about a thousand
years, have, save in the matter of idolatry, practically adopted the
Chinese customs, even to the binding of the feet of their little girls.
Among the wealthier Mohammedans, as with the wealthier Chinese, polygamy
is common, many having two or three wives, and among the middle class,
when there has been no issue by the first wife, many take unto
themselves a second wife. Divorces are of rare occurrence.

There are no harems. The better-class women are not seen much on the
streets, but in the country places, the farmer's wife, daughters, and
daughters-in-law go out into the fields, weed and reap the corn, carry
water, gather in fuel, and wear no veil. The daughters and
daughters-in-law of the better class, from the age of fifteen to thirty,
often wear a black veil when going on a visit to their friends, as also
do the Chinese.

In the busy farming seasons, the Mohammedan men, with their wives of the
poorer class, hire themselves out to the Chinese farmers, and come down
in large numbers to weed in the spring and gather in the corn in summer
and autumn. They bring their children with them and stay on the farm
till the busy time is over. We always get a goodly number of visits from
them.

Speaking of the Mohammedan male population in our prefecture of Si-ning,
the vast majority are ignorant of the tenets of the Koran, know little
of anything, save that Masheng-ren is their prophet, and that there is a
Supreme Being somewhere of whom they are almost as ignorant as the
Chinese. They seem to realize it a duty to attend worship on two special
occasions each year, but the majority of them never darken the mosque
doors at other times. Seldom a day passes but we have Mohammedan
visitors, and the answer we get from nine out of every ten to questions
about their doctrine is, "We are only blind folks and we do not know
anything." Their ah-hongs or pastors do not trouble to teach any save
the students, for which they are paid. Some even speak of heaven as
being Khuda (God). In many ways are they influenced by the Chinese
around them.

Already I have referred to the binding of the feet of their little
girls. In sickness it is a common thing to see the patient with a tiny
book written in Arabic bound up in red cloth and sewn on the shoulder
or back of the outside garment, to shield them from the evil spirits.
Many also observe the lucky and unlucky days in the Chinese calendar, by
removing from one house to anothe