CHAPTER IV
PERSIAN CLOTHES
Persian boys and girls are white, almost as white as ourselves, though they generally have black hair and dark eyes. The chief difference in appearance between Tommy Jones and ‘Ali Muhammad is that Tommy wears trousers while ‘Ali Muhammad appears to wear a skirt. Tommy’s sister on the other hand wears a skirt, and ‘Ali Muhammad’s sister wears trousers.
The fact is that if ‘Ali Muhammad is a poor boy, his trousers are short and so very wide as to be practically a divided skirt. Indeed they catch like a skirt in running, so that if he wants to go fast he pulls one trouser-leg up out of the way. If he wears a coat at all, it is a long cotton one, or more probably two long cotton ones, reaching nearly to his knees and adding to the skirt-like appearance.
The sons of well-to-do men often wear frock coats with the skirts pleated all round almost like a kilt, so that in spite of their longer and narrower trousers they still have a look of wearing skirts.
‘Ali Muhammad’s girdle too, which binds his coats to him and prevents their blowing about in the wind, is more suggestive of a sash than a belt. I once saw a little boy putting on his girdle on New Year’s Day. It was a long folded scarf or shāl and he put one end round his waist while his brother took the other to the far end of the long room and drew it tight. Then my little friend turned round and round, so winding his shāl round him, gradually moving up the room as the length grew less, and he finished by tucking in the end. But whether they wear long trousers or short ones, wide trousers or narrow ones, the boys all fasten them by drawing them up with a string round the hips—braces are not the fashion.
LADIES’ OUT-DOOR AND IN-DOOR COSTUMES
As we have found that, in spite of appearances, ‘Ali Muhammad after all wears trousers, we may perhaps find that his sister, Rubabeh, wears a skirt, and so indeed she does, but it is so short as not to be very noticeable indoors, while out of doors it is completely hidden by the big baggy over-trousers, gathered in at the ankles and footed, which she wears when she goes in the street. An English missionary once suggested to a young woman that a skirt reaching to the knees would look better, but she said she was not an old woman yet. The old women generally wear quiet colours and long skirts, reaching down to the knee, but young women and girls like something more dressy. They like a nice bright-patterned skirt about a foot long, but wide enough to reach half across the room. This they draw up with a string over the white cotton trousers, and the short shirt hangs loose outside. The shirt is generally white but may be coloured, and a short coloured jacket is worn over it, varying from plain coarse cotton to velvet embroidered with gold and pearls.
The indoor chādar, or “prayer-chādar,” is often of pretty print or muslin, and when Rubabeh puts on her clean white trousers, shirt and headkerchief, with a bright frill of skirt round the waist and a pretty jacket and chādar, she makes a very bright and effective picture. But when she goes out she must put on dark over-trousers which cover everything up to the waist, and over her head, in place of the pretty prayer chādar, she must throw a large black chādar which hangs over everything, while a long strip of white cotton hangs down in front of her face with drawn thread work in front of the eyes, so that she may be able to see without being seen.