom fail, unless the disease has taken a very deep root.

The other maladies prevalent here are hæmorrhoides, no doubt greatly increased by the immoderate use of red pepper; and a fever and ague, which is particularly dangerous to foreigners. In these disorders there is no remedy whatever known or used but amulets, consisting of certain sentences, transcribed from the Koran, on a slip of paper, which the patient wears about his neck, and in bad cases is made to swallow. Phlebotomy is unknown; but blood is occasionally drawn by means of cupping. As to surgery, I heard there were people at Mourzouk who had sufficient ability to cure a simple fracture.

The houses of the Fezzans are miserably built; they are constructed with stones or bricks made of a calcareous earth mixed with clay, and dried in the sun. No other tools are used in the building but the hands of the labourer. When the walls are completely raised, the friends of the proprietor assemble, and assist him to incrust and cover them with a mortar made with a white calcareous earth. This work too is done only by the hand. The houses are all extremely low, and the light enters by the door only.

As to diet, I never knew a more abstemious people than those of Fezzan. Meat indeed is a food they can at no time abstain from when set before them; but meat is not an article of food with the people in general: to indicate a rich man, at Mourzouk, the usual expression is, “that he eats bread and meat every day.”