[111] “Sons of the soil,” from cher, earth, and mukkul, children. In the masculine singular the word is chermun (fem. chermee), plural, chermur.
[112] The price of a slave varied from 3l. to 8l.
[113] In the Calicut district, half the children belonged to the mother, or rather to her proprietor, and the other half to the father’s master; the odd number was the property of the former. When both parents belonged to one owner, he of course claimed all the offspring.
[114] Generally speaking, the slaves in the maritime districts were in better condition, and far superior in bodily and mental development to their brethren in the interior.
[115] There are three different derivations of this word. Some deduce it from the pure Hindostani and corrupted Sanscrit word ma (a mother), and the Tamul pilla (a son), “sons of their mothers,” the male progenitor being unknown. Others suppose it to be a compound of mukkul (a daughter) and pilla (a son), “a daughter’s son,” also an allusion to their origin. The third is a rather fanciful derivation from Mokhai-pilla “sons of, or emigrants from, Mocha,” in Arabia.
[116] This description applies exclusively to the higher orders; the labouring classes are dark and ill-favoured.
[117] The genuine Arab, especially in Yemen and Tehamah, is, generally speaking, a Kusaj, or scant-bearded man; and his envy when regarding the flowing honours of a Persian chin, is only equalled by the lasting regret with which he laments his own deficiency in that semi-religious appurtenance to the human face.
[118] The practice of the Prophet, whom every good Moslem is bound to imitate, even in the most trivial and every-day occasions.
[119] The Æschynomene paludosa, a wood of porous texture, which swells when water is poured upon it. Lead is sometimes used to distend the flap of the ear by its weight.
[120] A name, by no means complimentary, applied to all who are not Moslems.