ut of course they would not hear of such a thing. To their
minds it is only the very poor and degraded who wander about unveiled or
even drive in an open carriage, and would not all the ladies of their
acquaintance be horrified at the bare idea of their leaving their old
habits. So that all our arguments and persuasion were useless, and the
husband went on writing his papers on the need of reform in the
treatment of their women. With this lady and her daughters we one day
went to a fair for women only. We had to submit to having our carriage
covered with a very large sheet so that no eye could see through the
closed venetians, and when, after great difficulty, the lady had been
placed in the carriage we drove to the enclosure where the fair was to
be held. Right into the enclosure drove the carriage, and then the
ladies, carefully shrouded in sheets, were conducted through a narrow
gateway into a second enclosure, and there were thousands of women and
children. Not a man was to be seen anywhere. It was so strange to see
them wandering about freely in their bright-colored garments and to
remember the streets of the great city they had come from, where hardly
a woman is ever seen. These women never crossed the threshold of their
houses before perhaps, so it was like fairyland to them.

We found one large, gaily decorated erection belonging to one of the
Nawabs of Hyderabad, and the women called us in and plied us with many
questions, and then begged us to go to their house to see them. We went
one day to find these new friends. After driving two or three miles we
came to a quaint walled village, passed under the gateway, and were
directed to the great man's house. We were told he had two hundred women
in his zenana. In front of the house we saw a young man with a drawn
sword, just about to mount his horse. He seemed much amused when we told
him we wanted to go and see the ladies, but he conducted us in to see
the head of the house. He was very polite, and asked us why we had come,
etc. We told him our commission and showed our Gospel, and at last he
said, "Oh, yes! You can go in." So we were conducted to the other side
of the courtyard and came to an enormous iron gate. A little door in the
middle of it was opened for us to squeeze through, and we were in the
zenana.

Outside were plenty of sun and air, a grand, spacious courtyard with
beds of flowers, and arched verandahs with large cushions to sit on and
lean against.